September 2, 2014
Senegalese authorities on Monday were monitoring everyone who was in contact with a student infected with Ebola who crossed into the country, and who has lost three family members to the disease. From the AP:
An Ebola outbreak in West Africa has killed more than 1,500 people in Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria. The university student is Senegal’s first case of the dreaded disease.
The 21-year-old left Guinea on Aug. 15, just days after his brother died of the disease, according to Guinea’s Health Ministry. It said that the brother apparently caught Ebola in Sierra Leone.
The student traveled by road, crossing into Senegal despite a border closure. He arrived in Dakar, the Senegalese capital, on Aug. 20, according to the World Health Organization, and was staying with relatives on the outskirts of the city. The agency said that on Aug. 23, he went to a medical facility seeking treatment for fever, diarrhea and vomiting — all symptoms of Ebola but also many other diseases.
But he concealed from doctors that he had had contact with infected people. He was treated instead for malaria and continued to stay with his relatives before turning up at a Dakar hospital on Aug. 26.
Senegal’s Health Ministry said Sunday that it has since traced everyone the student came into contact with, and they are being examined twice a day.
President Macky Sall said Monday that everything is being done to prevent any further cases of the disease in Senegal, including public awareness campaigns and television programs aimed at encouraging good hygiene practices, like regularl hand-washing.
The Health Ministry in Guinea, meanwhile, said that since the young man left home, his mother and a sister have died of the disease, and two other brothers are being treated for it.
The arrival of the disease in Senegal, a tourist and transport hub, has raised fears that the disease could spread even farther afield.
But public health experts have said that shutting borders and banning flights are not the answer.
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Spotlight on PSI
Zimbabwe’s YeduLani magazine reports on the release of new condoms by PSI in the country. Here is an excerpt:
Recently Population Service International Zimbabwe (PSI) launched the New Man in Town Protector plus Coloured and Scented condoms to the delight of attendees at the Harare International Conference Centre. PSI Zimbabwe has been Ministry of Health and Child Welfare’s long-standing partner in condom distribution and other sexual reproductive health and programmes. It has been distributing Protector Plus condoms on behalf of the Ministry through the retail sector since 1996.
“Today, I would like to especially congratulate them on the introduction of the coloured and scented condoms. The condoms now come in exciting different colours and with pleasant scents of banana, strawberry and vanilla, so you can choose a different condom to match the occasion,” said the Honourable Minister Doctor Parirenyatwa at the launch.
The new Protector Plus coloured and scented condoms are a high quality, high style, at affordable prices and within arm’s reach of one’s desire. PSI’s aim is to ensure that whenever the consumer thinks of sex, these condoms are available within arms reach wherever they are and at any time.
The new packaging, scented and coloured condoms have helped to refresh the Protector Plus brand and convey perceptions of quality and innovation among consumers. Outlets which were not stocking the product have started doing so in order to have access to the scented condoms.
The Minister did acknowledge the retailers for their special role they are playing in stocking the Protector Plus condoms in their shops at affordable prices. “It is through your efforts that the country has seen an increase in reported condom use as you make the condoms readily available in your retail outlets even up to very late hours. I am informed that retail outlets contribute over 90% of the condoms distributed by PSI.”
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Global Health and Development Beat
At a time when HIV rates have stabilized or declined elsewhere, the epidemic is still advancing in the Arab world, exacerbated by factors such as political unrest, conflict, poverty and lack of awareness due to social taboos.
Japan is urging local authorities to be on the lookout for further outbreaks of dengue fever, after confirming another 19 cases that were contracted at a popular local park in downtown Tokyo.
Nearly 260 health workers in West Africa have been infected by Ebola, and 134 have died. Dr. Robert Garry of Tulane University, who worked with five who died, discusses the devastation in the community with NPR.
USAID is providing an additional $5 million to help combat the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. The announcement brings USAID’s commitment for the Ebola response to nearly $19.6 million since the outbreak was first reported in March 2014.
A blaze at a vast rubbish dump home to six million tons of putrefying trash and toxic effluent has kindled fears that poor planning and lax law enforcement are tipping Thailand towards a waste crisis.
Extreme poverty drives some Kenyans to scavenge through rubbish dumps for materials to sell for recycling. At the main dump in Eldoret, a town in Kenya’s Rift valley with a population of 280,000, people sift through debris, despite the risks of disease and injury, and the threat of violence.
Parts of Latin America are severely parched. The drought is fueling clashes, forcing rationing, decimating crops and affecting travel through the Panama Canal.
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Buzzing in the Blogs
The New York Times blog On the Ground notes the rising level of domestic violence faced by Syrian refugees. An excerpt:
Domestic violence has long been an issue in Syria, traditionally a patriarchal country where men are the breadwinners and women make the home. In 2006, its first countrywide domestic violence survey, sponsored by the United Nations Development Fund for Women, found that between 10 and 25 percent of Syrian women had experienced physical violence.
But as thousands of refugees continue to pour across the Turkish, Jordanian and Lebanese borders, experts working there say that the displacement has triggered a shift in traditional family dynamics, leading to a rapid escalation in domestic violence among the nearly 3 million-strong refugee population.
This includes physical, emotional, and sexual abuse, along with cases of neglect.
“It is definitely on the rise,” says Dr. Wissam Kotait, a psychologist and director of Himaya, a nonprofit center in Beirut that targets abuse cases among both local Lebanese and Syrian refugee families. “Last year, for example, our team worked in several regions of Lebanon and had around 15-20 new cases per month, per region. So far in 2014, we’ve had 25-30 new cases per month per region.”
Hillary Margolis, who is the Syrian women’s researcher for Human Rights Watch, calls domestic violence “a phenomenon that we tend to see over and over in refugee settings.” One factor for Syrians, she says, is a sheer lack of physical space. Refugees often live in overcrowded refugee camps, or with multiple families sharing squalid apartments nearby.
“They are in very close quarters with very little privacy, no space to move around, and because they’re not in their home communities, people often aren’t comfortable going out as much as they used to,” Margolis tells me in an interview. “So they might not have an external support system outside their tent. It sounds silly, but people are on top of each other and when they are frustrated, it’s hard to walk away.”
This displacement – in which men who were gainfully employed at home find themselves without jobs, apartments, cars or normal life – has also led to shifts in traditional family dynamics. Fathers who were once breadwinners find themselves unable to provide for their wives and children, leading to anger and frustration that often turns violent.
“You have men who had impact and status in their community – and suddenly all that disappears,” says Fred Bemak, Professor in the Counseling and Development Program and Director of the Diversity Research and Action Center at George Mason University and a founder of Counselors without Borders, which sends psychiatrists into the field to work with Syrian refugees.
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Capital Events
Tuesday
12:30 PM – Paying for Performance in Health Care: Empirical Evidence from Rwanda’s National Program – CGD
3:00 PM – What Will Drive the Future of Global Health – CSIS
Wednesday
1:00 PM – Translational Research Based on Molecular Craniofacial Developmental Biology and Development of Related Clinical Activities in Dentistry – US-Japan Research Institute
Thursday
12:15 PM – Boserup and Beyond: Mounting Land Pressures & Develpment Strategies in Africa – IFPRI
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By Mark Leon Goldberg and Tom Murphy
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Disclaimer: Opinions presented in this email do not necessarily reflect the views of PSI.
