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The Western Area Surge in Sierra Leone

With more than half of the cases of the epidemic persistently registered in the Western Area District of Sierra Leone, and cases continuing to rise, in late November 2014, the need for the ‘Western Area Surge’ was established.

The overall goal of the Surge was to interrupt the alarming upward trend with intensive community engagement and improved service provision over the period 15th December, 2014 to 31st December, 2015 in order to break the chain of transmission.

The Surge was designed around the inter-dependence of supply and demand factors within the wider enabling environment. In the lead up to the Surge, it was evident that the supply side was not adequately delivering services. A lack of trust in the health system and the wider response had developed which undermined any further demand creation. Therefore, the first step in the Surge involved drastically increasing the quality and quantity of all services, and communicating this to build confidence and encourage the public to come forward at the earliest possible stage.

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Resource Type(s)

Fact Sheet

Topic(s)

Social Mobilization

Language(s)

English

Country(ies)

Sierra Leone

Source(s)

Health Communication Capacity Collaborative

Ministry of Health and Sanitation The Republic of Sierra Leonne

UNICEF

House to House Campaign: Covering the Country in Sierra Leone

November 4, 2016/in Fact Sheet Health Communication Capacity Collaborative, Ministry of Health and Sanitation The Republic of Sierra Leonne, UNICEF Sierra Leone English Social Mobilization /by Brandon Desiderio

Supported and launched at the highest level, His Excellency the President, Dr. Ernest Bai Koroma, went on National television and radio on the evening of 18 September and declared a “sit at home” for the period from 19 to 21 September 2014 to facilitate the implementation of the nationwide House to House Family Sensitization Campaign. Council chairmen and traditional leaders replicated this symbolic launch with similar events at districts and chiefdoms across the country. The MOHS, in collaboration with UNICEF, WHO, other partners, and line Ministries, conducted the campaign.

The goals were to:

• Achieve community ownership and participation in the EVD response;

• Engage the community in contact tracing and mitigating transmission risk; and,

• Lay a foundation for health sector recovery via interactive confidence building.

The objectives of the campaign were to:

• Reach 100% of households in the country with correct information on EVD;

• Increase community acceptance of EVD affected persons, especially children;

• Promote hand washing with soap at the household level;

• Rebuild public confidence and trust in the health system; and,

• Install neighborhood watch structures at community level.

Download Fact Sheet

Resource Type(s)

Fact Sheet

Topic(s)

Social Mobilization

Language(s)

English

Country(ies)

Sierra Leone

Source(s)

Health Communication Capacity Collaborative

Ministry of Health and Sanitation The Republic of Sierra Leonne

UNICEF

Hot Spot Busters, a Community Focused Intervention in Sierra Leone

November 4, 2016/in Case Study Health Communication Capacity Collaborative, Ministry of Health and Sanitation The Republic of Sierra Leonne, UNICEF Sierra Leone English Social Mobilization /by Brandon Desiderio

The “Hotspot Busters Initiative” was aimed at reducing and eliminating the spread of EVD in hotspot areas as soon as cases appeared. It became a key element of UNICEF’s response to the Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone. UNICEF and the Ministry of Health and Sanitation (MOHS), in partnership with the Health for all Coalition (HFAC), a local community-based organization with a network of social mobilizers in the field, implemented this intervention at the ward level across the country.

How does Hotspot Busting work?

A hotspot was defined by HFAC as ‘any two suspected cases from a community’.

The activities of this initiative aimed to:

• Sensitize Paramount Chiefs and traditional leaders on the need for intensification of the EVD response in the hotspot communities, including dissemination of chiefdom by-laws on EVD;

• Undertake intense door to door community sensitization;

• Provide key messages via SBCC materials;

• Facilitate community referrals; and,

• Report on suspected cases.

These brief case studies reflect the contribution of numerous partners in the social mobilization pillar co-chaired by UNICEF and the Ministry of Health

Download Case Studies

Resource Type(s)

Case Study

Topic(s)

Social Mobilization

Language(s)

English

Country(ies)

Sierra Leone

Source(s)

Health Communication Capacity Collaborative

Ministry of Health and Sanitation The Republic of Sierra Leonne

UNICEF

Hotspot Busters Initiative – Sierra Leone

November 4, 2016/in Fact Sheet Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs Sierra Leone English Social Mobilization /by Brandon Desiderio

An unprecedented Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) epidemic began in the Kailahun District of Sierra Leone in the spring of 2014 and reached its peak in November. The epidemic which has ravaged Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia has been characterized by WHO as “the largest, most complex and most severe we’ve ever seen.” With cases surging, there was a need to identify “hotspots” of outbreak and coordinate efforts to conduct social mobilization activities immediately in order to reduce spread and educate the community members and empower them as partners in fighting the disease.

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Resource Type(s)

Fact Sheet

Topic(s)

Social Mobilization

Language(s)

English

Country(ies)

Sierra Leone

Source(s)

Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs

Using Media and Communication to Respond to Public Health Emergencies: Lessons Learned from Ebola

September 16, 2016/in Paper Sierra Leone English Emergency Response, Media Humanitarian community, Media, NGO Workers /by Brandon Desiderio

This practice briefing sets out what BBC Media Action learned in delivering and supporting health communication in response to the Ebola crisis in West Africa in 2014–15, focusing specifically on their activities in Sierra Leone. The paper aims to contribute to a body of knowledge about how to best harness and deploy media and communication in public health emergencies. It also underscores the need for the global community to plan and invest in communication long before any crises take hold, to ensure that communication plays a central role in reducing the impact of future crisis events.

