Abstract
Liberia, Africa’s oldest republic founded by freed Black slaves and the American Colonisation Society, was stunted by a civil war that killed 250,000 people and displaced another 850,000 between 1989 and 2003. In 2005, Liberia made headlines for being the first African country to democratically elect a female president. However, the Ebola virus descended upon Liberia on 30 March, 2014. Almost 2 years after, Liberia was the outbreak’s hardest hit country with 10,666 cases and 4806 deaths. The Global Fund for Women suggests 75% of those who died from Ebola were women, with past studies revealing that a mortality rate among pregnant women could be as high as 93.3%. Of the 184 health workers who died, nurses and nursing aids (mostly females) accounted for the highest proportion (35%) of the 810 Ebola health worker cases reported by mid-August 2014. During the Ebola outbreak, both the World Health Organisation and the government of Liberia declared a “public health emergency,” providing an opportunity to canvass various fields of law responsive to the threat of the disease and strengthen public health security. The World Health Organisation declared Liberia Ebola-free for the fourth time on 14 January, 2016. Despite having a crippled health system, an outdated Public Health Act, extremely low numbers of health workers, and under-funded government institutions of health and social welfare, Liberia stands out as a success story in curbing the Ebola outbreak. This chapter examines the extent to which international, regional, and national law and policy impacted upon and contributed to reproductive and maternal health outcomes of girls and women during the Ebola crisis in Liberia.
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- 1.
Noteworthy is the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s estimate of 250,000 confirmed, probably, and suspected cases of Ebola virus in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone in 2015 obscures the actual 28, 646 cases occurring over the period of 3 years (see the Center for Disease Control in Liberia (July 2015) available at: https://www.cdc.gov/globalhealth/countries/liberia/).
- 2.
Liberia signed and ratified both the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights on the same dates, i.e., 18 April 1967 and 22 September 2004.
- 3.
See, Article 18 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, 1969, which Liberia signed and ratified on 23 May 1969 and 29 August 1985, respectively.
- 4.
Official Records of WHO, no. 2, p. 9, available at: http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/85573/1/Official_record2_eng.pdf.
- 5.
See, Articles 2(g) and 28(i) of the World Health Organisation Constitution, 1946.
- 6.
See, section 16.13, p. 73 of the Consideration of reports submitted by States parties under article 18 of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, 13 October 2008, CEDAW/C/LBR/6 available at http://www.refworld.org/country,,CEDAW,,LBR,,49672b4f2,0.html.
- 7.
The United States of America and Somalia are the only two countries that have not signed the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
- 8.
Article 25(a) of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities provides that States Parties shall: Provide persons with disabilities with the same range, quality and standard of free or affordable health care and programmes as provided to other persons, including in the area of sexual and reproductive health and population-based public health programmes.
- 9.
Morocco was not a member of the African Union in the last 30 years until on 30 January 2017, when African Union readmitted it as a member state despite on-going dispute in Western Sahara. See: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-38795676.
- 10.
Liberia signed, ratified and deposited with the Banjul Charter on 31 January 1983, 04 August 1982, and 29 December 1982 respectively.
- 11.
Liberia signed the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child on 14 May 1992.
- 12.
See, Articles 2(2) and 19 of the Protocol of the Court of Justice of the African Union, 2003 and Article 3 of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Establishment of an African Court of Human and Peoples’ Rights, 1998.
- 13.
See Chapter 1: Merger of the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the Court of Justice of the African Union of the Protocol on the Statute of the African Court of Justice and Human Rights, 2014. As at 1 April 2016, only nine (Liberia is not included) out of the 54 countries have signed the Statute of the African Court. There is zero ratification and deposit on its instrument.
- 14.
Act to Amend Chapter 30 of the Executive Law of 1972. 30.2 Duties of the Minister of Health and Social Welfare. Sub-section (b).
- 15.
Chapter 11(i) and (k) of the Public Health Law, defines isolation and quarantine as it pertains “Control of acute communicable diseases and conditions”. These terms are not used anywhere in Chapter 14: “Formidable Epidemic, Endemic or Infectious Diseases.”
- 16.
Section 2, National Commission on Disabilities Act.
- 17.
See Article 8 of The Public Emergency Regulations, 2014.
- 18.
Commission on Human Rights resolution 2003/28, preamble and para. 6.
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Bruey, V.F. (2019). Maternal and Reproductive Rights: Ebola and the Law in Liberia. In: Schwartz, D., Anoko, J., Abramowitz, S. (eds) Pregnant in the Time of Ebola. Global Maternal and Child Health. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-97637-2_15
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