Uganda Archives - Page 2 of 2 - Social Science in Humanitarian Action Platform

Evaluation of Ebola Response – Uganda

In recent months Uganda has experienced three separate Viral Hemorrhagic Fever (VHF) outbreaks. Two Ebola outbreaks in the districts of Kibaale and Luwero and one Marburg event in Kabaale. URCS responded in all three cases with assistance from the IFRC Disaster Relief Emergency Fund (DREF) and aimed to support clinical interventions from the Ministry of Health (MoH) and Medicins Sans Frontiers (MSF). In order to fully explore the value added of Psychosocial Support (PSS) and community based volunteers in this type of epidemic response, the unique opportunity of these outbreaks was utilized to document and learn from.
Three independent evaluators representing Disaster Management, Health and Psychosocial support were sent to the affected areas in February of 2013 to gather lessons learned of the response. The main aim of this assessment was to evaluate the PSS response of URCS to these VHF,

Seven Things We Can Learn from the Ebola Epidemic in Uganda in 2000 – 2001

Briefings

Diseases such as Ebola highlight the importance of a holistic focus on health systems, as opposed to assuming that health is the preserve and concern of health professionals alone. This was the lesson Uganda learnt very quickly in managing the Ebola outbreak in 2001.
Until the current epidemic in West Africa, Uganda held the unfortunate record for the greatest number of infections, with 425 recorded cases of Ebola, of which 224 people sadly died.