UNMEER [UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response] @UNMEER #EbolaResponse
UNMEER’s website is aggregating and presenting content from various sources including its own External Situation Reports, press releases, statements and what it titles “developments.” We present a composite below from the week ending 6 December 2014.

UNMEER site: Press Releases & Statement
:: UN employs ‘district-by district’ approach in fight against Ebola (1 December 2014)

:: Remarks by David Nabarro, Special Envoy of the Secretary-General on Ebola, to mark the first 60 days of UNMEER, Freetown, Sierra Leone (1 December 2014)

UNMEER External Situation Reports
UNMEER External Situation Reports are issued daily (excepting Saturday) with content organized under these headings:
– Highlights
– Key Political and Economic Developments
– Human Rights
– Response Efforts and Health
– Logistics
– Outreach and Education
– Resource Mobilisation
– Essential Services
– Upcoming Events
The “Week in Review” will present highly-selected elements of interest from these reports. The full daily report is available as a pdf using the link provided by the report date.

5 December 2014 | UNMEER External Situation Report
Key Political and Economic Developments
2. The government of Guinea-Bissau announced on 4 December that it would reopen the country’s official border crossings with Guinea within 5 days. Guinea-Bissau had closed the border in August 2014 in an effort to prevent cross-border transmission of EVD. Surveillance measures will be strengthened along the border. The recent summit of Heads of State of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) held in Ghana had recommended the reopening of borders with the most affected countries to accelerate response efforts and avoid stigmatization of their populations.
3. The United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) on Thursday said that a member of its military personnel had tested positive for EVD. The patient is receiving treatment at an Ebola Treatment Unit in Monrovia. In line with WHO protocols, the medical team of UNMIL has immediately conducted robust contact tracing to ensure that all those who came into contact with the individual while he was symptomatic have been assessed and quarantined. All areas where the individual is known to have been while symptomatic have been decontaminated.
4. A ceremony scheduled on 4 December for Guinea’s Prime Minister to lay the first stone of a new ETC in Matoto commune in Conakry, was cancelled when groups of local youth ransacked the premises. They were reportedly protesting against the establishment of the ETC, arguing that it would lead to a spike in EVD cases in their community. Government officials, diplomats and representatives of non-governmental organizations were forced to leave the site of the planned ceremony due to the tensions.
Response Efforts and Health
7. 17,256 confirmed, probable, and suspected cases of EVD have been reported in the three most affected countries, where there have been 6,113 reported deaths.
Resource Mobilisation
11. The OCHA Ebola Virus Outbreak Overview of Needs and Requirements, now totaling US$ 1.5 billion, has been funded for $ 993 million, which is around 66 percent of the total ask.
Essential Services
15. The EVD crisis is destroying livelihoods, according to a newly released UNDP socioeconomic study. The study shows disproportionate numbers of economically active people are getting infected. In Sierra Leone, for instance, 65% of the sick were in the 15-49 age group. As caregivers, women are especially vulnerable. They represent up to 74% of the people who get infected in some areas of Guinea. Because women are often responsible for growing and trading food in all three countries, these sectors are also particularly impacted. 97% of respondents in a recent survey reported reduced incomes from farming, petty trading and service delivery. Employment in the informal sector and in education is especially affected in all three countries. The report calls for boosting informal and formal loan schemes and microfinance; investments in the next planting season; promotion of value chains in export-oriented primary commodities; and continuing to build skills among the workforce.
16. As schools remain closed, two million children in Sierra Leone are affected. The Emergency Radio Education Programme (EREP) continues to broadcast daily lessons through 41 radio stations nationwide. Some 47% of 2,489 surveyed households have children listening. The Ministry of Education and UNICEF are working to increase listenership through community outreach. UNICEF is in the process of procuring 50,000 solar powered radios for the most vulnerable households.

4 December 2014 | UNMEER External Situation Report
Key Political and Economic Developments
1. Europe must send more medical staff to West Africa to help rebuild local health systems and tackle the outbreak of EVD, EU Ebola coordinator Christos Stylianides has said, adding that he was in touch with European capitals on additional assistance to counter the disease in Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Mali. At European level the mobilisation is “satisfactory but we must not relax our efforts” he indicated. Sweden has already announced that it will send 42 healthcare workers, while Greece is readying its first team. The EU’s medical evacuation system is “fully operational” with four planes on standby in Luxembourg and the US, and nine countries ready to treat repatriated staff. Mr. Stylianides is due to present an EVD action plan in December. Brussels is counting on more help;
2. MSF expressed concern on Tuesday about what it called a slow and uneven international response that portends further setbacks. MSF president Dr. Joanne Liu acknowledged an outpouring of financial and construction help from abroad in the past few months, but added that most of the work on tracking, isolating and treating patients, burying the dead and raising awareness to minimize contagion had fallen to the three countries at the heart of the outbreak: Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. “It is extremely disappointing that states with biological disaster response capacities have chosen not to utilize them,” Dr. Liu said. “How is it that the international community has left the
Response Efforts and Health
8. The WFP-led Emergency Telecommunications Cluster is equipping rapid response teams in Sierra Leone with tools such as satellite phones and portable internet to ensure efficient and effective communication even in the remotest of areas. These teams of 15-20 people include a burial team, medical professionals and contact tracers amongst others, and are managed by the government of Sierra Leone.
Resource Mobilisation
13. Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone will each receive US$ 500,000 to help curb the impact of EVD on food security and on the livelihoods of people in rural areas. The $ 1.5 million grant from the Africa Solidarity Trust Fund will be used in support of FAO’s recently launched Regional Response Programme to tackle agriculture and food security issues related to the EVD outbreak in West Africa.
Outreach and Education
18. UNDP in Sierra Leone, working with local NGO One Family People, has completed the first stage of a sensitization campaign for people living with disability, having reached out to 10,000 women, men and children. Thanks to the campaign, people who are deaf, blind or physically impaired received messages in braille, sign language and pictures on how to protect themselves and others.

