nilikuwa nikitaka kusema lakini @alph angezusha

sio mimi nimesema!

everyone is closing their gate and door and looking at the spectacle from their windows.... fear is the worst thing about Ebola... worst thing! Imagine Zambia has banned/denied Nigerians entry into it's territory... 170million nigerians because of 10+ cases who are already in quarantine... MADNESS!! MADNESS!!

@masukuma siwezizusha ndugu, this's the reality. Muslim body must be washed before burial. And always body is washed while covered, nobody looks at naked body of anybody (I feel so sad for those bodies, being stacked naked, by those undertakers. Especially ladies bodies and those male undertakers ). And always there are special equipment used to wash the dead body, which includes gloves, special bed, sheet, water, soap, perfume, etc.

IT IS PART OF PROCEDURE TO USE GLOVES. EVEN IN NORMAL CIRCUMSTANCES WE USE THESE SPECIAL EQUIPMENT.

So also during this time of dangerous infection, extra care is applied, by using special aprons like the below. Nothing different from what non-Muslims do while putting their dead in the coffins, they have to be handled with correct gear, isn't? So all this knowledge and precaution is also available in Muslim communities, we've doctors too, we have medical experts too, we've teachers too, we've scholars too etc

I felt that I should give more details about this issue, to shade more light on the care taken handling dead bodies as far as Islamic body cleaning is concerned.

I know that many people don't know that this important process of washing Muslim dead body before burial is a fully developed process. Many don't know that in many occasions this process has to be done by someone who has learned the process, what we called mortician. And many don't know that there are several tools and accessories that are required. Of course not all of them can be available in every community. But there is specified 'Mortician kit' that is clearly stipulated in Islamic burial process.

Below are the accessories:
1. A special bed.
2. A bar of soap.
3. A clinical mask.
4. A pair of rubber hand gloves.
5. A set of cloth gloves for washing the body.
6. A plastic apron.
7. An eye protector or goggles.
8. An a surgical head cap.
9. A safety rubber boot.
10. A standard size scissor for cutting the shroud.
11. A five foot measuring tape.
12. A roll of wound bandage.
13. Adhesive wound plaster.
14. A set of clinical safety pin for holdig the shroud.
15. A roll of sewing tread and needle.
16. A comb.
17. A set of non alcoholic perfume.
18. A pack of cotton buds.
19. A tweezer.
20. Prescribe length of white cloth for shrouding.
21. Cotton rolls for cleaning delicate parts like around the eyes, nose, mouth.
22. A folded knife.
23. Camphor or kapur barus (cinnamomum camphora) for body wash.
24. Cendana or sandal wood (santalum album) powder for shrouding.
25. Plastic sheet 4' x 6' for laying down on the bed (Optional).

NOTE: See source here

@masukuma i see where this is heading to, as usual it has to be religious issue!

Ok see how it started recently:


NOTE: none of this says they participated in cleaning any body. Two year old don't clean bodies. So first infection must have been as me or you would catch it.

Now let's look further what is this town?

It seems Catholic pitched tent here.

Let's see who are the Kisi people

The religion above doesn't sound Islam. In fact it says "ancestral" and other cults.

IMPORTANT: I agree with you that everybody must treat this as very critical. Any religious processes must be carried out with extreme caution. This also includes those who handle dead bodies in mortury, the medical students, those outting them in coffins, those washing the bodies etc

don't get hot under your collar - I am telling you that those areas have muslims and that particular ritual/rite contributed to it's spread! they may have not eaten the first monkey/bat/Ground hog/chimp/<INSERT HOST HERE> that made the virus jump species but possibly one of the health workers who attended to subsequent patients was muslim and it fan out due to that particular ritual. it's a fact that Guinea, Sierra Leone and Lofa counties have larger populations of muslims in that area. Just Saying!... don't turn this into a religious debate, it's not profiting anyone to claim it's muslims who started this or animist e.t.c. it's not a religious debate -it's not!

let's talk facts, 3 things made this situation worser than previous ones in congo, UG and sudan

1. the rituals involved in body preparation and burial
2. refusal and scepticism by local communities that the disease was there - they were even stoning Samaritan's purse and MSF vehicles
3. weak governments and subsequently weak health care systems and this exposed caregivers to this disease.

my assessment is that first everyone needs to get involved in ensuring that the numbers of new cases probable/suspected/verified is reduced by
1) ensuring that MSF/Samaritan's purse/Governments of these places/ The UN/ WHO gets everything it needs equipment wise and people wise. Let them build many many many quarantine areas since people are now bringing forward the sick. (this will make the numbers go up for a couple of weeks as the real face of the disease reveals itself then steadily downwards)
2) information flows well. the problem as I had noted before is that firstly the people there did not believe that there was Ebola and it was seen to be a government ploy to 'eat money' now most of them have moved from the point of denial that the disease is there to the point of "if i don't believe it's there it won't affect me and my family... I REJECT IT!" to Wide spread Panic! you think you are terrified? you are 5,000 kms away with a steady flow of information coming your way - think of that healthy uneducated, uninformed soul in a shanty like new Kru Town or West Point (check out west point in this video - how terrified is he/she when they wake up and it's your husband who is vomiting and diarrheaing uncontrollably? or even yourself after eating some bad food! or you walk outside and your neighbour is the one on the street. this was taken a week or so ago

so imagine you are the guy welding those metal gates in the background.... how terrified are you? The only way to stop this disease is information flow and by ensuring that these people give up any symptomatic patients is the only way to quell it's spread.

@masukuma it's clear what your intention was.

Anyway to be fair, lets say all precautions must be put in place. Those handling coffins, those undertakers in mortuaries, medical officials, doctors, families, the morticians cleaning bodies... All must use the correct gear.

Otherwise trying to divert attention and lie saying oh the first people who started this Ebola is so and so is being malicious. I shown you that the first invident in 1976 was in DRC. You know and I know that is not Muslim. Then recently it started again in Guinea, in the town of Gueckeduo, which is Catholic, the first bit and his mother and his grandmother, and the nurse and the mourner were not Muslims. In fact it's probable te nurse must have come from the nearby Catholic Mission hospital.

Then you made an about turn and posted video of Liberia and the cultural people who eat their enemies hearts. That's not Idlam either. In fact the leaders of that civil war led by Charles Taylor, the general Johnstone were all Christians. And Liberia is 85% Christian.

@nakujua sawa. I agree we should sensitive all areas of potential risk, and ensure people use the right tools of trade. Of course we know not every place will be able to have the right equipment, and that's where people are now abandoning the bodies, not touching them until the authorities get in.

I pray that Allah gives us protection from this pandemic. May those affected get healing and remedy.

How it got into Nigeria http://www.thedailybeast...a-spread-to-nigeria.html