Global health Week 2017: Lessons from the Ebola Outbreak

When:	Th 12-01-2017 18:00 - 20:00
Where:	Boeringzaal UMCG

Between 12 and 16 January 2017 the Learning Community Global Health of UMCG organises for students, staff and interested professionals a series of presentations of interest for people who want to know more about developments in global health. This presentation on January 12 is hosted by LC Global Health, UMCG and Global Health Law Groningen. Admission is free. The language is English.

Lessons learned from the Ebola Crisis, Global Health Security Agenda

Two years ago the Ebola crisis in West Africa shocked the world. The disease, which until then only occurred in small remote villages in rural Africa, caused havoc in three countries and disrupted the health system, the social life and even the economy of Sierra Leone, Guinea Conakry and Liberia.

Only when the disease threatened to spread to Europe and Northern America large- scale disease control activities took off and brought the epidemic under control. In response, further measures are being discussed to control the spread of diseases from animals to humans and to get a better grip on surveillance and control of communicable diseases. The Global Health Security Agenda now tries to unite the world in this effort. In order to bring into being a feasible and acceptable programme, we need to draw lessons from the Ebola crisis and from the rebuilding of the health structure in the affected countries. In this we need to consider the human rights and the perspective of the population, holding the key for effective control of communicable diseases.

Speaker 1: Dr Ger Steenbergen, Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Ghana: Lessons from the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, call for global solidarity to deal with new health threats of pandemic infectious diseases.
Speaker 2: Dr Ankie van den Broek, Royal Tropical Institute Amsterdam: Building resilient health systems after the Ebola crisis in Sierra Leone and Guinea Conacry. Speaker 3: Prof Brigit Toebes, Global Health Law Groningen, RUG: human rights perspective in Global Health Security

Panel discussion:
Panel moderator: Dr Jaap Koot, dean LC Global Health, UMCG
Panellists: Dr Ger Steenbergen, Dr Ankie van den Broek, Prof Brigit Toebes, Prof Hans Hogerzeil, prof. Global Health, UMCG

Focus of the discussion:

Is the Global Health Security Agenda a good way to develop resilient health systems for the people and build international collaboration to control infectious diseases?
Can universities contribute to strengthening the process of the Global Health Security Agenda?