Azerbaijan tightens measures against Ebola

/AzerNews/

By Amina Nazarli

The Azerbaijani government has decided to check postal items as part of measures undertaken to prevent the penetration of the deadly Ebola virus into the country.

Iltimas Mammadov, Deputy Minister of Communications and High Technologies said on November 5, Azerbaijan is ready to consider the possibility of applying the benefits of the ICT (Information and Communications Technology) sector to fight Ebola.

"The Ministry will primarily explore every possibility to take necessary actions if other areas to benefit IT are revealed," he said.

This lethal virus originating in Africa keeps the nations under alert, making them to explore more effective means of fighting and interaction.

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has deployed satellite terminals to fight against the virus and is currently developing new applications to closely cooperate with the World Health Organization .

The GSMA, an association of mobile operators and IT companies, leads in coordinating and standardizing the response of mobile operators in affected countries. It has collaborated with the WHO to develop what is called the "Ebola Mobile Response Blueprint."

The Internet Society ISOC has set up the Ebola TECH Response Group to use the experience of its extensive tech community throughout the world against the Ebola challenge.

Amid growing threat of Ebola virus around the world, which has killed over 4,920, an ITU Plenipotentiary Conference is being held in Busan, South Korea from October 20.

Azerbaijani Communications and High Technologies Minister Ali Abbasov is attending the conference, which incorporates three major organizations - the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the Internet Society (ISOC), as well as the GSMA, deeply involved in fighting against the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

Despite the fact that Azerbaijan does not have so high volume of goods imports with Western Africa as the European countries, in particular UK and France, there is a still a risk of penetration.

The huge exporter of bananas and coffee created deep doubts over the safety of importing these products to Azerbaijan.

However, the government says there is no room for concern in this regards, adding it keeps the situation under control.

Head of the Toxicology Control Laboratory of the State Phytosanitary Supervision Service under the Azerbaijan Agriculture Ministry, Yagub Ibrahimov said the laboratory of poisoning control is carefully checking imported bananas.