The donation of October 2014 goes to:
the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC)
The current Ebola outbreak is the largest in history. Nearly 3,200 people have died and over 6,800 cases have been reported across Sierra Leone, Liberia, Guinea, Nigeria and Senegal.
Entire villages in Liberia have been isolated following confirmed cases of Ebola. Hospitals are filling up with Ebola patients, leaving no capacity to deal with other health needs. Food shortages are expected due to price hikes, border closures and a lack of labour to harvest maize and rice crops. Many schools have closed indefinitely and some 2,000 children have been orphaned.
The disease has a 48% survival rate with the right supportive care, so it is vital that people who are infected seek medical treatment as soon as possible.
Red Cross is going door-to-door helping people understand how Ebola is spread, how to protect themselves, and where to get help. We are providing medical treatment and care, helping people to safely bury loved ones who have died, and following up people who have the virus to see that they get the care they need. In total, the international Red Cross Movement has reached 37.9 million people with information.
There are now over 4,000 trained volunteers at work in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea alone, with more being trained in other countries. Because these volunteers live in the places affected by the disease, they can understand and talk honestly with people about their fear and grief, and teach them how to protect themselves and prevent the virus from spreading.
Volunteers also have the sad but crucial job of helping people to safely bury loved ones who have died from the virus. Red Cross volunteers have so far buried around 1,353 bodies and followed up 16,730 people at risk of Ebola.
For more information on the ongoing epidemic of Ebola, see this Wikipedia article.
[donation made via Røde Kors (the Norwegian branch of IFRC]