3 December 2014 | UNMEER External Situation Report
Key Political and Economic Developments
2. The World Bank said Tuesday that EVD is costing the three most affected countries more than US$ 2 billion, as the virus causes their economies to slow down or shrink. The bank sharply revised down its 2014 and 2015 economic growth estimates for Sierra Leone and Guinea, but said the outlook for Liberia was improving slightly. For 2015, it now forecasts Sierra Leone’s economy will shrink 2.0%, down from a 7.7% growth forecast in October and 8.9% before the crisis. Guinea will shrink 0.2% versus October’s estimate of 2% growth and a pre-outbreak forecast of 4.3%. In Liberia, where there are signs of progress and increasing economic activity, the bank increased its 2015 GDP growth estimate to 3.0%, up from 1.0% in October, but still less than half the pre-crisis estimate of 6.8%.
3. With more than half of its population already under lockdown, Sierra Leone has now quarantined a sixth district. Tonkolili, in the centre of the country, was added to the growing list of districts which no one is allowed to leave or enter without special dispensation, in an effort to combat the outbreak. The northern districts of Port Loko and Bombali were closed off indefinitely in September, along with the southern district of Moyamba – effectively sealing in more than one million people. With the eastern districts of Kenema and Kailahun also under quarantine, more than half of the population of six million, in six of the nation’s 14 districts, now finds itself unable to move freely. Tonkolili is expected to end its quarantine on December 15, according to health ministry officials.
Response Efforts and Health
5. Community resistance, denial and resorting to traditional healers remain prevalent in Gbarpolu and Grand Cape Mount counties, Liberia. The high mortality rates in the remote communities affected by the EVD flare ups (e.g. 17 deaths vs 2 survivors as last reported by the Glensyasu community), combined with limited outreach in hard to reach places, contribute to maintaining a worrying trend in the two counties.
10. UNICEF has provided EVD prevention (hygiene and sanitation) supplies and infection control training to wardens and staff of 14 prisons housing juvenile offenders across Liberia.
Logistics
12. The WFP-led Emergency Telecommunications Cluster is providing technical support to the International Rescue Committee (IRC) to programme 400 mobile phones to be used for data collection by health workers in Bo, Sierra Leone. Internet equipment provided by standby partners Emergency and Ericsson Response will be sent to the International Humanitarian Partnership camp in Port Loko, to provide 80 organisations with internet access by the end of this week.

2 December 2014 | UNMEER External Situation Report
Key Political and Economic Developments
2. In his press conference, the SRSG also reported on performance against the targets the UN had set for 1 December: 70 per cent of burials being done safely and 70 per cent of new cases isolated in a treatment facility. He indicated that those targets have been exceeded in most cases. In the case of safe burials, those targets are exceeded in all three countries. The other target – 70 per cent of new cases being isolated – is being exceeded in two of the three countries, in Liberia and Guinea. And it is being exceeded in many places in Sierra Leone – but some areas remain in serious crisis, and there, targets are not yet being met. Those areas are the focus of UNMEER’s efforts now. Nonetheless, the 70/70 target in 60 days was set so the crisis could be turned around, and that has been achieved.
3. Despite the positive news, the SRSG also emphasized that there was still a long way to go. Special Envoy David Nabarro said the disease was slowing down in some districts and increasing in others. He cautioned that the distribution changes from week to week, and the situation can worsen unexpectedly. EVD remains a very complex, multidimensional crisis, and additional efforts remain needed. The strategy that has been designed to get it under control has proven to work, SRSG Banbury said – putting people in treatment facilities, ensuring safe burials, contact tracing and social mobilization. But it needs to be present everywhere, and it need to be supported with logistics, with payments to response workers, with the information management needed for these activities.
4. The SRSG stressed that to achieve the goal of zero cases, the response needs to be present everywhere. As numbers get lower, more and more emphasis needs to be on contact tracing, on surveillance, and on rapid response capabilities. UNMEER and its partners are looking at putting in place a district-by-district strategy for 62 districts in the three countries, with interventions in every district that are appropriate to the circumstances there. That will be the focus for the next 60 days. SRSG Banbury expressed his confidence that 60 days from now the three countries will be in a much better condition than they are now, though that will still require a lot of hard work. There remains a lot to be done to get to zero cases, but the global EVD response is on the right track.
Response Efforts and Health
9. The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria has agreed to contribute € 500,000 to bolster UNDP’s support to the Malian Ministry of Health. The funds will be used to strengthen preventive measures in health facilities; train and pay health staff, and purchase protective gear.
Essential Services
19. Beyla prefecture in Guinea has 45 community agents working as contact tracers in EVD affected areas. Out of these 45 personnel, only 13 staff members received their salaries in November. The 32 others have not been paid for more than a month. UNMEER’s FCM has followed up with the prefectoral Ebola response coordinator on this payments issue, and has requested the coordinator to bring this to the attention of the National Ebola Response Cell.
20. In Montserrado, where Monrovia is located, UNDP and the Liberian Ministry of Health have set up a task force to increase communication within communities around denial, stigma, safe burials and hiding of sick people. The group will dispel widely held fears that no one comes back from ETUs, and help locate contacts, secret burials and households hiding sick people.

