text: While local and international efforts have significantly slowed the spread of Ebola in West Africa, AmeriCares continues to support treatment of Ebola patients and protect health workers on the front lines of the epidemic. In Liberia, AmeriCares is now focused on rebuilding and strengthening the health system to improve access to health care and help prevent future epidemics. 
   
   Since the world’s largest Ebola outbreak began in early 2014, the virus has killed more than 11,100 people and infected more than 26,900. The disease has had a huge impact on health workers, infecting 869 and killing 507, including many doctors and nurses. The loss of so many health workers has been devastating to the region’s health care systems, which were already under-resourced and under-staffed, leaving people with malaria, typhoid, complicated childbirth and other illnesses without access to even basic care. 
   
   From the Beginning 
   
   AmeriCares first responded to the outbreak in April of 2014, with a focus on protecting health workers, expanding Ebola treatment capacity and restoring and improving health services. 
   
   Within a year, AmeriCares had provided millions of critical protective supplies to more than 100 health facilities in the three most-affected countries, recruited medical staff for and supplied Ebola treatment units in Liberia, and begun a long-term response to the on-going health crisis in West Africa, including infection prevention and control training for health workers. 
   
   Even as the epidemic ebbs, health workers in all three countries need critical support, including medicine, protective equipment and training. 
   
   “As our work to completely contain Ebola continues in West Africa, there is an ongoing need for safety equipment along with prevention and treatment supplies,” said AmeriCares Vice President of Emergency Response Garrett Ingoglia, “Support for frontline health workers is critical in controlling the epidemic and strengthening the health care system going forward.” 
   
   Brian Hoyer and Kla Williams – two of our team at Buchanan 
   
   Programs and Plans in Three Countries 
   
   In Liberia, AmeriCares established an office and warehouse in the capital city of Monrovia to efficiently distribute supplies to health facilities. AmeriCares Liberia team also manages our longer term commitment to build the capacity of the health care system to meet future health crises. 
   
   At the height of the outbreak in September of 2014, AmeriCares recruited all of the physicians and nurses needed to staff the Ebola treatment unit (ETU) built by the U.S. Department of Defense in Buchanan, Grand Bassa County, as part of a partnership with the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in coordination with the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare and funded by USAID. AmeriCares managed the facility and its staff of more than 180 health workers; the team revised safety protocols and maintained a constant state of readiness to isolate and treat Ebola patients, from construction at the height of the health emergency through the treatment center’s decommission after the outbreak had greatly diminished. In addition, AmeriCares provided all medical supplies needed to treat Ebola patients and protect staff at two other Ebola treatment centers managed by IOM in Liberia. 
   
   Under direction of AmeriCares staff, health workers at the Buchanan ETU staff also provided other important health services to local communities. Doctors and health workers established mobile clinics that delivered care to families in isolated areas, a measles vaccination program, psychosocial support for schools, and important infection prevention and control training for health workers, teachers and other school personnel. 
   
   As part of a longer term program to strengthen an already under-resourced health system weakened by years of civil war and devastated by Ebola, AmeriCares has begun an 18-month project to increase access and improve health services for mothers and newborns in Grand Bassa County. The work includes health facility upgrades, medical equipment and staff training at three health facilities – one hospital and two clinics. 
   
   In Sierra Leone, we continue to supply personal protective equipment (PPE) to caregivers in interim care centers for children who have been exposed to Ebola and require temporary care outside the home for 21 days – some of whom have parents who are ill or have died from the disease. AmeriCares also provides reunification kits for these children when they leave the care centers that include food, clothing and personal care supplies to replace lost items and help ease a child’s transition back into the community. 
   
   AmeriCares has also committed to providing 12 months of infection prevention and control training in Bonthe District for all health workers at Mattru Hospital and Bonthe Government Hospital. This health worker and patient-safety intervention will contribute to long-term health system strengthening that will prepare Sierra Leone for future infectious disease outbreaks. 
   
   In Guinea, where the Ebola outbreak began in early 2014, AmeriCares continues to provide our partners with medical equipment and supplies. Our largest shipment to date – 40,000 lbs. of PPE – will be distributed to more than 180 health facilities. The shipment also contains more than 15,000 liters of bleach which will support ChildFund International, our partner in Guinea, working with health clinics, health posts and community health workers to maintain infection prevention and control standards and to rebuild community trust in the health care system. 
   
