Doctor who died of Ebola hailed as hero 2

Landover Hills - Dr Martin Salia didn't get into the medical profession to get
rich, and even though he was a permanent US resident, he chose to work in
his native Sierra Leone because the need for surgeons there was so great.
Although his medical colleagues were worried when he returned there to
treat Ebola patients, they said the decision was consistent with his character.
The 44-year-old surgeon was remembered on Saturday at his funeral Mass
as a tireless, selfless and heroic advocate for medical care for the less
fortunate. Salia died of Ebola on November 17 after being flown to a hospital
in Omaha, Nebraska, in the advanced stages of the deadly virus. He became
the second person to die in the US after contracting Ebola in West Africa,
where it has killed nearly 7 000 people.
Ron Klain, the White House Ebola response coordinator, read a personal note
of condolence from President Barack Obama to Salia's family.
"The greatest heroes are people who choose to face danger, who voluntarily
put themselves at risk to help others," Klain said. "Martin Salia was such a
man."
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The 90-minute Mass at the home parish of Salia's family in Maryland drew a
crowd that swelled to the hundreds. Relatives, friends, colleagues and
dignitaries from both the US and Sierra Leone were in attendance, along with
Sierra Leonean immigrants from around the US, some of whom said they
didn't know Salia personally.
Salia's wife, Isatu, wept as she carried a small black box containing her
husband's cremated remains into the church, flanked by the couple's sons,
20-year-old Maada and 14-year-old Hinwaii.
Bockari Stevens, the Sierra Leone's ambassador to the US, called Salia a
national hero who abandoned "the luxuries of the United States" to aid his
homeland.
"It is a loss not only to your family. It is a loss to our country," Stevens said.
Stevens called for the US to do more to "ensure that this scourge is blighted"
in Sierra Leone and the other West African nations stricken by Ebola. Klain
pledged that more aid was on the way.
"The world's response has been too late, but now, help is coming," he said
to applause.
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Sierra Leone is now bearing the brunt of the 8-month-old outbreak. In the
other hard-hit countries, Liberia and Guinea, the World Health Organization
says infection rates are stabilizing or declining, but in Sierra Leone, they're
soaring. The country has been reporting around 400 to 500 new Ebola cases
each week for several weeks. Those cases are concentrated in the capital,
Freetown, its surrounding areas and the northern Port Loko district.
Salia was born and raised in Kenema, Sierra Leone, and received his medical
training in Freetown. He later served as a surgical resident in Cameroon and
also worked in Kenya and the US. His dream had been to open his own
hospital in Sierra Leone, colleagues said.
Salia did not receive aggressive treatment for Ebola until nearly two weeks
after he first started showing symptoms. His formal diagnosis was delayed,
and it took several days for him to be flown back to the United States. Those
delays, doctors said, probably made it impossible for anyone to save his life.
In a brief interview after the Mass, Salia's older son said he was heartened
by the esteem in which others held his father.
"I'm really proud that he was able to do so many things for a lot of people,"
Maada Salia said.
Associated Press writer Sarah DiLorenzo in Dakar, Senegal, contributed to
this report.
- AP