Step 1: What Is Ebola?

Have students to locate Sierra Leone on the globe and share what they already know or believe about the country. Consider using this basic country information to fill in gaps in knowledge or address misconceptions.

Print and distribute the “Ebola Basics” infographic from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to the class. Test for understanding by asking students, in their own words, to describe the symptoms of Ebola and how it is transmitted. For advanced science classes with high reading levels, consider using the CDC Ebola Factsheet.

*Though there is still no treatment or cure for Ebola, several vaccines have been developed and are being tested.

Step 2: Watch Clips 1 and 2

As students are watching the clips, ask them to write down facts that stand out to them and questions that occur to them. Take a few moments after watching to allow students to share their reactions and to discuss or table any questions that arise.

As a class, come to a shared understanding of the following terms:
(as needed, use the definitions from the CDC website)

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC): A U.S. government agency charged with protecting the health of the U.S. population. The agency specializes in infectious diseases, meaning illnesses that are transmittable (as opposed to those a person is born with). The CDC conducts research and surveillance, conducts outbreak investigations and sets guidance for the entire U.S. healthcare system on prevention, care and treatment of disease. The CDC becomes involved in international health crises in connection with its perception of how and whether they may affect the U.S. population.

Contagiousness: The likelihood that a disease can be transmitted to another person.

Epidemic: Occurrence in a defined area of cases of an illness or other health-related event that goes far beyond the norm. The beginning of an epidemic may be described as an “outbreak”; an epidemic that spreads over a continent or around the globe is a “pandemic.”

Infectious Disease: An illness that can be transmitted from one person to another, for example through the air or through contact with bodily fluids.

Intervention: Action taken that is designed to have an effect on a disease and alter its course.

Pandemic: A pandemic is the worldwide spread of a new disease.

Prevention: Action taken to avoid or forestall a disease.

Public Health: An approach to health that takes into account systemic and societal factors that affect the health of an entire population, including surveillance, prevention and intervention efforts.

World Health Organization (WHO): An entity of the United Nations designed to protect the world’s health with regard to infectious and other diseases. WHO conducts research and surveillance, recommends national and international health policy guidance, conducts prevention and treatment programs and leads and coordinates international health interventions.

Discuss:

If you were a public health official in Sierra Leone, what steps would you have wanted to take as the outbreak occurred? How would you have wanted the following to be addressed?

-Education about the disease
-Care and treatment for patients from their families
-Care and treatment for patients in clinics or hospitals
-Necessary health care for people who do not have Ebola, for example, car accident victims, pregnant women, cancer patients
-Prevention of further infection

Step 3: Play Clips 3 and 4 and have students use Handout One to keep track of what they see being done in the clip to fight the Ebola epidemic. Consider showing the clips twice to give students ample opportunity to complete the chart. Who is doing the action, and what is their action intended to accomplish?

When students feel confident that their charts are complete, have them circle the actions they noticed were effective and be prepared to explain why. Have students place checkmarks next to actions they saw that caused problems, conflicts or confusion.

Step 4: Show Clip 5 of the outbreak in Sierra Leone winding down. Understanding that there is still no treatment for the Ebola virus, ask students to use their responses on Handout One to write a letter outlining what they noticed about the national and international responses that went well and what might be improved. Consider using the sentence stems in Handout Two to guide the letter writing.