• Hai Jiang, Guo-Qing Shi, Wen-Xiao Tu, Can-Jun Zheng, Xue-Hui Lai, Xin-Xu Li, Qiang Wei, Mei Li, Li-Quan Deng, Xiang Huo, Ming-Quan Chen, Feng Xu, Long-Jie Ye, Xi-Chen Bai, Tong-Nian Chen, Shao-Hua Yin, Thomas T Samba, and Xiao-Feng Liang.
• State Key Laboratory for Infectious Disease Prevention and Control, Collaborative Innovation Center for Diagnosis and Treatment of Infectious Diseases, National Institute for Communicable Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, 102206, China.
• Infect Dis Poverty. 2016 Jun 6; 5 (1): 53.

BackgroundThe recent outbreak of the Ebola virus disease (EVD) in Sierra Leone has been characterized by the World Health Organization as one of the most challenging EVD outbreaks to date. The first confirmed case in Sierra Leone was a young woman who was admitted to a government hospital in Kenema following a miscarriage on 24 May 2014. On 5 January 2015, intensified training for an EVD response project was initiated at the medical university of Sierra Leone in Jui. To understand the knowledge, attitudes, practices, and perceived risk of EVD among the public, especially after this training, a rapid assessment was conducted from 10 to 16 March 2015.MethodsInterviews were conducted with 466 participants based on questionnaires that were distributed from 10 to 16 March 2015 by cluster sampling in three adjacent communities, namely Jui, Grafton, and Kossoh Town, in the Western Area Rural District of Sierra Leone.ResultsIt was found that knowledge about EVD was comprehensive and high. Positive attitude towards prevention was found to be satisfactory. Nearly all participants knew the reporting phone number 117 and had reported some change in behavior since learning about Ebola. More than half (62 %) of the participants had a history of travelling to urban areas, which increases the risk of infection. The multivariable logistic regression analysis showed that community and occupation were variables associated with perceived risk of EVD.ConclusionsOur study showed that community level social mobilization and community engagement were an effective strategy in the special context.

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