William Isdale speaks with Lawrence Gostin about the lessons we can learn from the global response to last year's Ebola outbreak and the future of global health.
Governments in West Africa and international aid agencies should help facilitate adoptions locally and provide better health care and education to support entire communities.
Kent Brantly at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta, Georgia, August 21 2014.
Tami Chappell/Reuters
A year ago, Dr Kent Brantly became the first person treated for Ebola in the US. The director of Emory University’s Serious Communicable Disease Unit looks back at we have – and haven’t – learned.
Sierra Leone has made significant progress in the fight against ebola and is grappling with economic recovery.
Reuters/Baz Ratner
Although Sierra Leone is not yet officially ebola-free, there are significant improvements. Economic recovery discussions have also started. Care needs to be taken to ensure broader societal benefit.
A health worker injects a woman with an Ebola vaccine during a trial in Monrovia, February 2 2015.
James Giahyue/Reuters
In the science world, laboratories are essential but safety precautions should be taken to prevent any incidents like the Ebola outbreak or biochemical attacks.
Ben Affleck championed the piece of legislation requiring companies reporting to the US Securities and Exchange Commission to disclose their use of ‘conflict minerals’ originating in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Reuters/Yuri Gripas
Celebrities help make causes known to larger audiences and can be effective in obtaining pledges from policymakers. Yet their simplified advocacy messages can lead to ineffective or harmful policies.
The new fingerprint test can detect Ebola in minutes.
from shutterstock.com
Ebola has been blamed for a surge in untreated malaria cases in west Africa that could have led to an excess numbers of deaths from malaria, greater than the total caused by the Ebola virus.
Minds as well as bodies will need to heal after the prolonged horror, fear and stress of Ebola.
Health workers rest outside a quarantine zone at a Red Cross facility in eastern Sierra Leone in this file picture from December last year.
Baz Ratner/Reuters
African health leaders do not often get the chance to tell the stories of their public health achievements and challenges.
Two women walk in front of a billboard, which says “Ebola must go. Stopping Ebola is Everybody’s Business” in Monrovia, Liberia, January 15 2015.
UNMEER/Emmanuel Tobey
Along with better strategies to respond to outbreaks in human populations, we need a stronger focus on surveillance in animals to identify infectious diseases before they pose a risk to human health.
Part-time lecturer at the Global Health & Social Medicine, Harvard University, and Lecturer at the School of Public Health, College of Health Sciences, University of Liberia
Director of the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Health Protection Research Unit in Emerging and Zoonotic Infections, and Professor of Neurology, University of Liverpool