Sir Peter Karel,Baron Piot,is a Belgian-British microbiologist known for his research into Ebola and AIDS.
Devex is a social enterprise and media platform for the global development community. It aims to connect with and inform development,health,humanitarian,and sustainability professionals through news,business intelligence,funding and career opportunities related to international development. As an independent news organization,Devex employs more than 100 staff members in different locations,including Washington,D.C.,where the organization is headquartered. It also maintains offices in Barcelona and Manila.
Guinea faces a number of ongoing health challenges.
Liberia is one of the poorest countries in the world. Civil wars have killed around 250,000 people and displaced many more. The wars ended in 2003 but destroyed most of the country's healthcare facilities. Recovery precedes proceeds,but the majority of the population still lives below the international poverty line. Life expectancy in Liberia is much lower than the world average. Communicable diseases are widespread,including tuberculosis,diarrhea,malaria,HIV,and Dengue. Female genital mutilation is widely practiced. Nearly a quarter of children under the age of five are malnourished and few people have access to adequate sanitation facilities. In 2009,government expenditure on health care per-capita was US$22,accounting for 10.6% of totaled GDP. In 2008,Liberia had only one doctor and 27 nurses per 100,000 people. It was ill-equipped to handle the outbreak of Ebola in 2014 and 2015.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus is an Ethiopian public health official,researcher,diplomat,and the Director-General of the World Health Organization since 2017. Tedros is the first African to become WHO Director-General,receiving an endorsement for the role by the African Union. He played a role in the response to the Ebola virus epidemic,the COVID-19 pandemic,and the 2022–2023 mpox outbreak.
Luciana Borio is a Brazilian-American infectious disease physician and public health administrator. She is a vice president at In-Q-Tel. She previously served as director for Medical and Biodefense Preparedness at the National Security Council,acting chief scientist of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA),assistant commissioner for counterterrorism policy of the FDA,and director of FDA's Office of Counterterrorism and Emerging Threats. She is known for her work advancing clinical trials,the development of medical countermeasures for health emergencies,and the public health responses to Ebola and Zika outbreaks.
Joanne Liu is a Canadian pediatric emergency medicine physician,Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Montreal,Professor of Clinical Medicine at McGill University,and the previous International President of Médecins sans Frontières. She was elected president during MSF's International General Assembly in June 2013.
The 2013–2016 epidemic of Ebola virus disease,centered in Western Africa,was the most widespread outbreak of the disease in history. It caused major loss of life and socioeconomic disruption in the region,mainly in Guinea,Liberia and Sierra Leone. The first cases were recorded in Guinea in December 2013;later,the disease spread to neighbouring Liberia and Sierra Leone,with minor outbreaks occurring in Nigeria and Mali. Secondary infections of medical workers occurred in the United States and Spain. In addition,isolated cases were recorded in Senegal,the United Kingdom and Italy. The number of cases peaked in October 2014 and then began to decline gradually,following the commitment of substantial international resources.
An epidemic of Ebola virus disease occurred in Liberia from 2014 to 2015,along with the neighbouring countries of Guinea and Sierra Leone. The first cases of virus were reported by late March 2014. The Ebola virus,a biosafety level four pathogen,is an RNA virus discovered in 1976.
Organizations from around the world responded to the West African Ebola virus epidemic. In July 2014,the World Health Organization (WHO) convened an emergency meeting with health ministers from eleven countries and announced collaboration on a strategy to co-ordinate technical support to combat the epidemic. In August,they declared the outbreak an international public health emergency and published a roadmap to guide and coordinate the international response to the outbreak,aiming to stop ongoing Ebola transmission worldwide within 6–9 months. In September,the United Nations Security Council declared the Ebola virus outbreak in the West Africa subregion a "threat to international peace and security" and unanimously adopted a resolution urging UN member states to provide more resources to fight the outbreak;the WHO stated that the cost for combating the epidemic will be a minimum of $1 billion.
Daniel R. Lucey is an American physician,researcher,clinical professor of medicine of infectious diseases at Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth,and a research associate in anthropology at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History,where he has co-organised an exhibition on eight viral outbreaks.
Richard Hatchett is an American oncologist and epidemiologist who has been serving as chief executive officer of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) in Oslo and London since 2017. He was awarded the Secretary of Health and Human Services's Award for Distinguished Service.
Syra Madad is an American pathogen preparedness expert and infectious disease epidemiologist. Madad is the Senior Director of the System-wide Special Pathogens Program at NYC Health + Hospitals where she is part of the executive leadership team which oversees New York City's response to the Coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic in the city's 11 public hospitals. She was featured in the Netflix documentary series Pandemic:How to Prevent an Outbreak and the Discovery Channel documentary The Vaccine:Conquering COVID.
Michael Joseph Ryan is an Irish epidemiologist and former trauma surgeon,specialising in infectious disease and public health. He is executive director of the World Health Organization's Health Emergencies Programme,leading the team responsible for the international containment and treatment of COVID-19. Ryan has held leadership positions and has worked on various outbreak response teams in the field to eradicate the spread of diseases including bacillary dysentery,cholera,Crimean–Congo hemorrhagic fever,Ebola,Marburg virus disease,measles,meningitis,relapsing fever,Rift Valley fever,SARS,and Shigellosis.
Nahid Bhadelia is an American infectious-diseases physician,founding director of Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases Policy and Research (CEID) at Boston University and an associate professor at the Boston University School of Medicine. She served as the Senior Policy Advisor for Global COVID-19 Response on the White House COVID-19 Response Team.
Alexandra Phelan is an associate professor at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. She specializes in international legal and policy issues that are related to emerging and reemerging infectious diseases,including upstream drivers of disease emergence like climate change.
Planning and preparing for pandemics has happened in countries and international organizations. The World Health Organization writes recommendations and guidelines,though there is no sustained mechanism to review countries' preparedness for epidemics and their rapid response abilities. National action depends on national governments. In 2005–2006,before the 2009 swine flu pandemic and during the decade following it,the governments in the United States,France,UK,and others managed strategic health equipment stocks,but they often reduced stocks after the 2009 pandemic in order to reduce costs.
Sylvie Champaloux Briand is a French physician who is Director of the Pandemic and Epidemic Diseases Department at the World Health Organization. Briand led the Global Influenza Programme during the 2009 swine flu pandemic. During the COVID-19 pandemic,Briand launched the WHO Information Network for Epidemics which looked to counter the spread of COVID-19 misinformation.
The Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response was established by the Director-General of the World Health Organization in response to a resolution adopted in the 73rd World Health Assembly at the onset of COVID-19 pandemic. Its mission is to "provide an evidence-based path for the future",and is led by Co-Chairs Ellen Johnson Sirleaf,the former President of Liberia and Helen Clark,the former Prime Minister of New Zealand.
Events in the year 2014 in Liberia.
