Re: Ebola’s revelations about our paganism and credulity

Poor knowledge, credulity and superstition are the key vectors that led to the rapid growth of the Ebola epidemic.” That was Dr Jibrin Ibrahim in his column published last Wednesday.Without doubt, the columnist has clearly identified the norms and our (Africans’) sappy attitude towards issues of this nature. Back here in Nigeria, many theories have […]

Poor knowledge, credulity and superstition are the key vectors that led to the rapid growth of the Ebola epidemic.” That was Dr Jibrin Ibrahim in his column published last Wednesday.
Without doubt, the columnist has clearly identified the norms and our (Africans’) sappy attitude towards issues of this nature. Back here in Nigeria, many theories have been coined in respect to this: that Patrick Sawyer was paid to bring the Ebola virus into the country; some claim it was a plot by some few political elites to achieve their political goals come 2015; some say it’s a disease of a particular religion, some said it was a Western agenda to further destabilise and dismember Nigeria. I can go on and on.
In some part of the country, what has now been termed ‘Salty Day’ was rumoured or believe to be prophesized by a Pastor who dreamt that drinking and bathing with salted water would prevent the user from contracting the virus. Many were killed as a result of this dubious preventative, rather than by the virus itself.
Kudos is due to the columnist for such a stellar article. We need more of these informative articles and awareness materials at this time of global emergency. Nigerians shouldn’t mix issues up, as the columnist point of view is that the Ebola virus has found its ugly way into the country, we should be careful and take sensible measures to prevent the disease from further spread. Ebola virus is a biological disease and which can only be cured by orthodox vaccines, not spiritual.

Ahmed Abdulrahman, Kaduna <[email protected]>;