Countries, especially those bordering West African countries have been urged to intensify Ebola preparedness and put into place measures to curb the epidemic which remains a major threat in the world.
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| Group photo of the workshop participants |
Speaking during the building capacity in communication and community work on Ebola Intensified preparedness Programme (IPP) Workshop training held in Kenya recently, Connecting Organizations for Regional Disease Surveillance (CORDS), to better manage the Ebola outbreak, the Director for Strategy and operations Dr. Petra Dickmann said the world is not yet free from Ebola hence the need for every country, mostly African Countries to develop tools to tackle the disease.
Dr. Dickmann said though the cases in West Africa are slowing down, the world is not off the hook yet, since one case can cause an epidemic. She also revealed that, there are about twenty other viral haemorrhagic fevers which spread like Ebola and are likely to be contracted by human beings hence, the call to remain on high alert.
Dr. Dickmann said the reason for IPP Program in Congo, Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya and other networking countries affected and not yet affected, is because CORDS realized a huge gap during the Ebola outbreak in West Africa and needed to come up with local solutions in curbing the menace.
She said that the ongoing trainer of trainees (ToT) program is to enable countries share their experiences and to promote working with communities to amplify the methods used from previous Ebola outbreaks to inform current risk management in a more acceptable ways initiated at the community level.
The training brought together twenty participants from Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Malawi, Burundi, south Sudan, Zambia and Ghana.
CORDS is a unique, international non-governmental organization, building information exchange among disease surveillance networks in different areas of the world, it is a network of networks, that promote global exchanges of best practices, surveillance tools and strategies, training courses, innovations, successful operating procedures, case studies and other technical data.
By Rose Achiego, Waumini Communications KCCB
