Hero Doctor Vows To Continue Working After Recovering From Ebola

DAKAR, Senegal (AP) — For eight weeks, Dr. Komba Songu-M'briwa worked at the understaffed Hastings Ebola Treatment Center outside Sierra Leone's capital. When he began feeling sick, he thought it might be exhaustion but on Nov. 26 he got dreadful news: He had tested positive for Ebola. Songu-M'briwa and just two other doctors, along with 77 nurses, work at the 120-bed treatment center. It was the "most difficult, most pitiful" work of his life, the 32-year-old said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press from his isolation room. Even so, he vowed to return to that crucial work if he recovered. "I do enjoy the work here and I hope and pray once I'm out of here, I'll take a bit of rest, and I'll come back and fight," Songu-M'briwa said on Sunday. On Monday, Chief Medical Officer Dr. Brima Kargbo announced that Songu-M'briwa had tested "completely negative" for Ebola after three tests came back clear. Songu-M'briwa — Ksong to his friends — doesn't know when or how he became infected. Sierra Leone has lost seven doctors to the disease; on Tuesday, the Health Ministry announced that yet another one had fallen ill with the disease. The country had only about 135 doctors to begin with, serving 6 million people. Denmark, with roughly as many citizens, has nearly 19,000 doctors, according to the Africa Health, Human & Social Development Information Service. Health care workers trea...
Source: Science - The Huffington Post - Category: Science Source Type: news