   Three Ebola survivors from one community. 
   
   Ongoing Shipments 
   
   With the support of our corporate partners and donors, 47 shipments of medical aid have been delivered to more than 100 partners in West Africa to treat Ebola patients, provide protective gear for health workers and prevent further infections. To date, we have shipped over 7 million units of medicine and medical supplies, including 3.3 million units of protective equipment and 227,543 course treatments of medicine to partners in West Africa. 
   
   Through our partnership with Cardinal Health, for example, we have sent multiple shipments of protective supplies, including surgical gloves, masks and isolation gowns, to the affected area with more shipments planned. In addition, AmeriCares has sent multiple shipments of Clorox®Regular-Bleach to our partners in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea. Chlorine solutions made with bleach are essential for hand washing and preventing and controlling infection at local health centers. 
   
   Early Response to the Crisis 
   
   AmeriCares first response to the outbreak in April 2014 included the purchase and distribution of protective gear and medical supplies for health workers in West Africa as well as support for public messaging campaigns to spread awareness about the disease for which there is no proven cure. Overall, confirmed cases and fatalities have been reported in Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Nigeria and Mali. Cases have also been reported in the U.S., Spain, Senegal and the United Kingdom. 
   
   Read the story of a tiny survivor and her treatment ||||| Jenneh Kamera, a resident of the Liberian capital Monrovia, takes her family’s food rations home. Normally she sells chicken and frozen foods at the city market. But when her district became a quarantined zone, transport restrictions meant she could no longer get supplies for her market stall. (Copyright: WFP/Frances Kennedy) 
   
   WFP is scaling up its response to the Ebola virus to provide assistance to around 1 million people affected by the outbreak in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, delivering food alongside the health response. WFP is also assisting the wider humanitarian community with logistics, helping other organisations to get aid workers and critical supplies into the affected areas. Donate here 
   
   WFP has launched a regional emergency operation which will provide food assistance to around 1.3 million people in the three most affected countries: Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. Food is being distributed to people under medical quarantine, people under treatment, and their relatives. We are working alongside national governments, the World Health Organization (WHO) and other partners. 
   
   WFP Scales Up Its Response To Ebola Outbreak In West Africa WFP is scaling up its response to Ebola virus outbreak, providing food assistance to more than 1 million people in West Africa. “The operation has been quite intense and we intend to scale it up as the need arises,” Etienne Christopher Saint-Jean, the WFP national logistics officer in Liberia, explained. “We intend to be very proactive instead of reactive to the situation.” 
   
   The objective is to prevent a health crisis from becoming a food crisis. In the three countries, the food chain is threatened at many levels, starting with production. Farmers are leaving behind their crops and livestock as they seek areas they perceive as safer from exposure to the virus. Travel restrictions and displacements are likely to affect food prices. 
   
   The bans on eating traditional protein sources, such as bush meat, may also have implications for the food security and nutrition of people in these communities. Some of the animals that people normally hunt for food, such as bats and apes, are known to be potential carriers of the Ebola virus. 
   
   On the top of that, hundreds of households have already lost one or more of their members. The majority of Ebola victims fall within the 15-45 year bracket and are therefore frequently the main income providers. The reduction of household income coupled with the already observed food price rise will further deteriorate the food security situation. 
   
   The Spread Of Ebola 
   
   The current Ebola epidemic in West Africa began with an outbreak in Guinea in December 2013. It has since spread to Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Nigeria. It is the most severe outbreak since the discovery of the virus in 1976. Click to enlarge map. 
   
   Food Assistance 
   
   Here's what WFP is doing in the three most affected countries: 
   
   Guinea: WFP began food distributions because of Ebola four months ago and has reached around 40,000 people (in Biffa, Fria, Télémélé, N’Zerekore, Macenta and Guekedo districts). Preparations are being made to gradually increase distributions to 350,000 people over a period of three months. 
   
   Sierra Leone: WFP is reaching Ebola patients in health centres and affected households in the epicentres of Kenema and Kailahun as well as houses that are under quarantine in 12 out of 13 districts in Sierra Leone. Up to 400,000 people in Sierra Leone are targeted under the regional response for the next 3 months. 
   
   Liberia: Between July 1 and Sept. 4, WFP delivered food to some 67,000 people at Ebola case management centres and in quarantined communities. The distributions have covered 10 of Liberia’s 15 counties, including the West Point slum community in the capital Monrovia and the Ebola epicentre of Foya District in Liberia’s northern Lofa County. The plan is to reach 449,000 people over a three-month period. 
   
