{"id":3660,"date":"2023-05-23T17:40:09","date_gmt":"2023-05-23T22:40:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/?p=3660"},"modified":"2023-05-23T17:56:41","modified_gmt":"2023-05-23T22:56:41","slug":"inside-the-troubled-early-days-of-guineas-ebola-response","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/2023\/05\/23\/inside-the-troubled-early-days-of-guineas-ebola-response\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside the Troubled Early Days of Guinea\u2019s Ebola Response"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"panel body-content\"><div class=\"panel__container\">\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wgbh\/frontline\/article\/watch-inside-the-troubled-early-days-of-guineas-ebola-response\/\">PBS<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Why wasn\u2019t the largest Ebola outbreak on record, which has now killed more than 10,000 people, stopped before it was too late?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That\u2019s the question at the heart of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wgbh\/pages\/frontline\/outbreak\/\"><em>Outbreak<\/em><\/a>, a FRONTLINE investigation from journalist and filmmaker\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wgbh\/pages\/frontline\/about-us\/producer-dan-edge\/\">Dan Edge<\/a>\u00a0that premieres tonight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Inside Guinea&#039;s Troubled Early Response to Ebola | FRONTLINE\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/nW5pFYvot9k?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>In vivid, comprehensive detail, the film traces Ebola\u2019s spread across West Africa, uncovering a string of tragic missteps in the response to the epidemic.&nbsp;Among them: What happened in March 2014 when the mysterious disease then&nbsp;spreading through&nbsp;Guinea\u2019s forest region was officially confirmed as Ebola.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At first, the country\u2019s ministry of health was shocked: all previous Ebola outbreaks had occurred more than 1,000 miles away from Guinea. Expertise was desperately needed. The relief group Doctors Without Borders \u2014 known also by its French acronym, MSF \u2014 stepped in immediately, setting up a field hospital in Gueckedou, the outbreak\u2019s epicenter, within 48 hours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Beyond the efforts of MSF, however, it was a different story. The World Health Organization (WHO) left the response in the hands of its officials in Guinea, who had no previous experience with&nbsp;Ebola.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cOur powers are limited when we are operating in countries,\u201d Dr. Francis Kasolo, Director of Disease Prevention &amp; Control for WHO Africa, told FRONTLINE. \u201cThe countries take the lead, we advise honestly, and this is what we tried to do in Guinea.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In just over a week, the outbreak spread 400 miles to Guinea\u2019s capital \u2014 and that\u2019s when Doctors Without Borders\u2019 top Ebola expert, Michael van Herp, spoke out, describing the outbreak as \u201cunprecedented.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It was a move that infuriated Guinea\u2019s Minister of Health, Col.&nbsp;R\u00e9my&nbsp;Lamah, who accused the group of sowing panic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As Lamah told FRONTLINE in the below excerpt from\u00a0<em>Outbreak<\/em>, \u201cI summoned all the staff from MSF to come in my office \u2026 I told them that I didn\u2019t appreciate their unilateral decision to say things different from our official line.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wgbh\/frontline\/article\/watch-inside-the-troubled-early-days-of-guineas-ebola-response\/\">Continue reading<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>PBS Why wasn\u2019t the largest Ebola outbreak on record, which has now killed more than 10,000 people, stopped before it was too late? That\u2019s the question at the heart of\u00a0Outbreak, a FRONTLINE investigation from journalist and filmmaker\u00a0Dan Edge\u00a0that premieres tonight. In vivid, comprehensive detail, the film traces Ebola\u2019s spread across West Africa, uncovering a string [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":false,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9,21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ebola","category-featured"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3660"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3660\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3661,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3660\/revisions\/3661"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}