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Pledging conference aims to raise 3.2 bln USD for Ebola recovery as flare-ups continue

Xinhua, July 10, 2015 Adjust font size:

The governments of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone hope to raise 3.2 billion U.S. dollars in support of Ebola recovery ahead of a pledging conference here Friday.

The three West African countries worst affected by the Ebola crisis requested the funds as part of their 24-month recovery strategies. The finance ministers of the three countries presented their respective strategies here Thursday during the first day of the two-day International Ebola Conference, UN officials said here.

The pledging segment of the conference will be hosted here Friday by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Robert Mugabe, president of Zimbabwe and chair of the African Union, as well as the presidents of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone will also participate in the conference.

The move to requests support for recovery efforts -- to help rebuild the region that was economically and socially devastated by the outbreak -- comes as the response phase continues.

A recent cluster of 30 new cases, including three new cases in Liberia which had previously been declared Ebola free, show the need for continued vigilance. The new cases were reported by the World Health Organization for the week ending July 5.

"The Liberian cases are a reminder of the absolute importance of remaining vigilant until the very end of the outbreak and responding quickly to end flare-ups when they occur," David Nabarro, the UN special envoy on Ebola, told journalists here Thursday.

However, Nabarro added that it was not feasible to wait for the outbreak to be completely over to start supporting Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone to rebuild.

"The world can't wait until the outbreak is completely over before supporting the recovery process," Nabarro said.

This was a sentiment shared by Helen Clark, administrator of the United Nations Development Program who spoke during technical consultations here earlier Thursday.

"Recent new cases in Liberia and ongoing new cases in Sierra Leone and Guinea remind us that the battle against Ebola is not yet won," she said. "While 'getting to zero, and staying at zero' will be central to the sustained Ebola response, national governments rightly want to step up the focus on recovery and development."

Nabarro gave some hopeful analysis, saying that despite the recent flare-ups, progress has been made on narrowing down the source of the virus to just six transmission chains.

"We're in a phase of painstaking analysis of each chain of transmission," he said. "There are some new cases but when they do emerge they can usually be traced back to existing transmission chains," he said. Enditem