The day starts much like most others. I make a plan. It gets tossed without my knowledge. I’m left confused and anxiously wondering whether we’ll get any material at all today. I’m wrong every time. We always get incredible, important footage.
As we head off to what is supposed to be a 10:15 appointment with the principal investigator of the team researching the long-term effects of Ebola, I’m told there is a “ceremony” and we must go there instead.
I start asking our fixer, Kaipee, all kinds of questions about what kind of ceremony and why, but as usual, can’t seem to get a clear answer.
After waiting a couple of hours, in a very hot hallway, we realize we’re going to one of the Ebola Treatment Units, commonly referred to as ETUs here, and now largely empty, after being flooded with people lining up outside during the crisis.
When we arrive, we catch a glimpse of men in white hazmat suits checking over children, and realize they are they children we have been reading about in the headlines, the children who contracted Ebola after their mother died from the virus. They are the last survivors to be released from the ETU.
As the youngest boy toddles out of the treatment unit, the gravity of the moment dawns on me. These are the last survivors from the latest Ebola outbreak. Now the countdown begins. Only after 41 days have passed with no new cases, will the World Health Organization declare the country Ebola free once again.
Liberia’s Chief Medical Officer of Health steps forward. “This is another historic day,” he says. International aid workers are in tears. It is clearly a celebration of the lives of two young boys that have been saved. (I have been unable to confirm their ages so far, but they appear to be about 3 and 7.)
It is bitter sweet because their mother also contracted the virus and was not so fortunate. The family is dealing with a significant loss. The children’s Auntie is at the ceremony, but it’s also unclear who will take care of them.
The boys are presented with certificates declaring them Ebola negative. These will also give them rights as survivors
As we leave the ETU, I can’t help but think, it’s a good thing my plan didn’t work out.
