The fight to save the last Ebola-free district in Sierra Leone

THE WASHINGTON POST                               OCT. 10, 2014

By Todd C. Franke

... The last region in Sierra Leone untouched by Ebola sits in the rugged, mountainous north, in a place called the Koinadugu district. It is a poor place, dependent on small farms and gold mines, the largest of the country’s 14 districts by land size and home to 265,000 residents. The district borders Guinea, where the current Ebola outbreak began and first spilled over into Sierra Leone. Koinadugu is surrounded by districts dealing with hundreds of Ebola cases.

But Koinadugu has kept the virus at bay.

Momoh Konte, shown at his office in Freetown,  returned to Sierra Leone from Washington to help his home district fight against Ebola. (Photo by Tanya Bindra for The Washington Post)

It is a remarkable feat, a source of pride for district residents, a source of hope for the entire struggling nation, and a curiosity to epidemiologists tracking the worst Ebola outbreak in history...

The district’s success was no accident. It has been the result of concerted, early efforts to staunch the spread of the disease, sometimes turning to novel measures, tailoring details to fit the region’s unique needs. Most of the planning has fallen to a man named Momoh Konte. He, along with district government and tribal officials, have managed to do what has seemed impossible elsewhere.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2014/10/10/the-fight-to-save-the-last-ebola-free-district-in-sierra-leone/