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Ebola and the power of film: How my students and I saved lives by making movies

By: Divine Anderson, as told to Julia Belluz. This article was originally published by Vox. Divine Anderson runs Liberia's first and only film school, the Liberia Film Institute. The 37-year-old started making movies in 1996 and has stuck to the medium because he thinks it's the best way to reach his fellow Liberians, many of whom can't read. When the Ebola outbreak was peaking last fall, he turned his attention to creating public-health awareness films that he spread through a mobile cinema — essentially a motorcycle retrofitted with a cart that carried him, his students, and a TV. We talked [...]

2015-03-10T00:00:00+00:0010th March 2015|

My journey on the tortuous Ebola trail

This article was originally published by the Daily Maverick. By Brooks Mormon It’s not easy to assess the degree to which Ebola has impacted on daily – or nightly – life in Liberia, as a person who was stranded, hands tied, outside the country during the outbreak. One thing is clear, however: waiting for an emergency is an unhelpful strategy of crisis prevention. In early August 2014, I left Monrovia, the capital of Liberia, which was quickly descending into Ebola-induced chaos. I headed to South Africa on business travel for my employer, a youth empowerment NGO. Things had gone south [...]

2015-02-20T00:00:00+00:0020th February 2015|

The Ebola Opportunity

This article was originally published by Global Policy Journal. By Blair Glencorse and Ashoka Mukpo “A few weeks ago there were plenty of cases” says Mohammed, a trader from a bustling market neighborhood of Monrovia, “but now Ebola- it has dropped”. In Liberia, the country hardest hit by the Ebola outbreak, there are now hopeful signs that the virus is being brought under some level of control. The latest World Health Organization situation report indicates that the number of new cases has stabilized. NPR wrote last month that there were just 8 Ebola cases in Liberia’s biggest treatment center. This [...]

2015-01-06T00:00:00+00:006th January 2015|

Liberia’s Daily Talk: All The News That Fits On A Blackboard

This post was originally published by NPR. By Ofeibea Quist-Arcton Editor Alfred Sirleaf set up the blackboard on Monrovia's main thoroughfare. Just off Tubman Boulevard — Monrovia's busy main thoroughfare — stands a plywood hut with a large blackboard at the front, in three panels. On them — written in clear, bold white chalk lettering — is a form of newsreel: mini-articles and editorials, as well as graphics and illustrations. The creator of Daily Talk — this Liberian journal with a difference — is Alfred Sirleaf. He's 41 and has been "writing" the news since 2000, three years before [...]

2014-12-14T00:00:00+00:0014th December 2014|

What Liberia Can Teach The U.S. About Quarantines

By: Jina Moore, BuzzFeed News World Correspondent. This blog post was originally published by BuzzFeed News. They don’t really work. And there are much better, more proven ways to fight Ebola. On a Tuesday evening in late August, Thomas Tweh was part of a team pleading with the Liberian government not to lock down his community. The government was planning to quarantine West Point, an informal neighborhood where Ebola cases were on the rise, and an angry crowd had overrun a newly opened transit center for suspected patients. Tweh and the 20 others negotiating with the government didn’t dispute the need for [...]

2014-10-30T00:00:00+00:0030th October 2014|

The Best Weapon Against Ebola in West Africa Is Winning Public Trust

By: John Tozzi. This article was originally published by Bloomberg Business. The fight against Ebola is taking place on two well-known fronts: on the ground in West Africa, where governments and aid groups are racing to build treatment centers; and inside the lab, where scientists are trying to create vaccines and therapies to halt transmission. A third battleground, harder to track but no less important, focuses on efforts to win trust and change the behavior of the people most at risk of spreading the virus. It’s something many global aid groups were late to. “A huge mistake of the outbreak from [...]

2014-10-30T00:00:00+00:0030th October 2014|

Accountability Lab: Rebuilding Trust During a Healthcare Crisis

This article was originally published by Ebola Deeply. By Kate Thomas Blair Glencorse is the Founder and Executive Director of Accountability Lab, which works to empower citizens and youth groups in Liberia to build the tools for civil society. We spoke with him about how a crisis of trust and information fueled the spread of Ebola in Liberia. ED: Of all three countries affected by Ebola, Liberia has been hit hardest, with the highest caseload. Why do you think that is? Glencorse: One reason Liberia is having such a difficult time with Ebola is to do with the exclusionary nature [...]

2014-10-24T00:00:00+00:0024th October 2014|

Ebola Threatens ‘Africa Rising’ and Strains Relations Across the Continent: A Look at the Southern Africa Example

This article was originally published by the Council on Foreign Relations. By Brooks Marmon A boy stands near posters displaying a government message against Ebola at Duwala market in Monrovia August 17, 2014. (2Tango/Courtesy Reuters) This is a guest post by Brooks Marmon, Accountability Architect at the Accountability Lab.  Brooks was previously based in the Lab’s Liberia office and recently completely an extended assignment in Zimbabwe and South Africa.   West Africa may be at the center of the ongoing Ebola crisis, but the fear of the virus is pan-African. Much of the world sees Ebola as an [...]

2014-10-15T00:00:00+00:0015th October 2014|

Op-Ed: Ebola, the unbearable strain on Liberia’s fledgling democracy

This article was originally published by the Daily Maverick. By Brooks Marmon In recent months, the West African Republic of Liberia has received attention on a scale it has not experienced since its devastating civil war ended in 2003. The Ebola outbreak has not caused nearly as many fatalities as the 14-year war, but the crisis in Liberia and its two neighbours, Guinea and Sierra Leone, has captivated the world. What’s the way forward? By BROOKS MARMON. The attention given to Liberia has resulted in extensive discourse on the social impact of the disease in the Ebola affected countries: the [...]

2014-10-14T00:00:00+00:0014th October 2014|

Liberian Singers Use The Power Of Music To Raise Ebola Awareness

This post was originally published by NPR. By Jason Beaubien Elliott Adekoya, 31, aka The Milkman, is a DJ at Monrovia's Sky FM radio, pictured here his DJ booth. He is also part of a group of 45 Liberian musicians called the Save Liberia Project. They want to get the word out that Ebola is real, but it is not a death sentence. He says that message, which was propagated early on by the Ministry of Health, actually contributed to the problem. John W. Poole/NPR In West Africa, one of the simplest ways to slow the Ebola outbreak is to [...]

2014-10-12T00:00:00+00:0012th October 2014|
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