She has hopped through the fiery fire of the fiend-like Ebola virus disease, hurt but later healed; now hale and healthy, Toshi Anonobi, one of the nurses at the First Consultant Hospital, Lagos State, where the first case of Ebola virus disease was reported in Nigeria is on her way to the “evil forests” where the virus currently lives and breeds – to save lives being tormented by the scourge.

 

Anonobi goes along with 249 volunteers from Nigeria to Sierra-Leone and Liberia, two of the three countries most affected by the virus, worldwide, leaving her family behind. Hers is one of the greatest sacrifices any human could pay to a fellow man!

 

Anonobi said she was moved by her experience with the disease and the need to save lives and nations currently in the grip of the virus.

 

Speaking with our reporter at a 2-day predeparture training organized for the volunteers in Lagos State recently under the auspices of the Africa Union Support for Ebola in West Africa, ASEOWA, the nurse said she remained committed to doing everything possible to ensure the virus is defeated from the earth.

 

“I got Ebola while working at the First Consultant Hospital. I was taken to IDH, infection hospital. Then, at IDH, they managed me and they managed me well. Today, I am alive to live to testify to the glory of God. I did not take any Ebola drug because Ebola has no cure but through the intervention of medical doctors and the nurses and other people, and through adherence to whatever they asked me to do, I was able to live through it. And, I was able to conquer. Today, I am alive.

 

“So, our sister countries that are battling with Ebola, I am one of the volunteers that want to go in the sense that I got healed; I got ok through some people, through doctors and nurses, through their intervention, through God. As I am going, I know that someone will get healed through me. I saw Ebola, I faced it, I lived through it, and I conquered it,” she added.

 

Asked if her family resisted her decision to assist in the fight against the disease having been once attacked by it, she responded: “There is no bad reaction from my family. My husband is aware of it. While I was at IDH, he used to come every day. He believed that I have overcome it. It is not a new thing to him. I have been there. I saw myself that I survived it, that was what motivated me. Though Ebola is real, no cure for it, they can manage it and one would get well.

 

“While I was at the IDH, my husband used to come almost two times a day. So, it was that initial time that he had mixed feelings. But, since I finally came out of it, he doesn’t feel bad about it again,” he stressed.

 

It is this same vision that drives her colleagues. Many of the volunteers who spoke with National Mirror gave similar reasons. They argued that Africans should rise to help their brothers and sisters, including anybody that require such help from the globe.

 

The contingent is the largest team that has emerged from any country to support the fight against the disease. Given its growing toll, Ebola has no other mission but to extinct humanity from Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, where 17256, cases, 10,793 laboratory confirmed cases and 6113 deaths have been recorded, according to United States Centre for Disease Control, CDC, updated statistics on the disease last week. Volunteers from Nigeria headed to Liberia and Sierra Leone last weekend. The two countries are lucky; they speak English language which is the official language in Nigeria. Hence, it is believed the effort will be result-driven, as there will only be very minimal challenges in reaching and communicating with locals in those countries, who also speak the corrupt English popularly called ‘pidgin’ like Nigerians. Thus, even culture and colour will also help also boost the fight against the scourge.

 

From all indications, for most of the volunteers, what they are doing is beyond just rendering help or saving lives; it seems they have seen the task as part of destiny they must fulfil. Comments from some of them aptly capture this assumption.

 

Dr Adekunle Sunday is one of the volunteers. He works at the ABU Teaching Hospital, Zaria, Kaduna state. He said: “I got to this programme by the open invitation, that is as a volunteer. If you recall, we took oath as medical professionals to take care of humanity. Then, this is an opportunity for us to actually be faithful to our oath. Initially, in the family, people had mixed feelings; everybody is afraid of Ebola as if it were a death sentence. But, at the end of the day, we all got over it. If you allow Ebola to continue to spread, it means even in our hiding places, Ebola may track us and find us out. It is very dangerous. Ebola is out to wipe off humanity.

 

“If you look at the effort of the Nigerian government. I think Nigerian government has done very well. You all recall that Nigeria is still in the learning process. And, all of us are still learning. For Nigeria to have taken this bold step of bringing medical professionals on board to tackle Ebola epidemic, I think it is a welcome idea. And then, at the end of it, it will all translate to individual group and the nation as a whole trying to make sure that whenever we have epidemic of any sort, we will know how to manage or how to approach it very well,” he added.

 

According to him, such effort could help in fostering unity among health professionals in Nigeria: “If you look at our differences, the time has come to actually put our differences aside and play our role as team. And, in this team work, I think Nigerians are the best professionals we have in the world. We are not looking at our differences; it is the job now. Those are the oaths we took – to take care of humanity.

 

“Going out, what we are telling the world is that we are capable; we are able to actually curtail any type of epidemic. It doesn’t matter, our differences are just minor issues. It is just that we have a lot of humanity at the back of our mind. I think that is the message to the world,” he stressed.

 

Beside, a lady, Imo Chinasa, who works with Ebola Emergency Operation Centre, EEOC, Lagos, is part of the team. She told our reporter: “My experience about ten years ago, I lost a relative because of HIV. That motivated me that if you are in the fight that matters, the family in the first place, you will not lose them. So, it is not about whether my family would let me go or not, the problem is if I go, will they be safer? So, I am thinking about my family, while thinking about every other family around. Don’t forget that every one of us came from a unit.”

 

Chinasa said further: “NIgeria has always been the champion of Pan-African affairs all over the world. It is not about their conception; it is about our own national interest of making sure that every of our neighbouring country is secure in terms of security and health wise. And, we know we have not just the capability, we have the capacity on the other hand to help them. We have the manpower and the skills to help them because the reason this problem escalated was because of inadequate facilities. The manpower was lacking and the right skills to contain the virus was not available.

 

“We know our potentials; we believe we will deploy our skills there and the disease would be contained for real. Nigeria cannot be secure, we can’t say we’ve contained Ebola, except it leaves our neighbouring countries,” she argued

by webmaster