Fatu Kekula has cared for four
of her family members with Ebola, keeping three alive without infecting herself.
Her trash
bag protection method is being taught to others in West Africa who can't get
personal protective equipment.
Kekula
saved, from left, her mother, Victoria, 57, sister, Vivian, 28, and father,
Moses, 52.
Kekula's
14-year-old cousin who was living with them, Alfred Winnie, passed away.
Kekula's
father is working to find a scholarship for Fatu so she can finish her final
year of nursing school. He has no doubt his daughter will It can be exhausting nursing a child through a
nasty bout with the flu, so imagine how 22-year-old Fatu Kekula felt nursing her
entire family through Ebola.
Her father. Her mother. Her
sister. Her cousin. Fatu took care of them all, single-handedly feeding them,
cleaning them and giving them medications.
And she did so with remarkable
success. Three out of her four patients survived. That's a 25% death rate --
considerably better than the estimated Ebola death
rate of 70%.
Fatu stayed healthy, which is
noteworthy considering that more than 300 health care workers have become
infected with Ebola, and she didn't even have personal protection equipment --
those white space suits and goggles used in Ebola treatment units.
Every day, several times a day
for about two weeks, Fatu put trash bags over her socks and tied them in a knot
over her calves. Then she put on a pair of rubber boots and then another set of
trash bags over the boots.
She wrapped her hair in a pair of
stockings and over that a trash bag. Next she donned a raincoat and four pairs
of gloves on each hand, followed by a mask.
It was an arduous and
time-consuming process, but Fatu was religious about it, never cutting
corners.
UNICEF Spokeswoman Sarah Crowe
said Fatu is amazing.
AMAZING!
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