The Foreign Service Journal, March 2015

18 MARCH 2015 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL ANSWERS TO CURRENCY QUIZ 1. Turkmenistan 2. Albania 3. Armenia 4. Burma 5. Eritrea 6. Tonga 7. Bangladesh 8. U.A.E. 9. Indonesia 10. Madagascar 11. Guatemala 12. The Gambia National Institutes of Health is having difficulty conducting a clinical trial of an experimental Ebola vaccine in Liberia. Reuters reports that NIH may move some testing to Sierra Leone. The Washington Post paints a picture of “near-empty” treatment centers, built by what the Post called an “aggressive American military and civilian response” that occurred “too late” to help the bulk of Liberians who were infected. Major General Gary Volesky, the top U.S. military officer in Liberia, told the Post that no one was “declaring victory” in light of the dropping infection rate, how- ever. And the treatment centers are now in place to be used if the virus resurges. In fact, the Ebloa epidemic is now in a critical and difficult new phase that global health officials call “getting to zero.”This involves tracking the thousands of virus transmission chains, tracing all those who might have been exposed and monitoring them for several weeks to make sure they don’t get sick. To do that, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control is increasing its involvement in the region. It now has 214 staffers in West Africa—more than at any other time during the outbreak. The agency plans to open new offices in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone in the spring. As Dr. Margaret Chan, director general of the World Health Organization, said in a speech to the Executive Board on Ebola at WHO, “The volatile microbial world will always deliver surprises. Never again should the world be caught by surprise, unprepared.” n —Debra Blome, Associate Editor Take AFSA With You! Change your address online, visit us at www.afsa.org/address Or Send changes to: AFSAMembership Department 2101 E Street NW Washington, DC 20037 Moving? Jeff Lau