Geneva, 29 December 2015 - Today the World Health Organization (WHO) declares the end of Ebola virus transmission in the Republic of Guinea. Forty-two days have passed since the last person confirmed to have Ebola virus disease tested negative for the second time. Guinea now enters a 90-day period of heightened surveillance to ensure that any new cases are identified quickly before they can spread to other people.

ADDIS ABABA, 28 December 2015 | The WHO Country Office, in collaboration with the Ethiopian Federal Ministry of Health (FMoH), conducted a one-day induction workshop on emergency response for its repurposed staff and consultants.

Clim-Health Africa, an international network of institutions working on climate change and health for Africa, was established in 2013. The network continues to serve as a virtual hub where expertise can be shared to develop the capacity of African communities, institutions, practitioners and negotiators to understand and integrate climate change and health related challenges into policy, socio-economics, planning and programming. The network’s first annual meeting was held in Johannesburg in 2013.

In response to the emergency situation caused by the El Niño weather phenomenon, the World Health Organization (WHO) has deployed a team of experts to work with the WHO Ethiopia Country Office team in coordinating the health response, assessing health impacts and needs, and strengthening disease early warning and outbreak management systems. The WHO Representative for Ethiopia gives overall direction and guidance to the emergency response activities of the newly reorganized emergency response team. 

Ethiopia has launched a large-scale nationwide mass drug administration (MDA) against soil-transmitted helminths (STH) and Schistosomiasis (also known as bilharzia), targeting 17 million school-aged children. The MDA aims to cover children aged 5-14 years, encompassing children enrolled in schools as well as those within the same age range but not enrolled in schools.

On Monday, 14 December 2015, the United Nations (UN) and the Government of Ethiopia signed the fourth United Nations Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF) that will be in effect for five years, 2016-2020. 

A global consultation to draw lessons from the development of Single TB and HIV Concept Notes and defining the way forward for joint TB and HIV programming was held in Addis Ababa on 18-20 November 2015.

Advancement in technology and medicine appear to have reached the highest notch, at the same time the world is at high risk of falling to an era when bacteria reign and people die because of infections.

Abuja 21 December 2015: The Federal Government of Nigeria has signed an agreement with the German Government to spend 10 Million Euros (€10,000,000) to improve and sustain gains made in polio eradication in the country. The ceremony was conducted in Abuja on 21 December, 2015.

KAMPALA, 18 December 2015:- Ugandan hosted the twenty-first session of the Joint Action Forum (JAF) of the African Programme for Onchocerciasis Control (APOC) at Speke Resort Munyonyo, 15th to 16th December 2015, under the theme ‘Forty Years of Onchocerciasis Control in Africa’ in Kampala.