Ebola Crisis Case Study

Crisis communication is an important aspect of any organization or country. Crisis such as Ebola creates scare and panic to many countries. Although Singapore has enacted stringent measures to combat crisis, it still lags behind when compared to countries like US. Even though, there is no incident of Ebola outbreak in Singapore, the country should put appropriate measures in place in readiness for any potential outbreak of such faux pas crisis. An outbreak like Ebola needs the efforts of both the government and its potential stakeholders. Crisis, unlike other problems, is unpredictable, can suddenly affect the stakeholders that were not recognized before, and can cause damage to governments’ reputation and trusts from their citizens. All these characteristics of the crisis make it hard for a country to manage it. This paper, therefore, explores varied ways through which the Singapore government can effectively manage a crisis such as Ebola.
Various researchers have come up with different definitions of crisis. Fink (1986) defines crisis as the ‘ unstable time or state of affairs in which a decisive change is impending” p. 15). Kathleen Fearn-Banks (2002) on the other defines crisis as the “major occurrence with a potentially negative outcome affecting the organization, company,

The MOH should be active in order to continually monitor any signs of Ebola outbreak. Like US, Singapore should isolate any suspected patient and implement quarantine in case of any detection. The outbreak of diseases like Ebola needs a country to have an adequate human resource in place in order to effectively handle it. In managing such crisis, the Singapore government should educate the public and train enough staff. Other countries such as US and other European countries have ensured that the public has adequate knowledge on how to effectively handle crisis (Weick, Sutcliffe, & Obstfeld,