When Ebola hysteria broke out in the United States in 2014, mainstream media got a little crazy. While one person was afflicted, 28,000 people got heart disease with far less fanfare. Meanwhile, the National Institutes of Health engaged in political theater and claimed it couldn't work on Ebola because they lacked the budget. Science 2.0 noted that they had gotten $300 billion while one tiny company strugged to get money for clinical trials - and it's only help was from the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, rather than the NIH. Nonetheless, Congress gave the NIH more money.

So American political and media bodies taught what not to do, while in West Africa we learned what would actually help; things like building local health care infrastructures, improving capacity to respond more quickly to outbreaks and considering multiple perspectives across disciplines during decision-making processes. 

The World Health Organisation began to rebuild its reputation a decade ago by shucking off activism and embracing products like DDT to reduce malaria, as they had done so well with in the 1960s, but the Ebola response was two steps backward. It looked like the United Nations of old - incompetent bureaucrats catering to local politics and helping no one. Activists say that to function they need binding commitments from the international community, but really WHO needs to make a binding commitment to the public, and to stop taking medical positions that are based in political and social engineering. 

An editorial in Science written by Janet Currie and Bryan Grenfell of Princeton and Jeremy Farrarof the Wellcome Trust, states the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends:  

•  Strengthen local health care. During the Ebola epidemic, workers on the ground bore the brunt of the outbreak. More than 800 health care workers were infected, and 500 workers died. Strengthening and rebuilding local health care infrastructures is the key to containing future outbreaks. 

•  Improve international response. The first cases of Ebola were confirmed in March 2014, and yet, the WHO did not declare it a public health emergency until August 2014. The WHO must be able to respond more quickly and with greater impacts going forward. Likewise, research should be coordinated during the time between epidemics as well as during outbreaks - not just when there is a crisis.

•  Social structures, living environments and human behavior all influence the course of an epidemic. Therefore, moving beyond disciplinary silos is essential. One example that illustrates this importance involves the development of safe, effective and deployable vaccines. A recent Ebola vaccine in Guinea has been successful, but it could have been deployed earlier. 15 years earlier, for example, if the NIH used some of its hundreds of billions of dollars before the situation is international outrage. 

•  Acting synergistically. Providing basic health services at a community level is the key to establishing trust, improving surveillance and creating capacity to mount a rapid response.