The current outbreak began in Guinea in March. Sierra Leone is now the epicenter of the epidemic. The situation is deteriorating rapidly in Liberia. On Friday, a man died of an Ebola infection in Lagos, Nigeria.
Nurses & doctors are also falling victim to the disease. 2 American aid workers have tested positive, & a doctor at Liberia’s largest hospital, the John F. Kennedy Memorial Medical Center in Monrovia, has died of the disease. The virus is amplified by a mobile population, especially across the shared borders between Guinea, Sierra Leone & Liberia. In the Nigerian case, the infected victim entered on a passenger flight from Liberia. The World Health Organization & the Nigerian government have shut down the hospital where the man died, & other passengers on the flight are being tracked down & tested.
Infected individuals must be isolated in health centers to prevent the virus from spreading to others & to give them the care they need. Bodies of victims must also be disposed of w/care: The virus, present in bodily fluids, including sweat, is most infectious at the end-stage. Then there is widespread ignorance among the most vulnerable populations about what needs to be done. The result is that many people are hiding sick loved ones at home & transporting bodies for burial w/no understanding of the precautions they must take.
Liberia’s president, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, has declared a national Ebola emergency. The governments of Guinea, Sierra Leone & Nigeria must also act w/equal urgency to raise public awareness, put additional trained medical personnel on the ground & trace patients’ contacts w/others. The current Ebola outbreak is more than a sum of national emergencies. It is now a regional crisis, & the whole of West Africa must act to contain it.