Ebola has so many effects outside of the damage that it does on the human body. It can injure people psychologically, economically and socially. We evaluated an Ebola suspect in our ETU whose test came back negative. We returned him to his community, but they wouldn't accept him because they were afraid that he still had Ebola. We had told his family about his negative diagnosis and provided him with an official certificate, but his neighbors still wouldn't allow him near. Our psychosocial team had to go to the community and work with the patient's neighbors to finally get them to accept him back into the community.
That fear of being quarantined by neighbors can work against measures used to control the disease. Last night we were notified that a nearby village had had eight deaths in the last 3 weeks due to 'magic' and that two bodies were still on the ground. We notified the Nimba County Ministry of Health and they dispatched a burial and contact tracing team the next morning. We also sent our laboratory technician to collect tissue samples to test for Ebola. When the team arrived in the village, the Headman told them that there were no bodies and that they had already been buried. He further said that all the people who died were old (in their 50's and older-ouch) and that they had simply died, without any symptoms of Ebola. Unfortunately, villagers will often lie about Ebola. If Ebola is believed to be in a village, the surrounding villages will blockade all the inhabitants until they are convinced that the village is Ebola free. That creates terrible hardships for a village, sometimes leaving them without access to food or even water. I understand the village Headman's dilemma, I just hope that he was telling the truth. In this case, eventually, time will tell.
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