Brief News From The Jungle

    Tom pulled up a satellite map of Yengema, where Claire now is, in the Kono District of Sierra Leone, and here's a section of what came up:

    A bigger view showed more of the same, vast areas of green broken up by vast areas of brown.
     We're guessing, based on Claire's description of the landscape around her, that the green must be the jungle and the brown the diamond mines.   
    We've received little news from Claire over the past few days, only a few lines in a brief email mostly assuring us that she is safe and well, and a phone call from Miguel to tell us that he'd talked to Claire for a few minutes and she'd relayed as much.
    We did learn, though, that she's been working this week in a community care center in the jungle, coordinating the triage operation and serving as a clinical mentor to the local nurses in critical care skills.  Claire says the Sierra Leonean nurses are so nice and full of enthusiasm, they call her Sister Claire or  sometimes Kumba, which means her parents' second daughter.
    The care center is very small and has only 12 beds.   If it's determined that a patient has Ebola they'll be cared for until they can be transferred to the closest Ebola treatment unit, which is about an hour away over treacherously rough roads. 
    At the end of this week Claire will be transferred to the government hospital in Koidu Town, the capital of Kono District about 30 miles from where she now is,  where she'll probably continue with the same duties she's now undertaking.
    Claire works at the care center from around 8 am to 6 pm, going throughout the day in and out of the Hot Zone, or the area where the Ebola or suspected Ebola patients are. 
    After work she comes home to the Diamond Hotel for a hot shower once the water comes on,  dinner, then maybe a pick-up game of cards around the dinner table with some of the other Partners In Health staff.
    Claire works every day, though she says could probably have a day off if she needed one. 
   Which I guess begs the question:  what would she do with a day off, anyway, in an area under siege from Ebola?