The 2014-2016 West Africa Ebola Crisis: 2020 Hindsight - Pr S. Cordner

On 8 August 2014, the WHO declared the West African ebola outbreak “a public health emergency of international concern”, the first such declaration so made. An emergency UN Security Council meeting was held on 18 September – again the first such meeting devoted to a health issue, the Ebola epidemic.

Resolution 2177 (2014) unanimously declared the epidemic a threat to international peace and security. The following day all 193 members of the UN General Assembly passed a resolution on measures to contain and combat the epidemic, jointly sponsored by 134 members – the greatest number to ever co-sponsor a motion in the history of the United Nations. By the time the crisis had ended (officially in March 2016), over 11,000 of more than 28,000 infected had died.

Unprotected handling of the dead, including by the population carrying out their local funerary practices, was one of the main modes of transmission of Ebola Virus Disease. The other was direct contact with the biological fluids of infected individuals. The latter meant that health care workers on the front line were very much in harm’s way. Over 500 health care workers died during the crisis, including 14 from Médecins Sans Frontières. This sacrifice has been insufficiently recognised.

The Covid-19 pandemic has produced a population much more aware of infectious disease, epidemics and their consequences. Based on his experience in Monrovia during the Ebola crsis, Professor Cordner will discuss the 2014/16 West African ebola crisis from the vantage point of our experience so far with SARS-CoV-2, the novel coronavirus causing the illness Covid-19.

PROFESSOR STEPHEN CORDNER graduated in medicine from The University of Melbourne in 1977. In 1981 he took up an appointment as Lecturer, and later Senior Lecturer, in Forensic Medicine at Guy's Hospital in London. He stayed there until 1987 working as a Home Office Pathologist. During this period he obtained his forensic pathology qualifications from the Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia and the Royal College of Pathologists of Great Britain. Stephen was appointed Foundation Professor of Forensic Medicine at Monash University and Foundation Director of the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine in 1987. He retired as Director in 2014 continuing on as Head of VIFM’s International Programme. He has worked in operational roles as a Consultant in Forensic Pathology to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). As a result he has had opportunities to explore issues at the intersection of forensic medicine and humanitarian action more generally. Over the years he has undertaken a number of missions overseas for the ICRC, WHO and UNODC. In 2019 he was made a Fellow of the Australian Institute of International Affairs in recognition of his contribution to mass casualty management, disaster victim identification and international forensic medical capacity development.