Highlights
As of 5 November 2014, the cumulative number of laboratory confirmed Ebola virus disease (EVD) cases is 4,113. The number of confirmed deaths is 1,090 with 810 survivors.*
Of the EVD confirmed cases, around 22 percent are children (0-17 years), with more than 90 child survivors.
To date, 2,911 children have been identified as being affected by the Ebola crisis (49 percent girls and 51 percent boys) including 944 children who have been orphaned. This is an increase of 192 from the previous reporting period.*
Situation Overview & Humanitarian Needs
2 new hotspot areas emerged within the reporting period - the district of Koinadugu (the last district in Sierra Leone to report EVD cases), and Kambia with a total of 48 and 26 confirmed cumulative cases.
Newly constructed laboratory in the UK sponsored EVD treatment unit in Kerry Town, Western Area, started analyzing EVD samples, bringing the total of operational labs in Sierra Leone to six with a capacity of 250-300 samples per day.
On 2 November 2014, the Africa Governance Initiative warned that in rural Sierra Leone, the virus is spreading nine times quicker now than it did two months ago.
Norway has agreed to provide up to 200 health workers and vital technical equipment for the UK’s Ebola Treatment Centre in Moyamba district.
Humanitarian Leadership and Coordination
On 30 October 2014, the UNICEF Representative joined the Head of the National Ebola Response Center (NERC), the Head of the UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER), and other UN agencies for a mission to Port Loko, one of Sierra Leone’s current hotspot areas, with more than 500 cases confirmed since May 2014. Visits were made to the UN Forward Logistics Base (FLB) and to the newly opened Command and Control Center charged with coordinating burials and response in the district (including burials and pickups).
UNMEER continues to scale up its response with seven reconnaissance missions completed to survey possible aircraft landing zones to allow rotary and fixed wing aircraft to increasingly be used in-country.
New Social Mobilisation indicators for the global dashboard were set and aligned with UNMEER outcomes.