When COVID-19 reached Sierra Leone, the government responded by implementing strict containment measures. While the effectiveness of such actions has been debated, the socioeconomic and political implications were undeniable. This qualitative study reveals that people suffered tremendously from economic insecurity, strains on social relationships, and civil rights violations, prompting many to perceive the COVID-19 pandemic as worse than the 2014–15 Ebola epidemic. These hardships have driven distrust of the government, which threatens continuing mitigation efforts. Using a feminist global health security frame, which recenters the protection of vulnerable individuals in relation to the state, we call for more contextually-relevant, civil society-informed pandemic responses.

The response to the novel coronavirus outbreak in China suggests that many of the lessons from the 2003 SARS epidemic have been implemented and the response improved as a consequence. Nevertheless some questions remain and not all lessons have been successful. The national and international response demonstrates the complex link between public health, science and politics when an outbreak threatens to impact on global economies and reputations. The unprecedented measures implemented in China are a bold attempt to control the outbreak – we need to understand their effectiveness to balance costs and benefits for similar events in the future.

During the 2014–2016 Ebola outbreak, health services in Liberia collapsed. Health care facilities could not support effective infection prevention and control (IPC) practices to prevent Ebola virus disease (EVD) transmission necessitating their closure. This report describes the process by which health services and infrastructure were recovered in the public hospital in Monrovia, Liberia. The authors conducted an assessment of the existing capacity for health care provision, including qualitative interviews with community members, record reviews in Ebola treatment units, and phone calls to health facilities. Assessment information was used to determine necessary actions to re-establish services, including building and environmental renovations, acquiring IPC supplies, changing health care practices, hiring additional staff, developing and using an EVD screening tool, and implementing psychosocial supports. On-site monitoring was continued for 2 years to assess what changes were sustained. Described in the report are 2 cases that highlight the challenge of safely re-establishing services with only a symptom-based screening tool and no laboratory tests available on-site. Despite fears among the public, health workers, and the international community, the actions taken enabled basic health care services to be provided during EVD transmission and led to sustainable improvements. This experience suggests that providing routine medical needs helps limit the morbidity and mortality during times of disease outbreak. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2018;13:767–773)