Testing Equipment Improves Liberia’s COVID-19 Response

By ADF On Apr 13, 2021

Dr. Wilhelmina Jallah, Liberia’s health minister, center, thanks U.S. Ambassador to Liberia Michael McCarthy, left, as they stand next to COVID-19 testing supplies donated by the U.S. U.S. EMBASSY IN LIBERIA

ADF STAFF

The U.S. government has donated $220,000 worth of laboratory testing supplies and equipment to Liberia to support the country’s COVID-19 detection efforts.

The supplies will help improve polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing capabilities at Liberia’s National Public Health Reference Laboratory. PCR tests are the most accurate way to detect the virus. The donation included 2,000 specimen collection swabs, extraction reagents for 4,000 PCR tests and other testing supplies.

Dr. Wilhelmina Jallah, Liberian health minister, thanked the U.S. during a handover ceremony.

“We are very happy today because these are the things that were needed,” Jallah said in a report by The Liberian Observer. “We were running short, but thanks to the United States government and all of our partners, the lab is back on track and moving, and results are going to be available and on time. All of us will be happy and not complain that we are missing our friends.”

Speaking before Liberian health officials and local media, U.S. Ambassador Michael McCarthy affirmed the U.S. government’s commitment to Liberia during the pandemic.

“The surest way to counter potential epidemics or pandemics is to stop an outbreak where it starts,” McCarthy said. “To do this, Liberia needs effective disease detection and surveillance to quickly identify infectious diseases when they occur and monitor the development of an outbreak. Detection and surveillance are the keys to effectively prevent, respond and contain infectious diseases.”

In December 2020, the U.S. Embassy delivered a $170,000 GeneXpert System machine to the Armed Forces of Liberia. The machine is a molecular diagnostics system used to test for infectious diseases such as COVID-19 and Ebola.

The previous month, the U.S. donated eight bedside oxygen generators to the Ministry of Health. An oxygen concentrator receives, purifies and distributes air for patients with low blood oxygen levels. The generators went to a new COVID-19 treatment facility in Monrovia, the John F. Kennedy Medical Center, Redemption Hospital in New Kru Town and to health care facilities in Maryland County.

In June 2020, the U.S. donated disposable face masks, full-body disposable personal protective suits, sanitizing gel and disposable medical-grade rubber gloves to the Liberian Joint Security Task Force.

The donated testing supplies arrived a couple of weeks before Liberia launched its vaccination campaign in early April. The country received an initial 96,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine through COVAX, the global plan to distribute vaccines equitably. Jallah was the first Liberian to receive the shot.

The Wall Street Journal lauded Liberia for tailoring its COVID-19 response based on experiences battling the Ebola epidemic in 2014. It was one of the first countries in the world to screen passengers at airports and adopt prevention measures such as rapid testing, contact tracing and quarantining infected patients.