Epidemic preparedness – a wise investment: the Uganda story

With an Ebola outbreak ongoing in the neighbouring Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2019, authorities in Uganda stepped up their health and response systems in readiness of possible important of the deadly virus. This investment in epidemic preparedness paid dividends, protecting Uganda citizens from an outbreak of Ebola.

Transcript

In 2019 the DRC (Democratic Republic of the Congo) Ebola epidemic crossed into Uganda.

If we fail to prepare we are preparing to fail both the coronavirus and ebola outbreaks underscore once again the vital importance for all countries to invest in preparedness not panic.

So far more than one billion us dollars has been spent trying to stop ebola outbreak in DRC. By comparison just 18 million dollars was spent on preparedness in uganda but when ebola did cross the border to uganda they were ready and stopped it.

This must be a lesson for the rest of the world last year the global preparedness monitoring board published its first report which concluded the world remains dangerously unprepared for a global pandemic.

Ffor too long the world has operated on a cycle of panic and neglect we throw money at an outbreak and when it’s over we forget about it and do nothing to prevent the next one this is dangerously short-sighted and frankly difficult to understand the only way we will defeat this outbreak is for all countries to work together in a spirit of solidarity we’re all in this together.