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Democratic Republic of Congo News

How local testing sped up response to new Ebola outbreak

When a young man in his town died of a haemorrhagic fever, Fabien Impanda Boliko had to act fast. The 56-year-old laboratory technician in Mbandaka tested and identified the first case of the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DRC) 11th Ebola outbreak in the western Equateur province.
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How traditional healers became allies in Ebola response

At the entrance to the Centre de médecine tradi-moderne du village, a health centre offering conventional and herbal treatments, in Beni town, a painted mural shows a man and a woman washing their hands. “Plants are life, handwashing saves lives” a caption reads.
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New Ebola outbreak detected in northwest Democratic Republic of the Congo; WHO surge...

The Government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) announced today that a new outbreak of Ebola virus disease is occurring in Wangata health zone, Mbandaka, in Équateur province. The announcement comes as a long, difficult and complex Ebola outbreak in eastern DRC is in its final phase, while the country also battles COVID-19 and the world’s largest measles outbreak.
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Ebola community health workers trained for the future

Beni, 10 March 2020 – In a small commune of mud and wattle homes in Beni, Rose Amboko walks into a family garden, a flash thermometer in hand. In this last remaining Ebola hotspot in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), mistrust and suspicion have been major factors in prolonging the outbreak. But here, Ms Amboko, 25, is welcomed as a friend, as she comes to monitor these close contacts of an Ebola patient, to make sure they’re in good health.

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Reducing Ebola risk through voluntary isolation

In the epicentre of the Ebola outbreak, in the city of Beni in North Kivu, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Democratic of the Republic of the Congo’s Health Ministry adopted a strategy once used during the Ebola outbreak in West Africa to simplify vital work of monitoring contacts of patients.
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Working with communities to end Ebola

“In some places they threw stones at us, but in others community leaders became engaged and fought alongside us for the survival of their people,” says Dr Freddy Banza, an epidemiologist and public health specialist with World Health Organization (WHO).
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Mixing it with the Motards: understanding the needs and concerns of crucial communit...

Alloya, a town serving a gold mining district in North Kivu is a town that understands trade and business. It is also a town with deep mistrust of Ebola responders. All too often, the belief that the Ebola response is about ‘business’ rather than saving lives, has taken hold.

In late June, cases of Ebola began to reappear in Alloya, following reintroduction of the virus by an infected person who avoided surveillance and travelled to the area from the then epicentre, Butembo.

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