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WHO team urges better training for Bahrain airport staff

Ebola training for Bahrain’s airport staff urged

MANAMA, November 12, 2014

Bahrain’s airport staff should receive better training if a possible future Ebola outbreak is to be averted, according to a visiting World Health Organisation (WHO) team.

The medical experts, who have been in Bahrain since Sunday at the government's request, made the recommendation despite no trace of Ebola having been found in the country or anywhere else in the GCC, said a report in the Gulf Daily News (GDN), our sister publication.

"We observed that Bahrain needs to scale up its drills and training of staff," said WHO Eastern Mediterranean Health System Observatory communication officer Inas Hamam on the sidelines of an event held yesterday in the K Hotel, Juffair to mark the conclusion of the five-member team's three-day visit.

"It has already started these activities and is doing a great job, but this needs to continue with more capacity building for staff.

"They need to be trained continuously and hence the requirement to step up the drills, especially in areas that have a high turnover like the airport.

"In such areas there will always be new staff taking over from the old trained staff, and they need to be kept abreast of the procedures and practices."

The WHO team's other recommendations included greater investment in the Health Ministry's infection control department to ensure anti-Ebola protocols are "properly applied on the ground" and an increase in training and equipment to fight the deadly disease should it ever appear in Bahrain.

According to WHO communicable disease expert Dr Hassan El Bushra, Bahrain already has all procedures "ready and in place" to deal with a possible outbreak.

"However, we make these observations to make the procedure better,' he said.

"The Health Ministry has been very open and transparent in its support of our team, which helped us in assessing the country's readiness."

Health Minister Sadiq Al Shehabi said that Bahrain was the first country in the GCC to have invited a WHO team to investigate its Ebola preparedness.

"This was a decision of the leadership, and we are happy that we have successfully completed the evaluation," he said, adding that an earlier ban imposed on people wanting to travel to or from Nigeria - declared Ebola-free by the WHO three weeks ago - had now been lifted.

The GDN reported on Monday the case of a Nigerian citizen who claimed to have been refused a visa to work in Bahrain, despite being a resident of Qatar and not having set foot in Nigeria for two years.

Assessment

Saudi Arabia is the next GCC country that will be visited by the WHO team - it and Bahrain are among 13 nations that opted to have an assessment of their national preparedness in the event of an Ebola outbreak.

Countries that have completed the assessment include Somalia, Tunisia, Egypt and Iraq - while Sudan, Yemen, Djibouti, Pakistan, Iran, Palestine and Afghanistan are to follow. According to the latest WHO statistics, 4,960 people have been killed in this year's Ebola outbreak with more than 13,000 reported cases - largely confined to the worst-hit nations of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone. - TradeArabia News Service




Tags: Bahrain | airport | Staff | ebola |

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