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Resource Type(s)

Paper

Topic(s)

Emergency Response

Media

Audience(s)

Humanitarian community

Media

NGO Workers

Language(s)

English

Country(ies)

Sierra Leone

Ebola: A Behavior-Driven Crisis Multimedia Story

July 22, 2016/in Multimedia, Website Health Communication Capacity Collaborative Liberia English Crisis Communication, Emergency Response General Public /by Brandon Desiderio

SBCC Helps Fight Crises like Ebola and Zika

This web-based multimedia package released by HC3 focuses on social and behavior change communication (SBCC) in the context of a public health crisis.

Ebola: A Behavior-Driven Crisis is a multimedia retrospective on the role communication played during the Ebola crisis in Liberia. Using animation, maps, video and audio clips as well as narrative text and featuring original communication materials in a gallery-style format, the digital resource demonstrates how SBCC can help combat rumors and misinformation, provide answers from trusted sources, calm fears, bring together stakeholders for a coordinated response and combat stigma.

Resource Type(s)

Multimedia

Website

Topic(s)

Crisis Communication

Emergency Response

Audience(s)

General Public

Language(s)

English

Country(ies)

Liberia

Source(s)

Health Communication Capacity Collaborative

Ebola Barrier Analysis Compendium: Summary of Barrier Analysis Studies on Ebola-related Behaviors

July 22, 2016/in Paper CORE Group, Curamericas Global Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone English Barrier analysis, Behavior General Public /by Brandon Desiderio

View Resource

This paper summarizes gaps in the knowledge on uptake of preventive measures for Ebola Virus Disease (EVD), findings from studies that have been conducted on treatment and management of EVD, Barrier Analysis studies on behaviors related to EVD, and the lessons learned from these studies. This paper is primarily addressed to governments, NGOs, Faith-based organizations (FBOs), Community-based organization (CBOs), social and behavioral change professionals and frontline workers, researchers, and program planners. It is intended for anyone interested in understanding the key behavioral determinants that affect uptake of behaviors that help in the prevention, early treatment and management of EVD, other communicable diseases similar to EVD (e.g., Marburg Virus Disease), and diseases that are transmitted by some of the behaviors studied (e.g., hand washing with soap).

Resource Type(s)

Paper

Topic(s)

Barrier analysis

Behavior

Audience(s)

General Public

Language(s)

English

Country(ies)

Guinea

Liberia

Sierra Leone

Source(s)

CORE Group

Curamericas Global

Quantitative Assessment on Health System Trust and Health Service Utilization in Liberia

June 24, 2016/in Research Health Communication Capacity Collaborative Liberia English Health Systems /by Marla Shaivitz | Health Communication Capacity Collaborative

This study explored the following objectives:

Explore client perceptions of health care providers and client perspectives, including
any Ebola-related stigma that may influence health-seeking behaviors;

Explore facility and community-based health care providers’ perceptions of service
provision including fear, self-confidence, training/supervision, and trust in the health
system.

Quantitative Assessment on Health System Trust and Health Service Utilization in Liberia

Resource Type(s)

Research

Topic(s)

Health Systems

Language(s)

English

Country(ies)

Liberia

Source(s)

Health Communication Capacity Collaborative

Reach Every District (RED) Strategy: A Response for Community Participation and Ownership

June 22, 2016/in Strategies and Plans Government of Liberia Liberia English Emergency Response, Infection Control, Interpersonal Communication /by Brandon Desiderio

Click the image to view the strategy.

The RED strategy was a wakeup call to community leaders and members to accept the reality that we had a problem on hand and the only solution in addressing this deadly disease was to make “Ebola everyone’s business”. Through empowerment, communities took ownership of the EVD response in their various areas to stop the transmission of the virus. Communities transmitted the correct messages in their local dialects and conducted active case search, reported sick or suspected cases, supported quarantined communities with food, water, and other basic needs until the MOH and partners could respond. It also drew the attention of the public that no matter what the situation may be the involvement of everyone in the EVD response paid off.

Resource Type(s)

Strategies and Plans

Topic(s)

Emergency Response

Infection Control

Interpersonal Communication

Language(s)

English

Country(ies)

Liberia

Source(s)

Government of Liberia

Video: Learning, to Prevent the Next Outbreak

February 23, 2016/in Video MEASURE Evaluation Project Guinea English, Français Emergency Response Aid Workers, General Public, Government, Infection Prevention & Control, Leaders, NGO Workers /by Brandon Desiderio

Last month, the USAID-funded MEASURE Evaluation Project released a video, available in both English and French, reflecting on the 2014 Ebola response within Guinea. Details below from their description:

Guinea was ground zero for the 2014 outbreak of Ebola virus, and health experts were concerned that other critical health issues such as routine care for maternal and child health, might suffer because of clinic closures or fears of contracting the virus. MEASURE Evaluation conducted a rapid assessment to understand better the effects of Ebola and published a journal article on the results, authored by Janine Barden O’Fallon, Alimou Barry, Paul Brodish, and Jack Hazerjian. Read it at measureevaluation.org/resources/publications/ja-15-198.

Regardez la vidéo en français ici.

Resource Type(s)

Video

Topic(s)

Emergency Response

Audience(s)

Aid Workers

General Public

Government

Infection Prevention & Control

Leaders

NGO Workers

Language(s)

English

Français

Country(ies)

Guinea

Source(s)

MEASURE Evaluation Project

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