By Beny Sam
Thursday April 14, 2016

With all the efforts made by our ministry of water resources, the bulk of our compatriots are still thirsting for water. In Africa, many communities go without electricity for ages, but they cannot afford to go without water. If the United Nations perhaps knew March month is the driest month in most West African countries, may be they would have shifted the World Water commemoration from a day in March.  Why I see the date disturbing is that when our Ministry each year mobilizes resources to mark the World Water Day, I see it as a biting irony since that is the time Sierra Leoneans forage all over the place to have a drop of water to utilize for various purposes.

Thursday April 14, 2016

Africa Health Budget Network (AHBN) yesterday launched a new campaign dubbed #ValueOurHealth at Kona Lodge, King Street in Freetown which is a prelude to the Global launch tomorrow.
#ValueOurHealth campaign which theme is ‘open and participatory budgets lead to more and better health spending for women and children’ is calling on all governments in Sub-Saharan Africa to take urgent action to increase access to budget information and to provide more opportunity for public engagement in the budgeting process.

The Ministry of Health and Sanitation in collaboration with the Nurses and Mid Wives Board, has condemned the establishment of illegal nursing and midwifery schools around the country.
According to a release from the board, illegal nursing and midwifery schools pose a threat not only to the image of the noble profession, but also to the innocent unsuspecting public.
The release further states that nursing and midwifery is a profession that deals with people who need properly established institutions with sets of rules and systems governing the profession.

Malian health authorities say they are searching for two women who left Guinea after having had contact with a recent Ebola case.

Dr. Keni Diarra, head doctor at the health center in Kenieba in the Kayes region, said Wednesday the two Guinean women came to Mali Sunday. He said they are suspected to be in Hamdallaye, a village in Kayes.

The World Health Organization says there have been eight cases of Ebola and seven deaths since late February in Guinea, flare-ups that came months after the nation was declared Ebola-free.

In Mali eight people were infected with Ebola and six of them died in 2014 before it was declared free from transmissions in January 2015.

More than 11,300 people, mostly in West Africa, have died from Ebola since December 2013.

By Ade Campbell
Wednesday April 13, 2016

POSTED BY: PUBLISHER AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER KABS KANU APRIL 13, 2016

By Edna Smalle
Wednesday April 13, 2016

A recent statistical update presented boy the Sierra Leone Legal Aid Board  on  their activities covering  1st September 2015 to 11th March 2016, shows that crime rate in the country is prevalent among youths.

Twelve (12) medical doctors from Saving Lives Initiatives in the United States of American  including two Sierra Leoneans, one Orthopedic and General surgeons 

Date:April 12, 2016Source:University of Liverpool

Researchers from the University of Liverpool and the King's Sierra Leone Partnership are to present new findings into post-Ebola syndrome at a major European conference this week.

The Matron at the Connaught Hospital, Isatu Kamara on Tuesday revealed to this medium that the hospital needs more doctors in specialised areas.
She made this statement in an exclusive interview in her office at the Connaught Hospital in Freetown.In responding to the recent development at the hospital, Matron Kamara said

President Ernest Bai Koroma has during a press conference held at State House on Thursday 8th April, 2016 restated his commitment to implementing robust post-Ebola programmes whilst he called for a collaborative effort in the Post-Ebola era of governance.

During the press briefing, the President acknowledged individuals and institutional efforts made by Sierra Leoneans including journalists.

With the Ebola outbreak over in Sierra Leone, Alpha Sesay has returned to school. The Red Cross volunteer is taking part in a joint project with UNDP to help reintegrate burial team members back into their communities.

Photo: Katherine Mueller - 1 April 2016

“Ebola, that was the name they gave us. Alpha Ebola,” says the 23-year-old. “Wherever you go, they will call you Ebola. Those Ebola boys are coming. That boy is part of a burial team. It was not really easy with us.

Recognizing the risk involved, members of the safe and dignified burial teams, all of them volunteers, received an additional financial incentive from the Red Cross. But that incentive, although appealing, came with its own set of challenges. “At first, I was saving some of the money,” explains Alpha. “Paying house rent. Feeding myself. I bought clothes. When my family realized that I had saved, they embraced me again.”

Sorie and Sewa are from the same village, Kebala, in Sierra Leone, they and Yokie are best friends. The three young men came to Freetown together to study as student nurses. When the Ebola epidemic began, they were given the option to work in the “red zone”—the Ebola isolation unit at Connaught Hospital—and agreed, despite the danger. Their family and friends disowned them and they were thrown out of their lodgings but were able to share a small room at the hospital.

Trained to wear the full PPE protection suit, they set to work treating very sick and infectious Ebola patients. They worked the night shift and often lost 5 or 6 patients a night. Sorie describes many patients gripping him tightly until the moment they died.

see more at: https://www.linktv.org/shows/trust-docs/three-best-friends-fought-and-survived-ebola-in-sierra-leone