This revised Emergency Appeal seeks a total of CHF 41.1m (increased from CHF 12.9m) to enable the IFRC to support the Sierra Leone Red Cross Society (SLRCS) to respond to the worsening Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) outbreak for 6,348,350 people. This revised Appeal represents a significant scaling up of SLRCS activities to conduct contact tracing, safe and dignified burials, social mobilisation, communications, and psychosocial support to 11 operational areas in 10 districts. It will extend the clinical case management component through the established Ebola Treatment Centre (ETC) in Kenema; increase physical resources such as vehicles, motorbikes and protective equipment; increase human resources (28 international staff, 97 national staff, and active 2,188 volunteers). Safe and dignified burial teams will be increased from 3 to 29 teams across the country. A beneficiary communications component includes use of mobile phone technology by Red Cross volunteers in data collection and reporting. The planned response reflects the current situation and information available at this point of the rapidly evolving operation, and will be adjusted based on further developments and more detailed assessments.
Details are available in the Emergency Plan of Action (EPoA).
The disaster and the response to date
March - April: Ebola outbreak first detected in Guinea; Sierra Leone established National Ebola Task Force. IFRC 1st DREF allocation of CHF 113,217 for preparedness.
26 May: First ebola case reported in Sierra Leone near the border with Guinea, with rapid caseload spread as a result of the movement of health care workers.
June: IFRC Field Assessment and Coordination team (FACT) deployed (rapid assessment); IFRC 2nd DREF allocation of CHF 114,119 and Emergency Appeal launched for CHF 880,000.
July: IFRC issues revised appeal for CHF 1.36m and deploys Emergency Response Units to establish the Ebola Treatment Centre in Kenema with extraordinary DREF allocation of CHF 1m.
September - October: with confirmed caseload spiralling out of control and twelve out of thirteen districts affected; IFRC issues revised appeal for CHF 12.85m. The IFRC ebola operation has achieved the following: 433 safe and dignified burials; 820 volunteers trained and active in the ebola operation; 17,470 contacts traced and followed up by the Red Cross volunteers; 1,352 houses and public facilities disinfected; 774,348 people reached through door to door social mobilization campaigns; 2,090 people received psychosocial support and re-integrated back to the community after treatment; 126 patients treated at the Red Cross treatment centre in Kenema; over 7 million SMS’s on ebola prevention sent across the country; millions of people have been reached with ebola prevention and awareness through radio dramas and the weekly live one-hour radio call-in show for questions and answers about Ebola; pre-positioning of personal protective equipment and related training on their proper use and disposal; Interagency coordination through the National Task Force.