The ministry of health declared an Ebola epidemic in the N’Zerekore region of Guinea on 14 February, following seven confirmed cases and three deaths. US government agencies are closely monitoring the epidemic, and coordinating with the Guinea government, the World Health Organisation, and other partners to provide rapid, localised outbreak control. This outbreak follows a declaration of an outbreak on 7 February by the DRC’s minister of health. The previous West African outbreak in 2014-16 killed over 11,300. The source of infection is under investigation. It is important to monitor one’s health for 21 days after travelling to an area experiencing an Ebola outbreak.

February is Black History Month in the USA. Many Black Americans have mixed emotions during this month. Some feel happiness for the great successes Black Americans have made over the years. The other emotion is sadness, because of the movies and documentaries that reveal the horrors of American slavery, discrimination, and their unfair and unjust treatment for 400 years. Pray for this month to begin a powerful season for healing. (Ecclesiastes 3:3b). Pray for the damaged communities to begin to forgive each other and allow God to heal the mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual wounds. Pray for deliverance from all the pain that they and their ancestors have suffered over the years. In the UK, 14 February was Racial Justice Sunday, and the Archbishop of Canterbury wrote a prayer referring to ‘the sin of racism’ and how Jesus ‘broke down the walls that divide’. We can pray for all nations to be freed from prejudice, and the violence of racist words and actions.

The current president's strategy for handling the former president's impeachment trial has been to keep the whole ordeal at arm's length. The Biden administration's long-term political fortunes rest on success in dealing with the pandemic, the economy and the American public's other concerns. In the end, the trial lasted only three days. The chamber can’t take up Biden's Covid relief bill until the House passes the version that they have spent the week working on. Pray that the much-needed relief is released swiftly. With the trial concluded, the Senate can now resume confirming Biden's administration appointments, after it returns from a week recess. Pray for wisdom to flow through all appointments yet to be made, and that the price of a speedy trial without witnesses will not mean a political price being paid later.

When a pastor shared the gospel with a Nepali family, they eagerly placed their faith in Christ and began attending church regularly, walking eight miles each way to attend. But when the owner of the land they leased learned of their newfound faith in Christ, he kicked them off the land. As an extremely poor family struggling to survive, they had leased the land both to live on and to farm, giving half their crops to their landlord in payment. In addition to being evicted from the land, they were denied access to the village water tap. Our persecuted brothers and sisters in Nepal face great pressure from their communities to reject Christ or suffer the consequences of continuing harassment and beatings from nationalists who envisage Nepal becoming a ‘pure’ Hindu nation. Also the government has criminalised conversion to Christianity and declared that ‘those who change their religion should be expelled from Nepal.’