Why COVID-19 is Not Raging in the Central African Republic (One of the World's Most Fragile Countries)

The Central African Republic is near the bottom of every major economic or development indicator. Out of 189 countries ranked in the UN Development Program's Human Development Index, the Central African Republic is second to last. When it comes to life expectancy at birth, the country ranks dead-last. It is also a country that is emerging from civil war.  Despite these challenges, the COVID-19 pandemic is not raging out of control in CAR. This is in large part due to the work of the World Health Organization, UN Peacekeeping, the Government of CAR -- and specifically Dr. Marie Roseline Belizaire. She is a Haitian epidemiologist with the World Health Organization who was deployed to the Central African Republic early in the pandemic to assist the country with COVID -19 preparedness and response plan.  We kick off discussing how her work fighting ebola across the border in the Democratic Republic of Congo has informed her response to COVID in the Central African Republic. We then discuss some of the strategies she developed in partnership with the government and the UN peacekeeping mission which has helped to contain the spread of COVID in the Central African Republic.