Beating Back Ebola

• Author: Mehmet Cangul, Carlo Sdralevich, and Inderjit Sian

Beating Back Ebola Finance & Development, June 2017, Vol. 54, No. 2

Mehmet Cangul, Carlo Sdralevich, and Inderjit Sian

Nimble action on the economic front was key to overcoming the health crisis

In March 2014, the largest Ebola virus disease outbreak in history presented West Africa and the international community with an unprecedented public health crisis. From late 2013 to early 2016, the disease claimed more than 11,000 lives and infected over 28,000 people (see Chart 1).

Ebola also caused an economic crisis, triggered by massive health and social spending and compounded by the almost simultaneous collapse in commodity prices. Already under strain before the epidemic hit, the health and social systems of the governments of Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone—the countries most affected by the epidemic—were overwhelmed.

Unprecedented epidemic The world woke up slowly to the reality of the Ebola epidemic. While the first known patient was infected in December 2013 in Guinea, it was not until three months later that the World Health Organization (WHO) officially declared an Ebola outbreak in the region. By then, the virus had already spread to neighboring Liberia and Sierra Leone as a result of porous borders and high population mobility in the region.

Ebola is a lethal infectious disease. The number of deaths started rising sharply, reaching more than 10,000 by the end of March 2015 (see Chart 2). The fatality rate was about 40 percent on average but was close to 70 percent in the initial phase of the epidemic.

With casualties rising, domestic authorities in the Ebola-stricken countries struggled to contain the virus’s spread. Constrained financial capacity to deliver emergency health care, confusion surrounding the transmission of the virus, and burial practices that spread the disease posed significant challenges for a region that had little experience dealing with public health disasters on such a scale.

In addition to the initial delays in diagnosing the epidemic, international health agencies were also grappling with ways to contain the disease, resulting in slower mobilization of international support than was warranted. The lack of a cure or vaccine further complicated containment. And concerns about a pan-African epidemic or even a global pandemic grew only after cases emerged in Nigeria, Senegal, and Mali and as far away as Europe and the United States.

Collapse in economic activity As the epidemic spread, tourism collapsed...