Entries by Paul Wood

9 Jun, 2014

Sierra Leone locks down

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Sierra Leone declares a 4-day lockdown from the 18th to the 21st of September 2014. This is in a bid to tackle the Ebola outbreak in the country. The aim of the move is to allow health care workers to isolate new cases and prevent the disease from spreading further. Health workers will be given vaccines in November, after safety checks have been completed.

26 Aug, 2014

Long term truce agreed

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A long term truce is agreed between Israel and the Palestinian Militants. It has ended seven weeks of fighting and came through as both sides continued to trade fire. The truce, brokered by Egypt begins at 19:00 local time or 16:00 (GMT). Moussa Abu Marzouk the Hamas deputy political leader said the deal represents a victory for the resistance. Indirect talks in which Israel calls for militant groups in Gaza to disarm will begin in Cairo within a months time. Palestinian officials say Egypt’s ceasefire proposal called for an indefinite end to all hostilities, the immediate opening of Gaza’s crossings with Israel and Egypt, and an extension of the territory’s Mediterranean fishing zone.

23 Aug, 2014

Fresh talks urged

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Abbas calls on Hamas and Israel to attend fresh talks in Egypt. The previous brokered truce collapsed on Tuesday. Over 2,090 Palestinians and 67 Israelis have been killed in recent weeks. Israel says that over 525 rockets have been fired into Israel from Gaza since the latest ceasefire ended, with 69 of them being intercepted by its Iron Dome anti-missile defence system. 60 air strikes have been carried out over Gaza on Saturday said the Israeli Defence Force and more than 70 rockets and mortar rounds that were fired from Gaza struck Israel.

22 Aug, 2014

Hiding patients illegal

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Sierra Leone has voted to pass an amendment to its Health Act whereby people caught hiding Ebola patients could face possible jail time of up to two years. The amendment still needs to go for presidential approval. The country has been hit hard by the current outbreak with at least 392 deaths and 910 cases recorded.
Sierra Leone majority leader Ibrahim Bundu:

[Sierra Leone has suffered] abandonment and isolation from those we viewed to be our biggest friends in the region and beyond. These ugly developments are evidenced in the cancellations of flights, closing of borders, reduction of operational hours of banks and further isolation by shutting down businesses at the time of greatest need.

He said lawmakers would soon review the country’s partnerships “so as to form a permanent record of who are true friends are.”

8 Aug, 2014

Nigeria: State of Emergency

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Nigeria declares a State of Emergency after seven cases of Ebola are confirmed in the country after a man arriving from Liberia fell sick. Two of the confirmed cases die while several people who have come into contact with the man are under surveillance.

20 Aug, 2014

Kenya to close borders

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Kenya will be closing its borders on Wednesday August 20 to people travelling from Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia due to the spread of the virus. Kenya is at high risk as it is a major transport hub. Kenya’s health secretary said Kenyans and medical workers flying in from those states would still be allowed in. Kenyan Airways says it will stop flights to Liberia and Sierra Leone when the ban comes in. Kenyan Health Minister James Macharia said it was “in the interest of public health” and warned that Kenyans and health workers who had returned from the three west African states would face “strict checks” and would be quarantined if necessary.

8 Aug, 2014

23 Victims Identified

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The Dutch-led forensic team working on the remains of those aboard Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 says it has identified 23 victims so far: 18 Dutch, two Malaysians, a Canadian, a German and a Briton. The Justice Ministry has said that all affected families have been notified.

7 Aug, 2014

Black box tape ‘unintelligible’

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French investigators say the cockpit voice recorder from the flight is damaged and unintelligible, and that their team is unable to extract information from one of the two black boxes found in the wreckage.

The device seemed to be recording but we don’t yet know why it did not work, except that this was not a result of the crash itself.

Trial drug use sparks controversy

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The World Health Organisation announces it is convening a special meeting next week to explore using experimental drugs in the West African outbreak, after two health workers from the US charity Samaritan’s Purse are treated with a drug called ZMapp. The decision to use an experimental drug to treat two Americans infected with Ebola, while nearly 1 000 Africans have already died from the deadly epidemic, has sparked controversy, but US experts say it is ethically justified.

The experimental drug is still in an extremely early phase of development and had only been tested previously on monkeys. It has never been produced on a large scale. There is no proven treatment or cure for Ebola. Samaritan’s Purse members Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol, however, have shown improvements since taking the drug.

8 May, 2014

Lovechild claim

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Onica Mothoa (66) claims to be Mandela’s lovechild. Mothoa alleges Mandela had the affair while he was married to his first wife, Evelyn Mase. She also claims to have been rejected by the Mandela Family, however Nelson Mandela’s grandson, Mandla Mandela has said that Onica Mothoa has not yet requested help from him.

Maybe she has not been using the proper channels. If she says she was chased away from the family, who from the family chased her away?

Onica is still trying to prove her claim.

South Africa: 1 death

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A 5.5 magnitude earthquake hits in South Africa with its epicenter close to Johannesburg, South Africa. One person is reported to have died. The quake was felt as far a field as Durban, Zimbabwe and Swaziland.