Attachments
Highlights
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On 8 October, two confirmed case of Ebola has been identified in Komanda Health Zone, Ituri.
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Insecurity in Beni city remains challenging, however, UNICEF operations in the affected areas have resumed.
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The Joint Response plan is still under reviewed by a team comprised of representative from the Ministry of Health, WHO, UNICEF and World Bank.
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A new communication strategy has been validated in Beni Health Zone, which seeks to shift focus towards reinforcing the ownership of community leaders and frontline workers to the response by encouraging them to report and conduct surveillance tasks at the community level.
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The nutrition care and treatment algorithm for Ebola cases in the Ebola Treatment Centers developed with UNICEF’s technical support was validated at national level.
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The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has deployed a Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to boost current efforts by the United States and the Government of the DRC to contain the outbreak of Ebola in Eastern DRC.
Situation in Number
181 total reported cases (MoH, 7 October 2018)
146 confirmed cases (MoH, 7 October 2018)
115 deaths recorded (MoH, 7 October 2018)
2,215 contacts under surveillance (MoH, 7 October 2018)
UNICEF Ebola Response Appeal US$ 7.624M
Humanitarian leadership and coordination
The Crisis Management Team continued to meet daily under the leadership of the Ministry of Health with all concerned partners and with the chairs of the different working groups providing thematic updates. UNICEF continues to participate actively in the coordination meetings at the national level and in Beni (operational headquarters) and co-leads the commissions on communication, WASH and psychosocial care; and active in the working groups on logistics and vaccination. A UNICEF security specialist is also deployed in the field to support security assessment and safety of the operations.
Beni health zone is the most worrying area for the response due to the high number of reported confirmed and probable cases. At the moment, UNICEF activities in risk communication and prevention, WASH, and psychosocial care are focused around five coordination hubs based in Beni, Butembo, Tchomia, and Mabalako Health Zone. And one sub-coordination hub is operational in Bunia city.
The coordination of UNICEF’s response is dynamic due to the identification of confirmed cases in Makeke, Mandima Health zone, Oicha Health Zone, Butembo, Masereka, and Tchomia Health Zone. UNICEF coordinates Makeke’s Ebola response from the coordination team based in Mangina Health Area and the coordination response for Oicha Health Zone. A coordination hub is put in place in Butembo Health Zone, which will also support the response in Masereka Health Zone.
Due to the security access in Oicha and Masereka Health Zone, UNICEF works through local partners to implement its activities.
The identification of a confirmed case in Tchomia Health Zone, Ituri, is important in the evolution of the Ebola epidemic as the confirmed Ebola case is located near Lake Albert, which is in close proximity to Uganda. This increases the risk of disease spill over to Uganda due to high movements of population across the lake and in the vicinity. Furthermore, the identification of a new case near Lake Albert places Bunia city at risk, which is located about 30km from Tchomia Health Zone. Due to security reasons, UNICEF’s response will be coordinated from Bunia, of which a coordination hub is currently being established.
Furthermore, two new confirmed Ebola cases has been identified in Komanda Health Zone, Ituri province. UNICEF has scaled up its reponse by deploying C4D, WASH, and psychosocial teams to the newly affected areas.