NEW YORK TIMES: …The first to respond to the Ebola crisis in West Africa, Doctors Without Borders remains the primary international medical aid group battling the disease there. As local health systems have all but collapsed and most outside institutions, including the United States military, have yet to fulfill all their pledges of help, the charity has erected six treatment centers in West Africa, with plans for more. Its workers have treated the majority of patients, just as they have in previous Ebola outbreaks and some other epidemics in the developing world…
Its state-of-the-art supply depot in Brussels, for example, has sent hundreds of thousands of masks, protective suits, large tents and medical supplies to West Africa in recent months, getting them on the ground within 24 hours. To overcome obstacles, the Brussels logistics team is innovating — developing field tents rigged so workers do not get overheated, retrofitting body bags to absorb infectious fluids and seeking fast ways to dry wet boots that must be regularly disinfected….
And the group has drawn on its legions of volunteers and billion-dollar base of donors who are attracted by its insistence on independence and record of providing care in places where often no one else dares to go… (more)
