PT: During the Ebola outbreak, I was working in Connaught Teaching Hospital. During the outbreak, we were encouraged to go to the treatment center to help the government. I worked as a volunteer nurse in the treatment center. Before we were sent, they trained us in IPC [infection prevention and control]. I worked at Hastings Ebola Treatment Center during Ebola outbreak.

Q: Can you tell me a bit more about being encouraged and then volunteering? What was that like?

PT: Well, really, it was not easy, as soon as people knew that you were working in an Ebola treatment center, people discouraged you. The stigma was painful. My landlord and my neighbors even went to the police. I was not treating any patients, but because of stigma, most of them went around saying that I had patients because I was working in a treatment center. My landlord even decided to give me notice. I was totally isolated. Nobody would come near me.

Q: And then you started to work in the treatment center. Could just describe what it was like working at that time, your experiences, what you learned, anything, what you saw, what you felt?

PT: Working in the Ebola treatment center at that crucial time, it was very scary. My family abandoned me, because they already concluded that I had made up my mind to die. My first day at the treatment center, I was asked to go and give IV [intravenous] fluid to one of the Ebola patients. The patient was not in a bed, so I had to look around for her and I met her taking a bath. After she finished taking a bath, I helped take her to the bed. I tried to set the IV line and saw that I had a splash of vomitus on me. But I had on a full PPE, which is the personal protective [equipment] gear. Even though I was safe, my in-charge quarantined me for one week.

Q: And that was your first day.

PT: That was my first day! So that very day, I couldn’t go home. After one week, they did a blood test. I was negative. The next day, I went home. There was a rumor going around that I have contracted Ebola virus, which was not true. People were not accepting us nurses.

Q: Even your family?

PT: Even our families. When I gave them money, I put it on the floor before they took it. Many people were homeless because of working in a treatment center. They were given notice. Even if you’ve got money you want to give your family, they would reject it.

Q: You talked a lot about the isolation and the stigma. For you, as a nurse working in the treatment center, did that change over time? Did the isolation and the stigma, did that get worse, get better?

PT: In the beginning, it got worse, because the disease was out of control. People were not observing the IPC protocol, to use hand sanitizer or wash your hands whenever you are in contact with someone, or in contact with any object. This IPC method really helped to minimize the transmission of Ebola virus. Without this sensitization, I think Ebola would have still remained. I also worked with confirmed cases, and in that type of treatment unit, the burden was much higher.

Q: The burden?

PT: Yes. Because we had to be very protective. With the slightest mistake, you contract Ebola. I can remember one kid who was also an Ebola victim. He escaped from the treatment unit to the nurses’ room, the staff room, and storeroom where the drugs are kept. This little boy, nobody knew where he came from. We failed to realize that he was from the treatment center, in the unit. The child came in and was with us. Even touched many of us. But by then, he had been, I think, two months in the treatment center. If it takes two months, or one month, they take your sample and re-test you. If you are negative, they will give you another chance. After two weeks, they do the last check. If you are negative then, then you will be discharged. So fortunately, the boy’s result was on the way, and the result was negative. If not, every one of us would have contracted the Ebola virus. So the experience was so much. The experience was so much.

Q: What is your proudest moment? What are you most proud of?

PT: What I am most proud of is we succeeded. The Hastings Ebola Treatment Center, if I remember, was one of the renowned treatment centers in Sierra Leone. We discharged a large number of survivors. Every month, we survived, and we discharged about forty or fifty. We discharged the survivors to go home. We took them home. And the other thing I am proud of is that only one staff member among us that caught Ebola virus, contracted Ebola virus.

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Philip Tommy was interviewed for Frontline Nurses by Susan Michaels-Strasser on August 13, 2019 in Freetown, Sierra Leone.

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