A BRADFORD professor at the centre of an international team of medics battling the Ebola outbreak is having to beg and borrow vital protection kit from neighbouring treatment centres as a global equipment shortage hits West Africa.

Professor John Wright is currently in Sierra Leone where the new treatment facility in Mayomba was due to open yesterday, but has been delayed until tomorrow.

"We are making progress at our Ebola hospital though I fear our opening day is receding slowly," said Prof Wright in his latest blog.

"Our wards are fully ready for action. Our pharmacy is stocked. Our staff are all trained but now need to have some final dress rehearsals with the infection control teams synchronising with our clinical teams."

As the team has prepared and practised procedures in readiness for opening, frustrations have risen over procedures and a lack of equipment.

"We are still struggling with how to communicate information from our ward rounds. Such a simple task of taking notes on the ward round but unable to take anything out of the red zone.

"We need information on each patient from our clinical office white board to inform us on the round, and then documentation of any changes from the ward back to the office white board," said Prof Wright.

Walkie-talkies, microphones and using Bluetooth or wi-fi have all been dismissed and paper rapidly becomes damp from repeated hand washing and disintegrates.

READ PROFESSOR JOHN WRIGHT'S DAILY BLOG

"In the end we laminate sheets of paper which we can soak in chlorine before we take out to the clinical office. It feels clunky, and we need to keep working on this," Prof Wright said.

The director of Bradford Institute for Health Research said the team had also suffered problems such as leaking body bags, a lack of kitchen equipment and flooding toilets, risking infection spread.

"Our PPE overalls tear too easily and we will need more robust alternatives, however the Ebola emergency has now exhausted all the Chinese-manufactured supplies and there is now a global shortage. We will have to beg and borrow from other centres," he said on Sunday.

Yesterday he added: "We are still struggling with our PPE - searches continue around the world for suitable biohazard coveralls. We have even turned to the blackmarket to find what we need."

The delayed opening is not a unique issue.

"If we open on Wednesday we will still be one of the first, having begun the race as the penultimate centres to open. All have had similar challenges of norming and storming between multilateral, multinational partners.

"There will be many lessons to emerge from this mammoth task about the mistakes we have made. And then at the next global emergency we will repeat them all over again," said Prof Wright.

Visit www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/contributors for regular updates of Prof Wright's trip.

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