Do not be Afraid of Ebola, by Yvonne White

Ebola is a scary and deadly disease that can kill people if not treated immediately. However, Ebola is less likely to affect those with a strong immune system, prayers, drinking water, and a positive attitude instead of a negative attitude.

It is true there is Ebola in certain African countries. However, not all African countries have the disease. Even countries that used to have the disease have now become Ebola- free. Thanks go to the Doctors and Nurses without Borders who leave their own homes to treat patients with the disease in other countries. To add, both the doctors and nurses deserve awards and heroism, not hatred and negative comments just because of their love for others.

Americans should not be afraid of Ebola. My mother keeps telling me that 90% of the things people worry about do not happen. Americans are lucky to have good and effective hospitals, with doctors and nurses to treat patients, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which reports any case of disease.

The media and politicians do not always speak the truth. People do not get Ebola in airplanes or in every parts of African countries. Additionally, Ebola is transmitted through body fluids from patients who have the disease. This is why patients with Ebola are put under 21 days of quarantines. However, this does not mean we should hate Ebola patients. They need help, too. There is a saying in Nigerian movies, which is the “rejected stones shall become the chief stones.” This means if someone is hated in any part of the world, especially his or her community, that person will be blessed by God and become rich and famous in the future, even when the person has died and gone to heaven.

People need to know, hatred leads to hatred, and it can kill ten times faster than any disease in the world. If we can love and care for patients who have cancer, diabetes, heart attack, stroke, AIDS and flu, I do not see why we have to be forced to hate patients with Ebola.

History is repeating itself. I remembered watching the Ryan White Story on YouTube. This was about a boy who had AIDs in the 1980s. The community where he grew up rejected and mistreated him and his family and even forbade him to attend school because he had HIV. The only people who showed him love were his family, doctors and nurses, Ronald Reagan, a few friends and Michael Jackson.

Media and negative comments have made people, especially children, to become bullies. Two boys from Ghana, age 11 and 13, who were studying in New York to get an education, got bullied and beaten badly by some children just because they were Africans. They did not have Ebola, and Ebola has not even appeared in Ghana. Furthermore, children from African countries get teased, bullied and beaten nearly to death, all in the name of Ebola.

I understand Ebola can be deadly. Nevertheless, it should not scare anyone because God is watching everyone. Health care professionals, especially the CDC, are doing whatever they can to eradicate the disease. I believe Ebola will disappear very soon because not everything lasts forever.

One last note, people from different countries have different cultures. In Africa, it is against the custom to cremate bodies. African people believe in burying the dead. Moreover, people are resistant to change, and it takes some time for people to get used to change. Just because Africans do not want to burn bodies does not mean they are fools and idiots. It is just not their culture. It is like African health officials coming to America to forbid people to eat at fast-food restaurants because they are concerned about their health, or to prevent them from driving and working in steel industries, in order to reduce pollution that can cause cancer and asthma both in children and adults. The health officials would tell them to take buses, trains, airplanes and cabs to work, other states and to schools instead of their air-polluting cars. This would for sure anger Americans.

Do not be afraid of Ebola; do not let it control your life.