(From left) Guinean President Alpha Conde, Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, European Union Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management Christos Stylianides, Sierra Leonean President Ernest Bai Koroma and Congolese President Denis Sassou Nguesso address a press conference at the Egmont palace in Brussels.


DPA/Brussels

African and European leaders yesterday warned against a relaxation of efforts in the fight against Ebola, at a conference in Brussels on eradicating the disease and helping the worst-affected countries to recover.
An outbreak of the haemorrhagic fever has ravaged Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia over the last year, leading to more than 9,500 confirmed and suspected deaths, according to the World Health Organization.
“Our three countries are beginning to triumph over the deadly disease that has threatened the sovereignty of each of our states,” said Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, warning however that more work is needed to bring new infection rates down to zero.
“This is the essential first step to economic recovery,” she added.
“We should not assume the worst is over,” added EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, who opened the conference with a minute’s silence for the victims of Ebola. “We are all too aware now of what a virulent and contagious disease this is.”
“Nobody can afford to drop their guard. The last mile may well be the hardest,” UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said in a statement.
Guinean President Alpha Conde said it was “easier to move from 100 to 10 [new infections] than from 10 to zero.”
The one-day conference, being held under the patronage of the European Union, is being used in part to make sure financial pledges for the fight against Ebola are met.
A reminder of the disease’s pervasiveness came at the weekend, when the vice-president of Sierra Leone was reported to have placed himself in quarantine after one of his bodyguards died of Ebola.
The conference is also about how to help Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia recover from the outbreak, which has decimated their economic growth and overwhelmed their health sectors.
Sirleaf yesterday joined forces with the anti-poverty organization Oxfam to call for donors to support her government’s call for $60mn to fund water and sanitation facilities for schools.
“The lack of clean water, hand washing and sanitation facilities are major stumbling blocks in helping our children develop life-changing habits which will enhance their health for the long term,” Sirleaf said in a statement.
More than 150 delegations were expected at the Brussels talks, with 69 countries and major international organizations represented - amounting to more than 600 delegates, according to a European Commission official.
The work will continue on July 20-21, at an Ebola recovery and reconstruction conference being hosted by the African Union in Equatorial Guinea, the organization’s Social Affairs Commissioner Mustapha Sidiki Kaloko announced at the start of the Brussels talks.
The meeting, in Malabo, is to focus on investment in public health, strengthening health systems and response to disease outbreaks, he said.
Stakeholders will also discuss the establishment of a “voluntary reserve health workforce that can be called on at any time to respond to health and emergency threats,” as well as efforts to set up an African centre of disease control and prevention, Kaloko added.
“We all have to learn lessons (from the Ebola outbreak), especially the fact that we were too late,” said Germany’s Ebola envoy Walter Lindner. “The most important thing is to react faster to a future crisis,” he added.