1 December 2014 | UNMEER External Situation Report
Response Efforts and Health
7. On Thursday 27 November, the UNMEER ECM in Liberia hosted the first NGO partnership meeting, to seek inputs from a broad range of implementing partners. Building county level capacity to decentralize policy discussions and coordination was deemed of high importance. Partners agreed that UNMEER has a central role in this regard. In addition, partners agreed to rationalize ad hoc coordination and create specific task groups to address issues such as CCC strategy and funding imbalances. The NGO partnership meeting will be held on a bi-weekly basis.
Outreach and Education
20. According to UNICEF, women in Samana sub-prefecture (Beyla prefecture), an area where there has been community resistance to EVD response, abandoned plans to march in protest against the presence of EVD responders after a sensitization by women leaders via rural radio. Also in Beyla, an agreement was reached for the establishment of a rapid response team within the prefectural communication commission. This cell plans advocacy activities to overcome community resistance.
21. In Liberia’s Grand Geddeh county, WHO, UNICEF, IRC and other partners conducted community engagement activities in Zwedru together with the county health team. The main aim was to have an interactive and informative session with community members and to share health information on EVD. More than 200 EVD posters were distributed. Teams also brought the emergency hotline telephone numbers to the attention of the communities.
Essential Services
22. UNICEF formed a partnership with Africa Humanitarian Action this week to expand the coverage of essential health services to 14 primary healthcare facilities in Montserrado County, Liberia, serving 158,181 people, including 26,890 children under five and 7,909 pregnant women. The provision of lifesaving medical and nutritional supplies is key in enabling access to lifesaving interventions.
World Bank [to 6 December 2014]

http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/all

:: Transcript of Press Conference with World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim and President of Sierra Leone Ernest Bai Koroma December 3, 2014

:: Remarks by World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim in Press Conference with President of Guinea Alpha Condé December 3, 2014

:: Transcript of Press Conference with World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim and President of Liberia Ellen Johnson Sirleaf December 2, 2014

:: Ebola: New World Bank Group Report Shows Growth Shrinking, Economic Impact Worsening in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone
December 2, 2014
WASHINGTON, December 2, 2014 – The Ebola epidemic continues to cripple the economies of Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, and is projected to result in negative or contracting growth in these countries next year as they work to eradicate the virus, according to an Ebola Economic Impact Update released today by the World Bank Group. The report comes as World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim begins a two-day visit to West Africa to assess the epidemic’s impact and discuss with governments and international agencies what steps need to be taken to reach the goal of zero cases as soon as possible.

This report updates the World Bank Group’s October 8 analysis of the economic effects of the Ebola crisis on the three hardest-hit countries. GDP growth estimates for 2014 have been revised sharply downward since pre-crisis estimates to 2.2 percent for Liberia (versus 5.9 percent pre-crisis and 2.5 percent in October); and 4.0 percent for Sierra Leone (versus 11.3 percent pre-crisis and 8.0 percent in October); and 0.5 percent for Guinea (versus 4.5 percent pre-crisis and 2.4 percent in October). All three countries had been growing rapidly in recent years and into the first half of 2014.

In addition, the World Bank Group is now projecting negative growth for 2015 of -0.2% in Guinea (down from pre-crisis estimates of 4.3 percent and 2.0 percent in October) and -2.0% in Sierra Leone (down from 8.9 percent and 7.7 percent in October). In Liberia, where there are signs of progress in containing the epidemic and some increasing economic activity, the updated 2015 growth estimate is 3.0 percent, an increase from 1.0 percent in October but still less than half the pre-crisis estimate of 6.8 percent. These latest projections imply forgone income across the three countries in 2014–15 totaling more than $2 billion.

“This report reinforces why zero Ebola cases must be our goal. While there are signs of progress, as long as the epidemic continues, the human and economic impact will only grow more devastating,” said Jim Yong Kim, President of the World Bank Group. “As we accelerate the immediate health response, the international community must also do everything we can to help the affected countries back on the road to economic recovery and development.”…