By Steven Bockarie Mansaray in Kabala
A district taskforce on Ebola in collaboration with a committee being headed by Dr Fasseneh Samura has extended the ban on movement of people in and out of Koinadugu district for another two weeks.
The initial restriction of one week expired on Sunday 10 August, 2014.
The committee chairman said the decision was to continue to control the movement of people into the district as the disease was being spread through contact with infected persons.
Checkpoints have been mounted by the police, military, health staff and youths, the biggest of which was erected at Kamasorie, a few miles away from Fadugu, the major entry point.
Meanwhile, the taskforce has produced a form for people leaving and entering the district to fill out and be approved by the taskforce chairman or the district medical officer (DMO) to be used as a pass. Particularly, people entering the district are subjected to a thorough screening process to determine their status before they are allowed to pass.
The DMO, Dr. Francis Moses, Tuesday told an Ebola taskforce meeting that all 16 blood samples sent to the Kenema lab for testing proved negative.“I am happy to say at the moment the district has no confirmed case of Ebola,” he said.
The district health management team and the taskforce have already identified a holding centre at Kasumpay along the Makeni-Kabala highway. They have put together a proposal to raise funds for the construction of the said isolation unit.
Dr Moses also told the meeting that the management team was facing serious challenges in terms of logistics and funding to help them intensify their surveillance and other Ebola related activities in the district.
“The district health management team is yet to receive funding from the government. They are waiting for central government to help enable them carry out their activities in the district,” he said, and called on all nongovernmental and community-based organisations to help in their own way to raise awareness on Ebola in the district.
Six of the 11 chiefdoms in the district share boundaries with the Guinea. The Paramount Chiefs in those areas have committed themselves to policing all entry points in their different chiefdoms.
Since people in the district were well known for their use of traditional medicines and secret societies, the taskforce and chiefs have suspended all traditional healing methods in the district.
The district officer, Thomas Lansana, recently ordered the closure of all mining activities in the Diang Chiefdom while the committee planned to engage chiefdom police to embark on a neighbourhood watch.
The actions were beginning to affect local economic activities, especially vegetable traders whose produce had already gone bad in the last two weeks.
Prices of goods however remained steady after traders promised that they would not increase them during such challenging times. They however pleaded with the district health management team and the taskforce to allow them to bring their goods in to avoid food scarcity.
(C) Politico 14/08/14
