Inspector General of Police says his officers are ready to provide adequate patrol and security for the three-day lockdown which begins tomorrow aimed at containing Ebola.
Speaking to Politico, Francis Munu said their support would be wide-raging to include providing dispatch riders to be able to move blood samples of suspected cases, to managing toll-free call centre numbers.
He said they had requested burial teams to collocate with the police at their stations so that "we will provide escorts for them to areas where deaths have been reported" as well as for burial.
He said they had already deployed close to 2,000 officers at treatment centres, police Ebola checkpoint, quarantined homes as well as support contact-tracing and provide intelligence.
"We will have a good number on standby ready to respond to any call that may be made to us as a result of the exercise" Munu said, and cautioned that they would not be deployed with all 7,000 groups of four who would be moving from door to door.
The police boss assured that if they pulled it off during the election, they would do it for the lockdown, reminding that during the polls they were present at every polling station which he said was even more cumbersome.
He said police would respond only to teams who encountered problems that required police intervention for which he said they were adequately prepared. Yesterday people in parts of Guinea attacked a team of health workers who had gone to sensitise the community about the Ebola disease.
(C) Politico 18/09/14
