The Mettaboy Report

Few emergencies in modern history have cumulated an endless list of frightening superlatives in such a short period of time. Within a couple of months, the West African Ebola Virus Outbreak (EVO) has been qualified as: public health emergency of international concern, extraordinary event, uncontrollable, fatally inadequate, exponential in growth, unprecedented, catastrophic, worst ever and greatest peace time threat. Since the outbreak ten months ago, it is only now that the international community seems to wake up albeit in panic to the ravaging scale of the epidemic. The response so far, has revealed an epic failure of collective actions at the global level for addressing African health challenges— something akin to a ''Rwandan moment'', when the international community fatally underestimated, misread and dithered to avert genocide. But a lack of farsighted leadership by Africa has not only mishandled the epidemic but also squandered a chance to show the world ...

The Indian Ocean island nation of 22 million people is famous for at least two things: its unique pristine biological diversity and its recurrent political turmoil— the most recent which ended last January with the election of a new President. But there’s another striking feature about Madagascar which barely gets notice even by its professional watchers: the relations between political crises and its business cycles. Economic growth and politics apparently operate at cross purposes. Growth spurts generates political crises in cyclical fashion.  Economic prosperity in Madagascar displays a destructive impulse: elites fight over its spoils in a way that end up sinking the whole country into periodic political turmoil and recessions. The Madagascar Cycle As the country slowly recovers from one of its most damaging political crisis which started in 2009, the newly elected President, Hery  Rajaonarimampianina seems to want do the right things. Sustained economic growth rema...

A surprised press conference held last month  by Emory University Teaching Hospital, stands out as a rare bright moment in the fight against an uncontrollable Ebola virus outbreak in West Africa.  ZMAPP, an untested serum-based therapy in humans was successfully administered to two American health workers who were later declared free from the virus, which has killed more than 1500 peoples. While more trials were still needed to ascertain the effectiveness of the drug, the public announcement raised hopes for a new front in the fight against the ravaging epidemic. Besides treatments for its debilitating fever, bleeding symptoms including palliative care as well as public health measures to contain the disease-- such as quarantining -- no licensed cures so far exist. This most deadly outbreak kills on average six out of ten patients, one more than all previous outbreaks together since 1976, when the virus first emerged. The number could climb to nine out of ten patients, at t...