COVID-19 Impact on Liberia
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), from March 17th, 2020 to September 18th, 2020, Liberia has only had 1,333 confirmed cases of COVID and 82 deaths (2020.) According to the CDC, on August 6, 2020, COVID-19 risk were high and resources were limited. COVID-19 was the second pandemic Liberia experienced after their first experience being Ebola back in 2015. A lot of sub-Saharan countries weren’t prepared when the pandemic hit. They lacked adequate personal protective equipment and were short of health care workers (Lyudmila et al., 2020). Liberians fear the health care workers are spreading the virus. After the Ebola outbreak in 2014, Liberia trained health assistants to prevent, detect, and respond to COVID-19 (Lyudmila et al., 2020).
Dealing with Communicable and Non-Communicable Diseases
Riders for Health, a partner of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, transports over 50,000 specimens across Liberia. They also have over 300 stations that are used to quickly diagnose infectious diseases (USAID,2019). Furthermore, malaria causes year-round and affects children under the age of 5 and women. It is the leading cause of morbidity and mortality resulting in 44% among children (USAID, 2019). The President’s Malaria Initiative by President George Bush went into effect in 2008. Most of the support goes towards purchasing bed nets, malaria test kids, and malaria drugs (USAID, 2019).
References
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Liberia - Clinician view. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel/destinations/clinician/none/liberia.
Lyudmila, N., Dahn, B., Raghavan, M. (2020). COVID-19: Africa needs unprecedented attention to strengthen community health systems. The Lancet, 396 (10245), 150-152. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)31532-4
USAID From the American People. (2019, September 12). President's Malaria Initiative-Liberia Activity: Fact Sheet: Liberia. U.S. Agency for International Development. https://www.usaid.gov/liberia/fact-sheets/president%E2%80%99s-malaria-initiative-liberia.
World Health Organization. (2020, September 19). Liberia: WHO Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Dashboard. World Health Organization. https://covid19.who.int/region/afro/country/lr.