   Logistics 
   
   Because of its expertise in logistics, WFP has been given the job of coordinating logistics for the entire humanitarian community involved in the Ebola response. This happens through the Logistics Cluster -- the group of humanitarian organisations that work together to ensure services like transport and storage work well during big emergencies. The Cluster has already provided support to UN agencies, NGOs and government authorities. 
   
   WFP also manages the UN Humanitarian Response Depots (UNHRD), which store emergency supplies that can be transported within 48 hours. UNHRD has recently sent more than US$220, 000 worth of protective gear like gloves, masks and emergency health kits for the World Health Organisation (WHO), Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and WFP from its depots in Ghana and Dubai. 
   
   In addition, it manages the UN Humanitarian Air Service (UNHAS), which transports humanitarian workers and light cargo to emergencies around the world. UNHAS is currently operating in West Africa and has flown more than 100 passengers from organisations like WHO, UNICEF, MSF and WFP into and out of the Ebola-affected areas since Aug. 16. ||||| Recovering from the Ebola Crisis in West Africa 
   
   In May 2015, more than a year since the deadly virus first surfaced in Liberia, the country was declared Ebola-free. The unprecedented outbreak claimed thousands of lives across West Africa. 
   
   Samaritan’s Purse responded aggressively in Liberia, where we have had a country office for more than a decade, through our Ebola Community Protection Program. Now that the virus has been contained, our office is starting programming to help the country recover. 
   
   Currently, Liberians are struggling with trauma and a lack of trust in the health care system. To help rebuild the system, we finished a project that we started before the Ebola outbreak—ELWA hospital reconstruction. 
   
   Communities that handled Ebola well had leaders who believed that the virus was real. Samaritan’s Purse hopes to connect with community leaders through a leadership training to help more of them effectively handle similar situations in the future. 
   
   We will also reengage with churches and at-risk people to encourage them and children to provide health messaging. This will begin by training our Samaritan’s Purse staff members in counseling so that they can communicate well with the people they serve. 
   
   During the height of the outbreak, Samaritan's Purse provided hygiene training along with infection prevention and control kits to affected communities. The ministry also offered home-based caregiver training and materials. We constructed four community care centers that provided supportive treatment as an interim step before going to an Ebola treatment unit. To support these various efforts, we airlifted nearly 200 tons of relief supplies to Liberia. 
   
   Through a massive public education campaign, which included thousands of church leaders, we provided potentially life-saving information to more than 1 million people, directly or indirectly, through a variety of events and media. ||||| International Medical Corps’ Emergency Response Teams are on the ground in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guiena and Mali providing both lifesaving treatment and training. 
   
   Our teams are operating four Ebola treatment centers and implementing training programs to equip frontline healthcare workers with the skills needed to stop this outbreak at the source. Through the efforts of Emergency Response Team members like Dr. Pranav Shetty as well as volunteer nurse Kelly Suter, among thousands of other First Responders, International Medical Corps will provide access to treatment for 1.5 million people in West Africa. 
   
   To date our Bong County Ebola Treatment Unit (ETU) in Liberia has discharged 78 survivors. Nurse Suter gave a firsthand account of just one survivor, baby Josephine. 
   
   Over a week ago Korto - an Ebola survivor- and her three-month-old daughter, Josephine, came to the unit by ambulance. Josephine had developed vomiting, diarrhea and a fever hours after Korto was discharged from the confirmed unit of the ETU. Josephine tested positive for Ebola and grew weak and dehydrated quickly. Each time an IV had to be restarted, she fought a little less. Eventually, we had to hold her down and shave half of her beautiful head of hair to place a scalp IV. While not a difficult or uncommon task when caring for babies, that moment carried with it a sense of defeat. Korto had to leave the room and the medical staff were visibly grieved by the task required of them. Despite all, Josephine continued to deteriorate- her tiny little whimpers being heard less and less from the low risk side of the fence. After days of expecting Josephine to pass away, her symptoms suddenly began to disappear. Josephine gradually regained her strength and is now completely symptom free. Her blood tests are almost negative, her cheeks have filled back out and she loves to be carried around by staff in full personal protective equipment. Though not official until her blood test is completely negative - she is the youngest survivor of Ebola to date. 
   
