BBC                                                              Dec. 15, 2014

Liberia has begun treating Ebola patients with serum therapy - a treatment made from the blood of recovered survivors.

Doctors hope the experimental treatment could help combat the virus that has been sweeping West Africa and killing thousands of people.

If a person has successfully fought off the infection, it means their body has learned how to combat the virus and they will have antibodies in their blood that can attack Ebola.

Doctors in Liberia will monitor how safe and effective is the serum treatment being given at the ELWA Hospital in Monrovia.

 Dr David Hoover, the programme's director, said: "This will empower local health care systems to become more self-sufficient and better serve their patients during this current epidemic as well as in the future."

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http://www.bbc.com/news/health-30478512

UNITED NATIONS NEWS CENTRE                                                                                    Dec. 13, 2014
Amid a spike in Ebola transmission rates in Sierra Leone, the United Nations envoy coordinating the massive global crisis response has travelled to the West African nation to help implement a surge in efforts to contain the outbreak.

Anthony Banbury, head of the UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER), views an International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) Ebola Treatment Centre in Kenema, Sierra Leone. (November 2014) UNMEER Photo/Ari Gaitanis

 “We need to put in place a big surge to get those case numbers down, and we've been working on implementing that surge in the last week,” Anthony Banbury, head of the UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER), said in a press release following his two-day visit to the country's capital, Freetown, from 11 to 12 December. With some 8,069 cases, Sierra Leone is now the worst-affected country in West Africa, according to UNMEER's latest data. Together, Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone have so far registered over 18,000 cases of Ebola, including more than 6,300 deaths.

USA TODAY  by Greg Zoroya                                                                                          Dec. 13, 2014

MONROVIA, Liberia — Landlords won't rent to them. Employers won't hire them. Taxi drivers won't give them a lift. Barber shops refuse to cut their hair without gloves.

Juliet Boima, 19, a survivor who works at the ebola clinic since she is immune now. Despite being unable to contract ebola, she still must wear protective gear to eliminate the chance that she could carry the virus to someone else.(Photo: Gregory H Stemn for USA TODAY)

They are Ebola survivors. In one place where they are desperately needed as workers, Ebola treatment clinics, many survivors have nightmarish memories of barely staying alive.

Thousands of West Africans have beaten the odds and survived Ebola. More than 6,500 people have died in the outbreak, and only 30% who have contracted Ebola have survived the aggressive disease that robs the body of fluids and causes major organs to fail.

Most who emerge from the clinics fully recovered discover a cruel society eager to distance itself from them and the plague.

NEW YORK TIMES  by Donald G. McNeil, Jr.                                                                              Dec. 13, 2014

NEW YORK --The well-prepared Ebola fighter in West Africa may soon have some new options: protective gear that zips off like a wet suit, ice-cold underwear to make life inside the sweltering suits more bearable, or lotions that go on like bug spray and kill or repel the lethal virus.

A prototype for one of the protective suits in contention for the U.S.A.I.D. "Grand Challenges" award. Credit John Hopkins University/Jhpiego