Ebola

ADF STAFF When eight pirates attacked the fishing vessels Aliman and Shenghai-2 off Sierra Leone’s coast, perhaps they thought they would kidnap crew members and extort ransoms for a hefty payday. Maybe they thought one or both of the…

ADF STAFF Maliko Sempewo’s wife and son are among more than 140 people who have died from Ebola since the virus appeared in Uganda in September. “They said that we must be under surveillance for at least 21 days,” Sempewo told Deutsche…

ADF STAFF Ugandan public health officials are hoping that communication as well as aggressive action will help control the spread of Ebola. Authorities locked down the Mubende and Kassanda districts along the busy highway connecting…

ADF STAFF With Ebola cases continuing to rise in Uganda, health officials are looking to the lessons learned from the 2014-16 West Africa outbreak to guide their strategy. Mosoka Fallah, program manager for saving lives and…

ADF STAFF Dr. John Nkengasong, outgoing director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), discussed lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic during his time leading the agency. Nkengasong, the first…

ADF STAFF From the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, scientists stated that one way to defeat the virus would be to achieve herd immunity. Now many are questioning whether COVID herd immunity is even possible. The concept of herd…

ADF STAFF In the fight against COVID-19, public health leaders say increasing Africa’s capacity for genomic surveillance is a key part of understanding the enemy and defeating it. If hospitals and health workers are the front line of…

ADF STAFF Africa’s public health leaders believe tools such as testing and viral gene sequencing will help track the spread of COVID-19 and blunt the impact of future waves. The World Health Organization’s (WHO) Africa regional office…

ADF STAFF Patrick Gono has eye-popping talent with a paintbrush, and he is using the skill for an important cause. In October, Gono, a self-taught Liberian artist, completed four vivid murals in West Point township in Monrovia as a…

ADF STAFF Six of every seven COVID-19 cases in Africa go undetected, according to a report by the Africa regional office of the World Health Organization (WHO). The low detection rate — 14.2% — has complicated the continent’s ability…