buildings. As he approached, golden sunlight spilled upon him through an opening in the canopy. He was gorgeous: swarthy, muscular, golden sparkles dancing through his thick, dark hair. I silently prayed he was a doctor.
When he reached us, he smiled. Which completely lit up my world. He said, “Hello. I’m Dr. Gustavo Tovar. You may call me Gus, except in front of patients. Then I’m Dr. Tovar. I’m one of the doctors in charge of training volunteers, as well as treating patients. I and the other supervising doctors will be taking you on a tour of our camp and showing you to your quarters. Tonight, we’re hosting a mandatory Meet and Greet for you guys. And trust me, you all want to be there. You don’t want to be working out here in the African wilderness with patients who are suffering from one of humanity’s most terrifying infectious diseases without having friends and forming close bonds with your colleagues.” He then offered a half-smile, which I found adorable, but less than reassuring in regard to our safety. Thinking back on it now, that half-smile was full of foreshadowing and a little bit creepy.
We trundled down into camp, a motley group following our pied piper, Dr. Gustavo Tovar. After sticking her heels several times in the dirt path, Zoe finally kicked off her shoes and carried them, her feet covered only in nylons. I winced as I saw her foot land on a juicy bug and crush it.
As we entered the area with buildings, Dr. Tovar noticed Zoe’s exposed feet. He instructed her to put her shoes back on. “Bodily fluids have spilled in this area: blood, vomit, etc. You do not want to put yourself at risk.”
We walked past several buildings. The sound of moaning became painful. It had the same effect as crying babies: a tug at your heart and soul, motivating you to do something. I felt relieved that I was a nurse. I couldn’t have handled being at that camp had I just volunteered to help with accounting or cooking or something not directly related to patients.
Dr. Tovar halted in front of the fourth building, turquoise with white shutters, dried mud splashed along the bottom of its outside walls. “OK, volunteers. I’m going to divide you into groups of five. Each group will be assigned to a different team in a different building. Each team is supervised by a different doctor.” Then he pointed to one of us at a time, repeatedly assigning us a number from one to five: “One…Two…Three…Four…Five…You all work in Building Number 1. One…Two…Three…Four…Five…You’re assigned to Building Number 2.” He did that five times, so it turned out there were exactly twenty-five of us.
A red-headed woman, freckles splashed across her face, sensibly dressed in shorts and a tank top, started heading toward her assigned building. Dr. Tovar stopped her. “Whoa! Where do you think you’re going?”
“To my building? To get started?”
Tovar opened his eyes wide in exaggerated shock. They were deep brown, warm. I felt about to swoon, and not just from the tropical heat. He said, “OK. I cannot impress enough upon all of you: you’re not to go wandering off anywhere alone. Exploring or finding your own way around our facilities is strictly forbidden. We’re dealing with Ebola Virus Disease here. You can’t possibly know which areas have been contaminated. Here…I want to show you something…” With that, he turned his back on us and waved us forward.
We followed him around the side of Building 5, the building to which I had been assigned. There were touches of cheer: two pink flower boxes under small windows, a single yellow flower poking its head out of one of the boxes, polka-dotted curtains in the windows.
Then we entered the backyard.
Workers dressed in protective gear surrounded a human-shaped mound covered by a white sheet. A foot, twisted at a weird angle, stuck out the bottom edge. Dr. Tovar said, “Under that sheet is a dead woman. Before expiring, she bled out from Ebola. The ground where she’s lying has no doubt been seeded with her sloughed-off gut and bowels. In a few minutes, she’ll be cremated and the backyard sanitized. You wouldn’t want to unknowingly walk across that stretch of land between the time the body was removed and the ground sanitized, now would you?” Gesturing toward Zoe, he added, “And you’re all to wear shoes at all times, hear me?”
We shook our heads in agreement.
Dr. Tovar instructed us to gather in front of our assigned buildings and wait for our supervisor to invite us in. He gave strict directions on the exact path each group should take to get to their destination.
Sadly, Dr. Tovar wasn’t my supervisor. He ran Building 1.
We left the backyard. My team walked around to the front and waited, wondering about the conditions inside.
