Sierra Leone Ebola-free! Residents celebrate momentous event

Sierra Leone has been declared Ebola-free by the World Health Organization, ending nearly 17 months of outbreak in the country.

A big celebration was held in the capital of Sierra Leone, Freetown after Anders Nordstrom, the country director from the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the country to be free from the disease after 42 days have passed without any new case. Many people attended the ceremony held around the Cotton Tree with a candlelight vigil held in honor of health workers who lost their lives in the line of duty.

"For us, Ebola is not over. We need your help to treat the many, many health problems we still suffer from. And remember those who died at the hands of Ebola, and especially the children who have been affected by this outbreak," said Yusuf Kamara, a healthcare worker and Ebola survivor who lost 16 family members due to the disease, via The Guardian.

According to the president of the country, Ernest Bai Koroma, there will be a 90-day heightened surveillance to ensure that the disease does not resurface. This means that The National Ebola Response Centre (NERC) will continue mandatory screening of Ebola virus in all dead bodies until June of next year.

Reuters reports that since the first Ebola case was recorded in the country in May 2014, nearly 4,000 deaths have been reported in Sierra Leone. The country, together with Liberia and Guinea are the three countries that are at the center of the outbreak in West Africa. According to the WHO data, there have been more than 11,000 deaths in three countries combined.

An attendee describes the ceremony to having "mixed emotions."

"Everyone is celebrating, but the truth is I'm surprised at the normality of everything. On Friday people came to work and were talking about it, but not in an excited way," said Marto Lado, an infectious diseases consultant at a Freetown hospital, via Guardian. "It's more of a relief, people thinking: 'Oh, my God, I can't believe we have got here.' It has taken so long for this weekend to arrive. There is still a lot of anxiety about what might happen. There is still Ebola in Guinea and we know it is not over yet."

Just a few months ago, Liberia was declared Ebola-free. Guinea, however, continues to struggle with the disease. According to The Herald-News, there have been seven new Ebola cases in the country in the last several days. According to Fode Tass Sylla, a member of the Ebola task force in the country, the citizens have not stuck to preventative and sanitary measures in the past couple of months.