Community Health and Disease Prevention

Running head: COMMUNITY HEALTH AND DISEASE PREVENTION
COMMUNITY HEALTH AND DISEASE PREVENTION
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COMMUNITY HEALTH AND DISEASE PREVENTION
Introduction
Ebola is a highly contagious disease spread through direct contact with body fluids from
the infected humans or animals. It is characterised by a viral haemorrhagic fever that starts
between two days and three weeks after contracting the virus. It is one of the most deadly and
virulent pathogens infecting humans. The first Ebola outbreak occurred in 1946 near the Ebola
River Zaire (Kourtis et al., 2015). More than 20 Ebola outbreaks have occurred in the past 40
years and became a case of death of more than 1500 humans (Kourtis et al., 2015). The main
route of transmission of Ebola virus are through direct contact with the body fluid of an infected
individual through breaks in the skin or inoculation in the eyes, nose and mouth (Khalafallah et
al., 2017). Controlling and managing Ebola outbreaks require a combination of both the
coordinated service medical services as well as community engagement including a wide range
of facilities like rapid detection, access to the laboratory services, contact tracing of the infected
individual, and care and treatment for those who are exposed to the disease and a proper disposal
of the dead who was infected with this virus (Laverack & Manoncourt, 2016). The paper focuses
on managing such emergency situations and developing intervention strategies to respond to the
health emergency by involving communities and the healthcare authorities in the intervention
plan.
Discussion
To respond to such a health emergency, an effective intervention plan must be
implemented through prevention, preparedness, response and recovery. The Australian Health
Management plan, the national government health sector must outline the arrangements between

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COMMUNITY HEALTH AND DISEASE PREVENTION
the Australian government and State and Territory government for the management of such
emergency situation. To support a coordinated and an integrated approach, it must also give an
outline of the responsibilities to the stakeholders of other health sector who will be involved in
the process. The orders must be written in the for the decision makers and inform about the
planning of the operation in both the state and territory governments and also the broader
Government of Australia (Health.gov.au, 2019).
Approaches to health emergency preparedness-
Top-Down versus Bottom-up Approach:
A top down approach starts from a large, originated and a basic unit placed in the highest
rank. The decisions are made at a central level and it assumes a predication of the order of events
and also assumes that it is the responsibility of the state to deal with the emergency or crisis that
either fails or succeeds. Whereas, in bottom down is build up from details with the involvement
and it is a system of a collective responsibility and response of both the state and local
communities and facilitates a multi layered governance structures. It includes a range of systems
like public, private, community and the media (Parsons et al., 2016). In top down approach the
decisions made and implemented are mire quicker in the emergency cases. This is particularly
important when an immediate response in needed. It helps in aligning the response gaols with the
strategy goals, however, when applying a top down approach, the communities are left out
sharing their opinions (Parsons et al., 2016). This can lead to an unspecific situations can lead to
misunderstandings resulting into a fail response since community does not know the response
plan in details. Involving the community members first, that is, following a bottom up approach
allows the community members to take part in the decision making process and enables the

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COMMUNITY HEALTH AND DISEASE PREVENTION
decision to be made collaboratively with the government authorities. It improves communication
and empowers the community by motivating them to take part actively in the effective response
process (Laverack & Manoncourt, 2016). However, applying a bottom up approach is time
consuming and required a coordinated effort when compared to that of the top down approach
and it is sometimes not applicable and suitable for sensitive projects.
Intervention strategy for responding to an emergency situation:
When managing Ebola outbreaks in a certain location, the intervention strategy for
emergency response plan should be implemented following a bottom up approach by involving
both the community members as well as medical by establishing a pre agreed arrangement by
developing services in the plan involving a range of health services required to control such
emergency situations (Laverack & Manoncourt, 2016). The approach of the intervention
strategies must involve the following stages:
1. Preparedness-
 By establishing the pre agreed arrangements through the development of plans.
 Researching and finding out the strategies for managing such Ebola outbreaks.
 Ensuring resource availability and instant response and monitoring the emergence of the
disease.
2. Response-
 Preparing to commence the enhanced arrangements
 Recognizing and characterizing the disease