A few minutes later, a woman in a white coat came through the front door. She had piercing blue eyes and a halo of frizzy black hair. “Hello. I’m Dr. Angela Steele.” She didn’t smile. “Thank you all for volunteering your service. We’re on the frontline here, battling an outbreak of Ebola. It has only recently arrived in Liberia. Our job is to contain it. As a result, we’ve been given license to administer experimental drugs sent to us by several countries, developed by a variety of pharmaceutical companies and approved by both the World Health Organization and the CDC for this purpose. I’m going to take you over to another building where you’ll be instructed on how to use protective gear. Then we’ll return here and you’ll be introduced to your patients.” No small talk. Right down to business. My heart raced. My palms grew sweaty.
Crossing the dirt road, we entered a building with a sign over the front door designating it: Safety Station 5. Inside, the walls were lined with shelves marked Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and benches. The shelves were filled with things I recognized from my infectious diseases training back home: yellow protective overalls, clear aprons, white hoods, masks, goggles, respirators, turquoise gloves, overshoes, and turquoise rubber boots.
Through a door in the back, Dr. Steele led us to a separate building marked: BIOHAZARD: Disinfecting Station 5. She pointed out a path that led from the road directly into this building. She said, “Never, ever pass through a Safety Station Building, sometimes referred to as a Protective Personal Equipment or PPE Building, to get here. Only use the outside path for your Disinfecting Station after being in a patient treatment facility or coming into contact with Ebola in any way.”
Our tour of Disinfecting Station 5 revealed garbage cans ominously marked Biohazard, showers, sinks, dispensers with soap and alcohol-based hand rubs, and single-use towels. Outside the back door of the station were other areas for showering, removing and discarding protective gear. Dr. Steele stated in a sharp tone, “Do not ever attempt to remove your own protective gear. Trained assistants will help you, so that you don’t risk contamination from the outside of your gear. Do you understand me?”
We all answered yes in a variety of ways: nodding our heads, mumbling agreement, or in my case, replying, “Yes, Ma’am!” a little too loudly.
Dr. Steele and two interns (God, what a place to intern!) demonstrated how to put on and take off protective gear. Then assistants helped us suit up. Protected from virus, we looked more like astronauts on an alien planet than medical personnel about to help patients. We no longer seemed human.
Dr. Steele said, “Today, you are going to meet patients. Tomorrow, your medical training and direct work with patients will begin.”
As we lumbered across the path toward Building 5, Zoe’s Oriental eyes loomed large through her clear plastic face mask. She reminded me of a gargantuan insect with dark nervous eyes.
Inside the treatment facility, patients lay listless on hospital beds spaced evenly along both side walls and separated by plastic curtains. Several female patients wore brightly colored dresses. No hospital gowns, apparently just whatever they had been wearing when they arrived. Reading from a chart at the foot of each bed, Dr. Steele explained each patient’s condition and how they were being treated.
Medical personnel moved about the room in suits identical to ours, administering to patients. One stuck an elderly man with a hypodermic needle and drew a
blood sample. The sight of that thick red blood, teeming with Ebola virus, twisted my stomach into knots. I felt terrified that I would throw up inside my suit.
The last patient we encountered was a little boy named Akachi Anikulapo-Kuti. Dr. Steele said, “His first name means ‘hand of God.’ Ironic, don’t you think? I don’t believe any God would ever do this to a little boy.” After studying him a moment, she continued, “He’s four years old. Arrived here this morning. He tests positive for Ebola. We started him on an experimental drug from the CDC two hours ago.”
Akachi opened his eyes, noticed us hovering about him in our alien insect suits; then rolled over, away from us. In his arms, he clutched a stuffed bear—so new and clean, it must not have come from home, probably a comfort gift from staff.
Expecting the sick to be writhing in agonized torment, I asked why everyone appeared listless. Dr. Steele explained, “We have them heavily medicated for pain. That’s one of our primary treatments, to ease their suffering.” Her blue eyes brightened behind her face mask. “And we have access to the most powerful pain meds in the world. Our patients are almost always under our control.” I figured she meant “our patients’ pain is almost always