In resource limited settings, outbreak responders including
healthcare providers are particularly vulnerable to infections during
infectious disease outbreaks. The high level of casualties amongst
healthcare workers ignited debates about whether as caregivers they have
a duty to attend victims of lethal epidemics, or if they have a right
to stay away from work during such emergencies.
The goal of this
project aims at providing guidelines to healthcare workers during
infectious disease outbreaks in order to help them deal with potential
ethical dilemmas. These guidelines will be designed so that as many
patients as possible are given the care they require, whilst securing
the safety of healthcare workers and safeguarding the functionality of
the healthcare system beyond the contagion.
This work is
performed in collaborations with healthcare workers from the Democratic
Republic of the Congo which have experienced Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic
fever and/or Ebola virus outbreaks. Specifically, we aim to conduct oral
interviews with local healthcare providers to fill up a questionnaire
that will be used to better understand the perspectives, opportunities,
and constraints that they experienced. Their answers will be invaluable
to draft recommendations regarding policies to address the ethical
dilemmas they may face while minimizing casualties in outbreak
responders.