Ebola mission for Bristol graduate

“I was scared at first because you just don’t know what to expect,” said UWE graduate Laura Holding.

The microbiology graduate, who normally works for Public Health England, has recently returned from West Africa after volunteering to help deal with the Ebola crisis.

Based at a treatment centre in Kerry Town in Sierra Leone, she was responsible for diagnosing the disease. “It’s rewarding as well as sad,” she said.

“Obviously there are good times too such as when a very sick patient makes a full recovery and can go home.”

Far cry from normal

Laura graduated from UWE in 2013 with a master’s degree in medical microbiology. She worked at the first British-built treatment centre for five weeks, conducting laboratory tests on patient samples to determine who is infected with the virus.

It’s a far cry from her normal job working in a food, water and environmental lab, but Laura said she felt the need to use her professional skills to help as best she could: “Like most of my colleagues here I wanted to use my training and education to help a genuine cause. Studying exotic pathogens was my favourite topic – but I didn’t ever envisage I’d have to use the knowledge first hand.”

‘Difficult to communicate’

Staff deal with up to 150 samples from patients a day. Typically Laura would set up the lab, cleaning all surfaces with a very strong bleach solution and ensuring there are enough disinfectants, consumables and reagents. Five staff work at any one time carrying out safety checks and rotating between duties such as isolator work, RNA extraction and polymerase chain reaction (PCR).

Safety was paramount for the volunteers and the protective clothing Laura had to wear made it “very difficult to communicate at times”.

“It does get uncomfortable but we make sure we drink lots of water. We are very lucky to have air conditioning in the lab which I know previously deployments have not had the luxury of, so although it can get hot, it’s never unbearable.”

Regular hand-washing in a weak chlorine solution and having her temperature checked on entering and leaving various sites was also a routine part of daily life.

Despite what she witnesses Laura said she loved the country and it’s people: “The country is beautiful – its name translates as lion mountain – and its people are doing all they can, many of them helped build and work at the centre.

“Before I arrived I imagined a broken country so initially I was surprised at how life was carrying on as normal, on the surface anyway; markets are still bustling, people are out with nets fishing and people are upbeat.

“However, there are a lot of other consequences of the outbreak such as economic impact, hospitals and schools closing and various other projects in the country coming to a halt.”