The fear of Ebola goes beyond the security measures - The Globe and Mail
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As I visited treatment centres and talked to health workers across Monrovia, what struck me was the vast gulf between the West’s often irrational panic and the calm practical attitude of the Ebola workers on the ground. Given enough resources, equipment and treatment beds, they know they can beat Ebola.
The methods are well understood by now: early diagnosis, isolation, support and staff safety. And these methods could easily be learned by the Western health organizations that have often been reluctant to accept the risks of the Ebola zone. “It’s not rocket science,” Médecins sans frontières (Doctors without Borders) emergency co-ordinator Laurence Sailly told me. “It’s like running a hospital with very specific security measures. It’s a lot of logistics and water and sanitation.”
What will always stay with me is the desperation and vulnerability of the Ebola patients themselves: collapsed on the ground, clutching their heads, too weak to move, waiting hours or days for help. Talk to them, or their family members, and you realize that they cannot comprehend the slowness of the world’s response.
via @doronisaacs
