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Iowa doctor returns from Sierra Leone, shares ideas to slow spread of Ebola

An Iowa doctor has returned after spending almost a month helping with the Ebola crises in Africa.

An Iowa doctor has returned after spending almost a month helping with the Ebola crises in Africa.

Epidemiologist with the Iowa Department of Public Health, Dr. Samir Koirala, spent 25 days in Sierra Leone assisting with the prevention of the spread of Ebola. When he traveled there, he said he knew the risks, according to a report by WHO news.

“Getting international doctors there is not a problem because they understand the risk and know what precautions they need to take,” Dr. Koirala said.

While Dr. Koirala was overseas working with the Center for Disease Control, he said he didn’t make direct contact with patients, but got a feel for why Ebola will be so hard to stop.

“People believe that once you go to the hospital, you are not coming back. You will be dead. That belief has to be changed,” Dr. Koirala told WHO news.

He also said that many African people don’t believe the disease is real, and fear that it may be a government scam or that doctors will kill them to sell their organs for profit.

“There are rumors that the government is trying to make some kind of currency and need blood for that,” said Dr. Koirala.

At a press conference Wednesday, September 17, 2014 he shared that better equipped treatment centers and diagnostic facilities would slow the outbreak. He said the biggest challenge, however, would be earning the trust of the African people, according to the report.

“There have been successfully treated people and they have been discharged. That message isn’t coming out,” said Dr. Koirala.

Two Americans diagnosed with Ebola were the first patients to be treated for the virus in the United States. Both of them survived, and one of them went on to donate his blood to help another infected American survive.

According to the CDC the Ebola outbreak is one of the largest Ebola outbreaks in history and the first in West Africa.

In late August, the World Health Organization said more than 1,500 deaths from Ebola.

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