The unprecedented Ebola epidemic in West Africa has taken the lives of more than 4,000 of the 8,400 people infected with the disease. “This is not just a problem for West Africa, it’s not just a problem for Africa. It’s a problem for the world, and the world needs to respond,” said CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden.
Since the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) ramped up its Ebola response in early July, more than 700 CDC staff members have provided logistics, staffing, communication, analytics, management, and other support functions. More than 100 CDC staff have been deployed in Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone assisting with various vital response efforts such as surveillance, contact tracing, database management, and health education.
The CDC Foundation is assisting CDC by providing critical assistance and supplies through donations to the Foundation’s Global Disaster Response Fund, which enables CDC staff to respond quickly to changing circumstances and needs.
To strengthen the response going forward, the CDC Foundation is working with donors to provide much-needed supplies and equipment for use on the ground in West Africa. These items include personal protective equipment, infection control tools, ready-to-eat meals, generators, vehicles and motorcycles, hiring of locally employed staff, exit screening tools and supplies at airports such as thermal scanners to detect fever.
To date, the CDC Foundation and its donors have provided funding and in-kind donations to assist in CDC’s Ebola response in West Africa. For instance, the CDC Foundation and its donors have provided 200 computers equipped with software and printers for use in the field by CDC and in-country staff. In addition, the Foundation has provided personal protective equipment and thermal scanning thermometers for use by airport screeners. And funding has been provided for health worker training, medical supplies and public health communication in the region. Importantly, funding also has been provided and is being deployed to establish sustainable emergency operations centers in the most impacted countries of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
“There is a window of opportunity to tamp this down, but that window is closing. We need action now to scale up the response,” said Dr. Frieden.
The CDC Foundation’s board of directors acknowledged the tremendous needs presented by the Ebola epidemic and committed to absorbing 100 percent of the Foundation’s administrative costs associated with the Global Disaster Response Fund so that every penny donated by others is used to support CDC’s emergency mandate in West Africa.
Your donation to the CDC Foundation helps CDC in its real-time response to the epidemic while enhancing disease surveillance and response in these countries going forward.
