Blair Glencorse is in Liberia with Accountability Lab, working to find creative young Liberians that have great ideas for solving challenges in their communities, including Ebola.
Photo Credit: Morgana Wingard
Late last year, Blair did an Instagram takeover on ONE’s account. We found the photos so moving that we wanted to share them with you here.
Below you will find photos of some of the hidden heroes Blair has found in Liberia who are using innovative ways to beat the virus.
Meet Anthony Showell, one of our “Hidden Heroes” in the fight against Ebola in Liberia.
He’s 11 years old and the youngest student at Accountability Lab’s Film School. He’s making films about Ebola awareness and fighting the stigma that surrounds survivors. He told us “everyone, however young, can help to make Liberia safe again”.
Meet Karlia Bonarwolo, one of our “Hidden Heroes” in the fight against Ebola in Liberia.
He was one of the first people to contract Ebola in Monrovia back in early July and is now President of the Ebola Survivors Association of Liberia. He’s organizing the survivors to fight for the benefits they’ve been promised and to organize themselves to lobby for better health services and for health insurance. “The government is close but needs to do more to finish this fight” he told us.
Meet Kou Gbaintor-Johnson, one of our “Hidden Heroes” in the fight against Ebola in Liberia.
Gbaintor is the Head of the People United community in Monrovia- a township of 17,000 people in the city center. She set up Ebola awareness and case tracing teams quickly, funded by the community who all contributed 40 cents a day to the cause. There have been just 2 cases and 1 death in the whole community: “we prevented Ebola before it even started” she told us.
Meet Leslie Lummeh, one of our ‘Hidden Heroes” in the fight against Ebola in Liberia.
Leslie runs Accountability Lab’s art school and a visual arts academy called LIVArts. He and his team have been painting Ebola awareness murals on walls around Monrovia to help the government and international community get the right messages out in a country where over 50% of the population can’t read. “Artists might not be health workers, but we have been working to beat Ebola- images are the most powerful way to educate people on how to stay safe,” he told us.
Meet Pandora Hodge, one of our “Hidden Heroes” in the fight against Ebola in Liberia.
Pandora runs a student organization called Kriterion Monrovia which has deployed 72 young Liberians to train health workers and sensitize communities around the country. Because cell coverage can be so bad, and many people don’t have phones, the students have also created a postal service by motorbike that takes notes from families to their loved ones that are in the Ebola Treatment Centers. “Ebola doesn’t catch us, we catch it,” she says. “We are raising awareness to stop this in its tracks.”
Meet Regina Wilson, the last of our “Hidden Heroes” in the fight against Ebola in Liberia.
Regina is the Chairwoman of the Ebola Task Force in the New Georgia community of Montserrado County. After an outbreak of cases, she mobilized her community to quarantine family-members of the affected- and the neighbors all joined together to provide them with the food & water they needed during this 21-day period. There are 6 Ebola orphans from that time, but the community has been Ebola-free for almost two months. “Everyone who is sick has to go and get treatment” she says “the sooner you get in the sooner you get out”.