I read online Ebola news from
many mass media every single day. I bookmarked WHO Global Alert and Response
(GAR) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Ebola Hemorrhagic
Fever websites, and check to see if Disease outbreak news (DONs) has been
updated. WHO has been updating DONs periodically, almost every other day, and
provide the total number of cases and deaths of Ebola virus disease (EVD).
<World Health Organization
Global Alert and Response: Ebola Virus Disease>
Ebola cases were found in
Sierra Leone when I was preparing to go, but I took decisive action to board an
airplane. It was a long story why I could not change my mind. Though 21 days of
self-monitoring has been passed without any symptom, I do not want to say out
loud, “I am free from Ebola!” Even if my body is fine, my Sierra Leone
friends are still there. I cannot simply ignore Ebola anymore only because I am
safe in East Africa.
I often ask WVSL staff
through Skype if they are ok. I ask, “How
are you?” Actually, those words, “How
are you?” “잘지내?” have been totally empty of meaning so far. Those
were just for the sake of formality. If I say “How are you?” you may say “I
am good.” It was like a meaningless conversation formula that people give
and take. In Tanzania, people like to greet each other. If I say “Habari yako?” they may say “Nzuri.” So then, what is the difference
between this greeting formula and hip-hop singers? Those singers like to guide
audience, “Say Ho~~~oh~~~” and pass
audience a microphone and put their hands to the ear. It is a tacit suggestion.
Then the audience did submissive(?) response and say “Ho~~~oh~~~!” Your tacit suggestion has been accepted. Then singers
were excited to interact with audience, so they say some more advanced one. “Say Ho oh oh OH!!” Thankfully, audience
answer, “Say Ho oh oh OH!!”
For me, I am not just
saying “How are you?” in this case.
Whenever I ask “How are you?” to
them, I am wondering if they are really okay. But the greeting formula cannot
be easily beyond the range of “How are
you, fine, thank you, and you?” Even if they say “I am OK,” I assume that “OK”
does not really mean “OK,” but it is
just good answer for “How are you.”
Moreover, I cannot feel the tone of that “OK”
because Skype chat does not tell me their mood.
I am neither Ebola expert
nor Ebola intern. My World Vision Fellow work is totally irrelevant to Ebola,
but it has certainly affected my status of safety and my daily life. All
foreign staff in World Vision Sierra Leone (WVSL) has already left, and I am
here in Tanzania. What can I do for my friends in Sierra Leone and people in
West Africa? There are hundreds of Ebola news every day, and we are living in a
deluge of information. Many people (including me) are only interested in what
is happening around them. It is true that we are busy with handling happenings
on the periphery, not in the opposite side of the earth. If I were not in
Africa, Ebola outbreak would never be my interest. Likewise, people may not
know what is really happening in West Africa. Articles deliver only facts and emphasize
only the number of death; we easily miss the hidden side of Ebola tragedy. I
cannot say scientific theory or complicated biological/ chemical action of
human body against Ebola. But what I can do is to reinterpret the article that
I can transmit people’s real emotion about Ebola.
Here is the New York Times
article about “The Burial Boys of Ebola.”
<If They Survive in the
Ebola Ward, They Work On>
They call themselves burial
boys, and most of them are 20s, who are students and taxi drivers. This group
of young men became volunteers themselves to take on the most dangerous and
dirtiest work: finding and burying the dead bodies all across 9-hour distance
of Eastern Sierra Leone every day. They have been trained by Doctors Without
Borders and supported by Red Cross, and they are fighting against Ebola in the
very front line of highest affected area, Kailahun District.
“I sacrifice myself for my country. If I don’t
volunteer, who can volunteer to do it now?” Kandeh Kamara, one of volunteers asked back to the reporter.
“I am a solider because we are now on the
battlefield. We are fighting with the virus.”
His family said he would be
no longer welcome in his village, but he bulled his way to become a burial boy.
He had to turn his back on his family and some village people who never
understood him. After work, he had no money to buy food, so he begged on the
street. The only reason why he takes his life in his hands to do this work is
definite.
“I’m supposed to sacrifice myself for my country.”
Q. If you were him, would
you also be willing to risk your life to fight against Ebola?
Q. If your children plead
with you that “Don’t go there again!” would you still be willing to disobey
them and go back to the hospital to treat Ebola patients?
Q. If your 15 nurse colleagues
have died, would you willing to keep staying in that hospital to be the only
Ebola worker?
The dead body is the most
dangerous. People touch the dead body and easily get infected as well. What’s
more, the burial boys do not wear full protective clothes. There is no enough
equipment to protect themselves from Ebola. While many health workers are
giving up and fleeing from Ebola, the burial boys are giving up their homes and families,
fighting with uneducated village people, and finding and burying corpses to
stop Ebola. They are fighting against both stigma and Ebola.
According to WHO, at least
129 health workers have died of Ebola, and 2,615 cases and 1,427 deaths have
occurred in Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Nigeria so far. The real number
of victims must be much more than that.
“Until the Ebola virus is over, I will stay here.
If I have a long life, I can go back to my people. I can talk to them I’m
doing this job for you. Maybe they can understand me.”
 |
| “They [village people] are angry with us. Some of
them are uneducated. They don’t even believe that Ebola virus is real.” - The New York Times |
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