Script and Service: Field notes from a travelling pharmacist on global aid, work, and adventures

The biggest tragedy of all is that surviving Ebola is only the start of a long, troubled journey. An indiscriminate disease that respects no social, educational or economic boundaries and is spread through the most natural of human tendencies - touch - can wipe out entire families and does so without compassion. Those you love most, those you hold and kiss, those you care for when they are dying - they are the ones who make you sick, as you then cause your own husband, wife, children and neighbours to run the Ebola gauntlet. To endure weeks in an Ebola Treatment Centre (ETC) cared for by people with faces you can't see; watching people die around you. To survive the humiliating, incessant diarrhoea, the weeks of rehydration therapy, the days of waiting and waiting for that negative Ebola test, to be finally discharged and find out that your children didn't make it; that your parents are both dead; that you are the sole responsible survivor left to care for your brothers and ...

I wake up before dawn to the calls of the fishermen on the shore 50 metres away as they arrive home with their catch. Men from the nearby village come and help pull in the nets whilst the woman sit back with their colourful buckets, watching patiently until the fish are flapping on the sand. At that moment they descend in a wild mêlée to get their share of the best fish to sell or feed their families. I can hear the buzz and excitement even over the air-conditioning unit in my room - on this deployment to Sierra Leone with Save the Children we have been very fortunate to stay in a standard of accommodation above that normally expected on a humanitarian mission. For the last 4 months I have lived in a beautiful location on the beach, in a hotel with a swimming pool, where I don't have to cook, clean or do any of my own washing. Not what I expected when I applied to work in one of the poorest countries in the world and certainly in stark contrast to the village located  outside the...

*A fictitious account of a journey that over 400 patients have taken through the ETC  Two months ago I went to the funeral of a man in our village who had died of Ebola. Back then there were more cases of families hiding away their loved ones who were sick. They were scared that if they admitted the illness they would be taken away, sometimes to an unknown place, and that they would never be seen again. So people were dying at home. In our culture we help cleanse the body at funerals and touch and share tears with the bereaved to show sympathy and support. A week later I started to develop aches and pains, and two days later, fever and diarrhoea. I called 117 and an ambulance arrived and took me to the Save the Children Ebola Treatment Centre (ETC), near to my home. When I arrived at the ETC I had to wait in the locked ambulance whilst the doctors and nurses dressed in their Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). Then they took me into the Red Zone whilst a team of hygien...

As humanitarians would say, I 'deployed' three weeks ago with a suitcase full of alcohol gel from dad, a 6-pack of Handy Andies from mum and a guitar, a last minute purchase from Amazon. In hindsight, I'm not sure that teaching myself how to play the guitar in the middle of an epidemic was the best idea I've had, but it certainly wasn't the worst. Connecting in Casablanca, my initial thoughts were that the plane to Sierra Leone would be empty as who in their right mind would be heading that way? I was wrong - the airport was full of young, white, European NGO workers all congregating in eager huddles talking about life post-Ebola. So here I am in Africa again. West Africa this time, with a humanitarian NGO not a development one and during the 18th known outbreak of the viral haemorrhagic disease, Ebola. In truth I see very little of the real Sierra Leone. For an hour each day on the drive to and from the Ebola Treatment Centre (ETC) I see the country that...

There is no denying Sierra Leone has had a tough past. Having not long established peace following a ten year civil war followed by years of UN peace-keeping and overseeing of elections, in July 2014 a state of emergency was declared in response to the latest Ebola outbreak in West Africa. For the past 8 months schools, cinemas, nightclubs and football grounds have been closed. Gatherings of more than 5 people have been banned (except for church) and a curfew has seen shops have restricted opening times and no-one permitted on the streets after 10pm. Hand shakes and hugs are forbidden, temperatures are checked and buckets of chlorine are found everywhere for hand sanitisation. A journey from Freetown to Kailahun where the first cases of Ebola were reported has increased from 5 to 7 hours due to the 14 mandatory temperature checkpoints along the way. The healthcare system has buckled under the pressure. Eleven Sierra Leonian doctors have died of Ebola since the start...

This time last year I was preparing for my second Christmas in Tanzania searching the market for an elusive chicken willing to be sacrificed and roasted. I missed the crisp winter nights at home, the festive lights, the parties and Billy Idol blasting out in shops crammed with food, gifts, clothes and a billion other material things that seem indispensable on December 25th. But there was something to be said for the simplicity of being gifted a pile of mangoes and a packet of cashew nuts. Of not having to cook a meal that covers a dining table and is left half uneaten. No need to buy bigger better noisier presents or watch the Queen's speech or play games that end in stony silences over the evening turkey buffet. Where thanks are given to one God or the other for the blessings of family, health and income. Mangoes had never tasted so good. I loved being back in the UK. The supermarkets, dirty late night take-away's, fancy toiletries, Friends reruns, efficient transport ne...