This reportive piece from NPR covers the reunification of 18 children with their families in Liberia after being quarantined at an Ebola care center, or “shelter” in Monrovia. The children were placed there after observation as they had all come into contact with the Ebola virus, primarily through relatives. Many of the children had lost several family members to Ebola, one of the reasons that family reunification in the context of Ebola in Liberia can be challenging, according to the article.
The process of reunification can be lengthy - children who have come into contact with Ebola are first put under observation to see if they exhibit any signs of having contracted the virus. After the observation stage, the children are placed into a second shelter where they must remain for at least 21 days before they are eligible to be released. Once the second stage is complete, the children are transported back to their families (to those family members who remain and are able to take them in). They are sent home with mattresses, clothes, blankets, 55 pounds of rice, and cooking oil, as many of their belongings were likely burned when their homes became contaminated with Ebola.
Adding to the challenge of reunification, the children who return, and the adults who survive the Ebola virus, are often met with a great deal of stigma in their communities and the transition can be difficult. What’s more, they are left to deal with the grief of having lost loved ones. Thirteen year-old Lovetee remarks "We were [a family of] seven. My father, my grandma, my auntie, my uncle and my brother died."