Ebola survivor brings dignity to child burial

Maseray Kamara knows Ebola's toll firsthand. The virus took her husband and sister during its rampage through Sierra Leone. Ebola struck her as well, but she survived.

However, the 53-year-old grandmother is unbowed and looking to protect her community from the illness. She is the first woman Ebola survivor to join World Vision's burial team in Bo, a major city in south-central Sierra Leone.

"For me, surviving Ebola is a miracle of God," says Maseray. "I joined the burial team as a way of giving thanks to him."

Concern for the dignity of deceased Ebola victims also motivated Maseray to become a burial worker.

"While I was recovering in hospital, I saw how some corpses were treated and I thought, 'This is not right,'" she says. "They need to be given a last honor and their dignity protected, especially the women."

When a death call comes into one of the organization’s call centers, an eight-person team responds.

Maseray spent a week training and preparing emotionally for her first call to provide a safe and dignified burial.

“I am ready for this day," she says. “I will execute all that I have been taught in the training.”

The call comes. It's a 20-minute drive from the burial team staging area in Bo to the nearby Bendu community, where the team leader explains to mourners what is about to happen. Maseray dons multiple layers of protective equipment. As an Ebola survivor, Maseray is immune to the disease.

Maseray learns her first call is to bury a baby – the 1,686th victim interred by a World Vision burial team since the teams began operating in November. More than 3,535 people had died from Ebola in Sierra Leone, as of May 1, including 463 children.

The team speaks to the family, and then Maseray leads her colleagues to the house. She emerges holding the shrouded, lifeless child close to her chest.

Normally, the burial teams lay the body down while the imam or pastor says a brief prayer.

“This is even more important for me, as a mother myself," Maseray says, "It is really important for me to bury my fellow mother’s child in a safe and dignified way.”

During the prayers, Maseray embraces the child.

As the team treads through the forest to the burial site, Maseray cradles the child in her arms, approaching the gravesite slowly.

“I want to give this child a great farewell,” Maseray says. “I want to walk the child in peace.”

After gently lowering the body into the grave, Maseray carefully covers it with sticks. Finally, she takes a wooden stake with a number plate fastened to it, and puts it on the grave.

There's no name on the plate. Just a number. She commits it to memory.

“1,686 … that’s my number,” she says.

Safe and dignified burials key to Ebola prevention

Maseray is proud to serve with World Vision, which leads SMART (Social Mobilisation And Respectful Burials Through faith-based alliance), in partnership with Catholic Relief Services and CAFOD. Together, they have trained and equipped 803 workers to conduct safe, dignified burials for Ebola victims and others that preserve sacred traditions, while preventing contamination of family members. Since November 2014, SMART’s 57 teams have buried more than 8,500 people in seven districts across Sierra Leone, as of May 1.

Maseray and her courageous colleagues are frontline Ebola fighters, who view their work as a service to their country. Grieving families are supportive and grateful for their help. They understand why their loved ones must be buried according to this “new normal” in Sierra Leone, as emotionally difficult as it is.

While bringing comfort to grieving families, burial workers risk their health and safety daily to some degree. However, many are shunned and stigmatised because of the work they do. Often abandoned by family and friends, some have even been evicted by fearful landlords.

But they remain undeterred. “We are winning this war, but it isn’t over yet,” says Maseray. “We will continue until it is.”

 

(Source: https://www.worldvision.ie/news/detail/ebola-survivor-brings-dignity-to-child-burial )

---