Identifying delays in healthcare seeking and provision: The Three Delays-in-Healthcare and mortality among infants and children aged 1-59 months.

Delays in illness recognition, healthcare seeking, and in the provision of appropriate clinical care are common in resource-limited settings. Our objective was to determine the frequency of delays in the "Three Delays-in-Healthcare", and factors associated with delays, among deceased infants and children in seven countries with high childhood mortality. We conducted a retrospective, descriptive study using data from verbal autopsies and medical records for infants and children aged 1-59 months who died between December 2016 and February 2022 in six sites in sub-Saharan Africa and one in South Asia (Bangladesh) and were enrolled in Child Health and Mortality Prevention Surveillance (CHAMPS).

Improvement in the Surveillance System for Livestock Diseases and Antimicrobial Use Following Operational Research Studies in Sierra Leone January-March 2023.

In Sierra Leone, two operational research (OR) studies in 2019 and 2021 showed deficiencies in the data being captured by the Integrated Animal Disease Surveillance and Reporting (IADSR) system. This third OR study was conducted in 2023 to assess whether the second OR study's results and recommendations were disseminated with the key stakeholders, the uptake of the recommendations, improvements in data capture in the IADSR system, and to describe the data on livestock disease and antimicrobial use. In 2022, on seven occasions, the authors of the second OR study disseminated the study's findings.

An Update on the Surveillance of Livestock Diseases and Antimicrobial Use in Sierra Leone in 2021-An Operational Research Study.

In Sierra Leone, in 2020, a study by the Livestock and Veterinary Services Division (Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry) on the surveillance system of animal diseases and antimicrobial use found poor reporting. Of the expected weekly districts reports, <1% were received and only three of the 15 districts had submitted reports occasionally between 2016 and 2019. Following this, staff-capacity-building on reporting was undertaken.

Veterinary Healthcare Provision and Quality of Reported Data on Antimicrobial Use in the Treatment of Livestock in Sierra Leone, 2016-2019.

Antimicrobials help in the prevention and treatment of infections and are crucial for animal production, but overuse can result in antimicrobial resistance. Hence, understanding data quality on livestock antimicrobial use is essential. We assessed frequency of reporting, completeness, and concordance of reported data and availability of human resources and infrastructure in 14 districts in Sierra Leone.

Isolation of Angola-like Marburg virus from Egyptian rousette bats from West Africa.

Marburg virus (MARV) causes sporadic outbreaks of severe Marburg virus disease (MVD). Most MVD outbreaks originated in East Africa and field studies in East Africa, South Africa, Zambia, and Gabon identified the Egyptian rousette bat (ERB; Rousettus aegyptiacus) as a natural reservoir. However, the largest recorded MVD outbreak with the highest case-fatality ratio happened in 2005 in Angola, where direct spillover from bats was not  shown.

Author Correction: The discovery of Bombali virus adds further support for bats as hosts of ebolaviruses.

In the version of this Article originally published, the bat species for 12 individuals were incorrectly identified in Supplementary Table 1 and 2. After resequencing the MT-CytB and MT-CO1 segments and reviewing the data, the authors have corrected the errors for these 12 animals. In the amended version of the Supplementary Information, Supplementary Tables 1 and 2 have been replaced to include the corrected host species information.

The discovery of Bombali virus adds further support for bats as hosts of ebolaviruses.

Here we describe the complete genome of a new ebolavirus, Bombali virus (BOMV) detected in free-tailed bats in Sierra Leone (little free-tailed (Chaerephon pumilus) and Angolan free-tailed (Mops condylurus)). The bats were found roosting inside houses, indicating the potential for human transmission. We show that the viral glycoprotein can mediate entry into human cells.