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Written question asked by Jim Cunningham (Labour) on Wednesday, 22 May 2019, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 5 June 2019 (named day). It was answered by Harriett Baldwin (Conservative) on Wednesday, 5 June 2019 on behalf of the Department for International Development.

Democratic Republic of Congo: Ebola

Question

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what steps his Department is taking to protect from violence the health workers providing vaccines and aid to people affected by Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Answer

The ongoing Ebola outbreak in the DRC is one of DFID’s key emergency priorities. Although a challenging security context is significantly hampering response activities, an experimental vaccine has been deployed throughout the response to good effect, and has likely saved thousands of lives.

The UK Government is committed to promoting respect for International Humanitarian Law. We strongly condemn repeated attacks and threats of violence directed towards health facilities and health workers who are working towards ending this outbreak. Health workers are not a target. The response must balance protecting health workers with not using security in a way that further escalates mistrust or violence. This is something that the UK has been advocating since the beginning of the outbreak. We are pleased to see theincreasing involvement of the United Nations Department of Safety and Security, as well as a number of civil society organisations who have important experience of working in fragile and conflict affected humanitarian contexts.

Secondary information

Type
Written question
Reference
257418
Session
2017-19
Subjects
Health professions Protection Violence Democratic Republic of the Congo Ebola
Link
View this Written question on www.parliament.uk