Ebola is far from over, but funding is slowing to hard-hit Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone. Long before international aid arrived, and long after international aid workers leave, community organisations and local volunteers will be grappling with the disease and its effects. In Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, women have been disproportionately affected by Ebola, and many of those on the frontline in the fight against it are women’s organisations, and individual women.
Fatmata Sesay was one of the first nurses sent to the Ebola ward at the Kenema government hospital, the worst-hit district in Sierra Leone, a country with more than 3,600 deaths since the World Health Organisation officially declared the outbreak a year ago.
Sesay nursed many people back to health, including her 12-year-old daughter and one of her colleagues, but with inadequate equipment and protection she became infected. She now has serious medical side effects, including partial blindness, and depression.
Her property was burned down as a health precaution. She was taken off the payroll by the hospital, after her name was mistakenly put on the list of deceased medical personnel. She has received no compensation, salary or other benefits for several months when the mistake came to light. She stayed active by volunteering at a private clinic that helps Ebola orphans, which has now closed. Isolated, her main source of comfort has been members of an Ebola survivors’ group.
Many survivors of the disease face similar issues and some are receiving help, often by local groups.
A group of funders has pulled together to support on-the-ground initiatives with a call to action launched by more than 30 donors in this open letter. Funders want broader recognition of the effectiveness of in-country organisations and more intensive funding for them. The letter draws attention to the fact that women’s grassroots groups can get resources to under-served women and young people facing cultural and economic constraints. Seventeen of the signatories are already getting funds to local organisations, including women’s community groups.
The impact of Ebola on women has been significant, in their role as caregivers in the home and the community, traders travelling across borders, and nurses in local clinics.
In July 2014, Liberia’s minister for gender and development, Julia Duncan-Cassell, learned from the country’s health teams that 75% of those who were infected or died were women. In August, the UN children’s agency, Unicef, reported that 55% to 60% of those who died from ebola in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone were women.
While large aid organisations and international NGOs have focused on setting up clinics and delivering healthcare workers and much-needed supplies, local organisations, embedded within affected communities, have played a vital complementary role in the fight against Ebola. These local groups reach tens of thousands of individuals in hard-to-reach communities and provide much needed information, supplies and services. As is often the case, funding local groups often means funding women’s organisations. In a crisis, they become frontline responders.
In Guinea, Association pour la Défense des Droits des Enfants et des Femmes en Guinée – a women’s association reaching a large network of women particularly in rural areas – carried out a radio awareness campaign in multiple languages, went door to door to visit families, particularly speaking with female carers and trained religious leaders to communicate Ebola prevention facts and counter misinformation. As a result, families were more likely to seek testing when sick, and to delay burial rites, which can transmit Ebola, until the deceased were tested and cleared.
In Liberia, the Let Girls Lead network of local organisations educated communities about preventing Ebola, packaged and distributed free sanitary kits, and worked to help families remain healthy.
In Sierra Leone and Guinea, women’s rights organisations funded by Urgent Action Fund-Africa carried out sanitisation activities, and developed and disseminated materials to raise awareness on prevention techniques within the home and in women–oriented workspaces such as markets.
Women’s community organisations and women’s rights organisations are critical first responders and need to be funded as such. They’re also there for the long haul and will remain on the frontline long after outside help has moved on. They provide an opportunity for long-term strategic funding with measurable impacts in the shifting landscape of Ebola, and other crises in the future.
- Niamani Mutima is executive director of Africa Grantmakers Affinity Group, Shira Gitomer is programme director of Geneva Global and Sarah Hobson is executive director of the New Field Foundation