   * Baby Josephine did test completely negative at four-months-old and was discharged from our Bong County ETU along with her mother Korto. 
   
   Read more about our Ebola response ||||| UNICEF Mobilizes to Fight Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo 
   
   In May 2018, the Government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) announced an outbreak of Ebola in the Northwestern Equateur Province. At first, the outbreak appeared to be confined to remote areas, but soon cases were confirmed in Mbandaka, a city of nearly 1.2 million people, heightening the risks of a more rapid spread of this highly contagious disease. 
   
   UNICEF and partners responded immediately, dispatching community health workers and shipping supplies, and installing handwashing stations at schools among other measures to improve water quality, sanitation and hygiene, all critical for Ebola prevention. 
   
   Early response was initially successful, quelling the outbreak in 11 weeks, but Ebola was reported in eastern DRC in August. By early January 2019, the country's conflict-ridden North Kivu and Ituri provinces has become the epicenter of the second deadliest and second largest Ebola epidemic in history. More than 600 probable Ebola cases have been reported, one-third of them children, with 368 deaths and 207 recoveries. Children are at a higher risk of dying from the disease than adults. One in ten Ebola cases is under the age of 5. 
   
   What is Ebola? 
   
   According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the Ebola virus disease (EVD), formerly known as Ebola hemorrhagic fever, is a severe, often fatal illness in humans. The virus is transmitted to people from wild animals and spreads in the human population through human-to-human transmission. 
   
   How does Ebola spread? 
   
   Human-to-human transmission of EVD comes from direct contact with the blood and other bodily fluids of those infected. The virus is relatively robust and can survive until transmission on materials contaminated with those fluids, such as bedding and clothing. 
   
   Can Ebola be cured or treated? 
   
   The average EVD case fatality rate is around 50%. Case fatality rates have varied from 25% to 90% in past outbreaks. Symptoms include fever, severe headache and in some cases, hemorrhaging. Treatment includes giving intravenous fluids (IV), balancing electrolytes (body salts) and maintaining oxygen status and blood pressure. Early intervention can significantly improve the chances of a patient's survival. 
   
   Is there an Ebola vaccine? 
   
   Yes. WHO is coordinating with the DRC Ministry of Health, Doctors Without Borders / Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), UNICEF and other partners to vaccinate those who are at high risk of infection in the affected health zones. UNICEF will play a leading role in providing information to the communities affected by the outbreak. 
   
   How was Ebola discovered? 
   
   Ebola was first discovered in 1976 in former Zaire, or what is now the DRC, near the Ebola River. Dr. Peter Piot of Belgium and his colleagues were the first to identify Ebola. 
   
   Who is most at risk for getting Ebola? 
   
   For most people, the risk of getting Ebola is low. The risk increases if you travel to Africa or visit or work in areas where Ebola virus outbreaks have occurred. 
   
   How UNICEF Is Helping 
   
   UNICEF played a major role in responding to previous outbreaks, including the epidemic in West Africa in 2014–2016, the deadliest outbreak ever, which killed more than 11,000 people. As part of its emergency response, UNICEF delivered more than 8,000 metric tons of critical medical supplies and worked with local communities, religious leaders and traditional healers to raise awareness of safe health practices. The West African outbreak, which spread from Guinea to Sierra Leone and Liberia, was a complicated, harrowing emergency that resulted in more cases and more deaths than all previous outbreaks combined. As the crisis abated, UNICEF helped the survivors heal, especially the children who were directly affected. 
   
   Learn more about UNICEF's work to protect children and their families in the DRC from Ebola. ||||| From Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies is active around the world and looking for your help. There are numerous ways you can be involved with the Red Cross Red Crescent. 
   
   From volunteering to sharing support online to financially contributing, our work is fueled by your support. 
   
   Ways to get involved 
   
   Remember, our work starts locally so it's often best to begin by learning more about your local Red Cross or Red Crescent.
target: – Hand-wringing isn't going to help stop the world's Ebola outbreak, but money might. The New York Times offers a list of groups trying to keep the disease in check in West Africa and elsewhere, along with links for those interested in donating: Doctors Without Borders: Ways to help here. International Medical Corps: Go here. UNICEF: Go here. Save the Children: Go here. International Red Cross: Go here. World Food Program: Go here. Samaritan's Purse: Go here. Partners in Health: Go here. Americares: Go here. An NBC cameraman is the latest American to contract the disease.