Circulating around the globe during the 2014-15 Ebola outbreak in West Africa were bold and sensationalistic headlines such as “Killer Virus”, “Ebola Here!” and “Burn dead bodies.” Along with such stark and shocking headlines were images of health providers sealed (concealed) within personal protective equipment (PPE), people following in the footsteps of every suspected case sparying disinfectant, and sick, suffering or dead bodies splayed out in public or whisked off in the most degrading manner as a sense of panic and hysteria overrode social conventions.
Sensationalistic statements and visual provocations coming from TV and other media filled people with dread and played on people’s anxieties of a disease with dramatic symptoms, with high death rates, and certainly no cure. Given these impressions—ones that linger in the mind long after the crisis has passed and ones that conjure up everything else dreadful and horrific—it is hard to consider Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) as anything other than exotic, unique and unstoppable.
