Africa
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More ECOWAS Member States have announced financial contributions to raise the total of the regional Solidarity Fund to fight Ebola to $7.7 million
NIGERIAN is leading other member countries in Economic Community of West African States, ECOWAS, in the contribution to the Ebola regional solidarity fund. At the just-ended ECOWAS extra-ordinary summit in Accra on Ebola and Burkina Faso, Nigeria, which had earlier contributed $3.5 million to the Fund, pledged additional $1 million and affirmed its willingness to make 500 health volunteers available to help fight the disease in affected ECOWAS countries.
Cote d’Ivoire has already contributed $1 million to the fund and was joined at the summit by Senegal, which announced a contribution of $1 million. Benin pledged the equivalence of $400,000, Sierra Leone $250,000, Niger and Mali $200,000 each, and Burkina Faso $150,000.
Also during the November 6, summit, the West African Economic Monetary Union, UEMOA, presented a cheque for $1.5 million to John Dramani Mahama, chairman of the Authority of ECOWAS heads of state and government and Ghana’s president and host of the summit, to strengthen the Ebola fight in the three most affected ECOWAS member States (Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone).
ECOWAS has already donated $1 million to each of the three Member States within the context of the multi-sectoral coordinated response to defeat the disease.
Nigeria and Senegal have been declared Ebola free by the World Health Organization, WHO, for halting the transmission chain of the outbreak which has claimed some 5,000 lives from the estimated 13,000 reported cases, mainly in the three severely affected countries.
In their Communiqué at the end of the Accra summit, the regional leaders urged Member States to contribute military personnel and logistics to enhance response capacities, support the medical staff on the field and participate in the contribution of additional treatment and isolation centres as well as ensure their security. Member States were also encouraged to provide additional medical and voluntary staff to the affected countries.
Member States were also enjoined to conduct extensive public education communication and awareness on Ebola with a view to preventing the stigmatisation of affected persons and stopping the spread of the disease. To better address sanitary crisis in the future the ECOWAS leaders called for the strengthening of national health systems, including by increasing resource allocation to health at a minimum of 15 percent of national budgets in accordance with the Abuja Declaration.
The ECOWAS Commission was also directed to take all necessary measures to set up a regional centre for disease prevention and control in West Africa and enhance health research in the region. The summit called on airlines to and maritime companies to continue operation in the affected countries and on partner countries to lift visa restrictions imposed on such countries.
The regional leaders equally urged the private sector, civil society, regional and international humanitarian and development organisations to intensify technical, financial and institutional assistance to rid the region of the Ebola scourge.
— Nov. 17, 2014 @ 01:00 GMT
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