News & Stories
In Sierra Leone, maternal and child health care services are being transformed through an initiative called Quality Essential Health Services and System Support Project (QEHSSSP).
When 18-year-old Fanta Karoma found out she was pregnant, she was scared. It was her second pregnancy—her first child had been stillborn, after a complicated birth—and it was also bad timing.
In September 2014, as the largest Ebola outbreak in history was devastating West Africa, Alusine Mark Dumbuya was struggling with an additional, very personal concern in a rural region of Sierra Leone.
It was a landmark, a triumph, a watershed moment—without fanfare. On Oct. 6, two doctors stood under the awning of a yellow hospital on the western edge of Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone, and gave instructions to the first patients to be discharged from the first tuberculosis treatment program of its kind in the country.
The teams wound down dirt paths, high-stepped through muddy slums, and climbed stairs cemented into lush hillsides. Never mind the lack of road signs and house numbers—they knew where they were going. They lived nearby.
Government employees supported by Partners In Health will fan out from health centers around the capital to deliver the second and final dose of a cholera vaccine.
Others are bigger. Elsewhere they’re more plentiful. But it’s tough to beat the understated dignity of the new birth waiting homes that Partners In Health opened in eastern Sierra Leone last week.
We need to provide better care for Ebola patients. That is the main point that physician-anthropologist Gene Richardson and co-authors, including Partners In Health Co-founder Dr. Paul Farmer, make in a recent comment in academic journal The Lancet Global Health.
A message from Dr. Paul Farmer and former Ebola patient, Mariatu, in Sierra Leone. Dr. Paul Farmer reflects on all the work supporters like you help make possible.