Why Raising Money To Fight Ebola Is Hard

By Zoe Chace - Sep 22, 2014 - npr.org

The response to the 2010 earthquake in Haiti was massive: Billions of dollars in donations poured in.

"It had everything," says Joel Charny, who works with InterAction, a group that coordinates disaster relief. "It had this element of being an act of God in one of the poorest countries on the planet that's very close to the United States. ... And the global public just mobilized tremendously."

People haven't responded to the Ebola outbreak in the same way; it just hasn't led to that kind of philanthropic response.

From the point of view of philanthropy, the Ebola outbreak is the opposite of the Haiti earthquake. It's far from the U.S. It's hard to understand. The outbreak emerged over a period of months — not in one dramatic moment — and it wasn't initially clear how bad it was.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2014/09/22/349962559/why-raising-money-to-fight-ebola-is-hard