Bo, 13 February 2023 – The World Health Organization Country Office in Sierra Leone has swiftly responded to a call by the Ministry of Health and Sanitation to replenish medical supplies at the Bo Government Regional Hospital following an emergency response by the hospital team to a mass casualty incident that depleted the routine stockpile of medical supplies of the hospital.
Freetown, 25 January 2023 - The COVID-19 Vaccine Delivery Partnership, (CoVDP), have today handed over vehicles including motorbikes and computers worth over USD$2.8 million to support Government of Sierra Leone’s COVID-19 vaccine deployment. CoVDP is a joint venture of the Global Alliance for Vaccine Initiative (Gavi), the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Health Organization (WHO).
Freetown 21 December 2022 – Sierra Leone has achieved the global World Health Organization (WHO) target of fully vaccinating 70% of the population against COVID-19 by the end of 2022. The milestone places Sierra Leone among just three other countries in the African region to have reached the target. The 70% target was set by global health leaders with a strategy that outlined the priority actions needed from the different actors to achieve the targets.
Living with mental illness has been a harrowing ordeal for Safiatu Kondeh. The 34-year-old, who lives in Kabala, northern Sierra Leone, with her mother and two children, has had to endure conditions almost worse than the disease.
Freetown – An age-old social belief that “what goes on under the cloth should remain under the cloth” is killing women in Sierra Leone.
“People are dying in silence,” says Dr Desmond Maada Kangbai, the head of the country’s immunization services. He explains that most women affected by cervical cancer are not willing to talk about their condition or even present themselves for screening and thus possibly get a diagnosis early enough to change the course of the disease and their life.
Over 80 maternal and child health experts from around the world have concluded a meeting in Freetown aimed at improving midwifery education. The body of experts included health authorities of Sierra Leone, Malawi, Bolivia, Pakistan and Congo, WHO and other global health partners. Their deliberations focused on finding workable strategies that will help strengthen the quality of midwifery education and training to improve standards that will help curb preventable death of mothers and newborn babies.
Public health experts in Sierra Leone are meeting to review data of the past three months on trend of priority diseases in the country. Drawn from the technical and administrative levels from the national and districts in the country, as well as partners, the experts will monitor and evaluate the surveillance indicators and performance of three key components including disease surveillance, laboratory capacity and the immunization programmes for the period April to June of 2022.
The World Health Organization Country Office in Sierra Leone and the Ministry of Health and Sanitation have completed a 3-day quarterly meeting in Freetown to jointly review progress of the 2022-2023 Biennial Workplan implementation and initiated discussions for priorities setting for the next biennium 2024-2025.
