West Africa Private Sector Coronavirus Platform (WAPSCON19)

Context: the world is facing a truly unprecedented situation. The global Coronavirus pandemic has reached and affected different aspects of life in Asia, Europe and the Americas. As time passes, we are also seeing the outbreak slowly reaching other countries, notably in the African continent, with the number of confirmed cases rising to 4,827 as of 03/04/20. There is particular concern over the development of the situation in West Africa, due to limited healthcare capacity, and the vulnerability of the communities we have long worked with.

Purpose: As most countries of the world seek constructive and efficient controls to nationally contain the spread of the Coronavirus, we look towards this area of the world that may not have access to the same support offered during the 2014 Ebola outbreak.

We recognize our role as the private sector in mitigating the impacts of the virus, with a focus on maintaining the safety and well-being of our employees, the continuity of our business operations, and the livelihoods and health of the communities we operate in. 

Structure: the structure of WAPSCON19 is decentralized and allows flexibility of contribution in each country. To achieve this, the platform’s working model is based on the identification of one private sector executive per country (usually C-suite) to lead the work nationally. The function of these executives, hereby referred to as County Chairs, is to host calls and initiate cooperation with other businesses operating in the same country. The endpoint of this exercise is creating local capacity to respond to the threat of Covid-19, under the umbrella of “county hubs”.