As Ebola relief ramps up, other aid efforts stumble in West Africa

(The Christian Science Monitor) Back in May, when the Ebola virus first crossed over from Guinea into Sierra Leone, among the first to know were staffers working for a U.S.-based charity on a child malnutrition project in the country’s east.

Catholic Relief Services staffers began switching from malnutrition to Ebola prevention when the first cases were confirmed in neighboring Guinea. But with limited resources and knowledge of how to combat the disease, they were outgunned when it came to Sierra Leone.   

“It moved from one town to a slightly more major town; then it was in the next district, where our office is," said Meredith Dyson, CRS country health program manager. “I don’t think that anyone at that point saw where it was going to go or understood the measures that were going to be needed to contain it.”