'Speed, money and compassion' - lessons from an Ebola survivor and other experts

Here is the latest breaking news from around the world: 'Speed, money and compassion' - lessons from an Ebola survivor and other experts2 hours ago Share Save Add as preferred on GoogleThomas MukhwanaAfrica correspondentAFP via Getty ImagesWest Africa experienced the world's worst and most complex Ebola epidemic more than a decade ago"I saw the burial team taking eight of them," recalls Ebola survivor Patrick Faley. "They put them into a bag and carried them to the burial. I made new friends although they ended up dying.

I was the only person that was left there. "This week's scenes from the Democratic Republic of Congo, where medics are scrambling to respond to an outbreak of Ebola, have brought back haunting memories for those who have lived through similar crises. A decade ago Faley found himself on the front line of a similar situation in West Africa - the worst recorded outbreak of the disease, which killed more than 11,000 people in two years mostly in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

The Details

For Faley, the memories of what he lived through, including the death of so many of his friends, raise questions about lessons that can be learned for how to handle the latest outbreak in eastern DR Congo in which the World Health Organization (WHO) says more than 170 people have died. His story is a reminder of the horrors the virus can cause. Faley was recruited as a community volunteer by Liberia's Ministry of Health to spread awareness about Ebola.

He went from village to village to explain how the virus was spread by contact with bodily fluids and encourage people to stop things like greeting one another by shaking hands. It also involved dispelling rumours and explaining why traditional mourning practices - such as washing the bodies of the deceased - had to be banned. He worked within communities near his home in the north of the country - and says it was attending the funeral of a colleague who had died of the disease that changed his life as he himself forgot the advice.

"You have to shake hands; you have to hug people," he tells the . "Forgetting to know that we have a crisis, an emergency crisis in our country. "Three days after the funeral, he fell sick with Ebola, finding himself turning from healthcare worker to patient and ending up in the capital, Monrovia, in an overcrowded ward, filled with the bodies of those who had died.

What Experts Say

"We sat in the ambulance," he remembers, "and people were just dying at the front of the hospital. "Faley recovered from the infection but his wife and son later caught the virus as well. His wife got better and made it home.

Tragically their four-year-old son Momo did not survive. The lessons from the West African outbreak a decade ago are helping to shape the response this week to the new surge of cases in DR Congo, with funerals banned for those suspected to have been infected.

The development has drawn wide international attention, with diplomatic circles watching closely.