Location:
The Kirby Institute Level 6 Seminar Room Wallace Wurth Building UNSW Australia Sydney NSW 2052
Open to
All
Contact for enquiries
Rata Joseph +61 (0)2 9385 0900 rjoseph@kirby.unsw.edu.au
The Kirby Institute is pleased to present:
Ms Dina Saulo-Research Officer, Public Health Interventions Research Group & Justice Health Research Program- Kirby Institute
"Responding to the Ebola Outbreak in Sierra Leone"
Abstract:
The current Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) outbreak in West Africa began in early 2014 in Guinea and spread into Liberia and Sierra Leone due to family connections and trade routes across these countries. The international health community mobilised to respond to the outbreak which saw an unprecedented escalation of cases from October 2014 – January 2015. To date the number of cases across all countries is 28 256, Sierra Leone has recorded 49% (13,756) of these cases. Transmission of EVD in Sierra Leone has largely been driven by poverty, social and cultural practises and weak health systems.
Dina was deployed in May 2015 with the Western Pacific Region Office (WPRO) Ebola Support Team through the Global Outbreak Alert Response Network (GOARN) to provide support for the surveillance and epidemiology functions in Port Loko District, Sierra Leone.
Dina will provide a brief situation report on EVD in Sierra Leone and share her experiences of activities undertaken during deployment through exploring a number of cases from one cluster. The cluster that will be discussed began at a time when Port Loko District reached 30 days without a positive case. The index case attended a number of secret burials of family members in an adjacent district and was transported while symptomatic into Port Loko District. From this index case, 36 EVD cases would occur, leaving only 12 survivors. Each case study presented will explore routes of transmission, outbreak response and challenges while providing some insight into the community impact of the EVD outbreak.
Bio:
Dina is a research officer in the Public Health Interventions Research Group and the Justice Health Research Program at the Kirby Institute. She completed a Bachelor of Nursing in 2009 and has recently handed in a Master of Applied Epidemiology at the Australian National University. Dina has worked for the last 7 years in a public health capacity with a focus largely on sexually transmissible infections and blood borne viruses within the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community context.