A long road

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 sisters - that is incomprehensible.

Then to return to your home in a village where, at best, many people will not come near you out of fear of the disease, to those who stop doing business with you so you can't support yourself or your remaining family. To the worst case where survivors are so stigmatised and victimised that they are no longer physically safe - people you should trust break into your home and leave you in such fear that you can't sleep, eat, live in peace. Basic human rights that above all, you should be entitled to.

As the number of Ebola cases continues to fall in Sierra Leone, many ETC's have closed or been placed on standby meaning unless there is a surge in patient numbers, the centres will remain shut to new cases. This has allowed time and attention to be spent on running Survivor Clinics where patients are invited to return for medical, psychosocial and nutritional follow-up. Brothers and sisters attend together, fathers and children, husbands and wives. All some of the lucky 50-60% of people who survive the disease. But as I read through their reports the reality hits. Fatmata lost her six month old daughter and her husband. Ibrahim lost his wife and now has 5 children to take care of alone. Kadiatu and Cecilia lost both their parents, all their siblings and 6 other family members. No-one has an income. No-one has enough food. Many have chronic joint pain, eye problems, hearing loss, headaches, alopecia, stomach ulcers. They all feel very, very sad. But they come back. They come back to the same place where weeks or months earlier they left as an Ebola survivor to much joy and celebration.  Celebration that they had survived a vicious disease and could return to their homes with the Certificate that would state they were clear of Ebola and not a threat to their communities. 

Through it all, the essence of the Sierra Leonean people shines through. There is a glimmer of hope in the eyes that look back at me. All is not lost. And when I ask in Krio 'Aw Di bodi?' (how are you?), I receive the reply 'Thanks to God' and I feel incredibly humbled and grateful to be in the presence of people who despite everything they have lost and all the troubles they face ahead, are still thankful to be alive.

To make a donation to support orphans of Ebola please consider:

http://www.stgeorgefoundation.org.uk/