Kortee Jorgbor

Kortee Jorgbor

Q: This is Sam Robson here in Buchanan, Liberia, Grand Bassa County, with Mr. Kortee Jorgbor. Today's date is March 11th, 2017, and I'm interviewing Mr. Jorgbor as part of our CDC [United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] Ebola Response Oral History Project. Thank you very much for being here with me and talking with me.

JORGBOR: Thank you.

Q: Yeah, yeah. Could we start out, could you say, "my name is," and then pronounce your name?

JORGBOR: My name is Kortee Jorgbor.

Q: Can you tell me what your current position is, your current job?

JORGBOR: Currently I work for Riders for Health as a courier head for Sinoe County, basically transporting samples to the lab.

Q: During the Ebola epidemic, if you were to tell someone in just a couple of sentences, very shortly, what you did, what would you say?

JORGBOR: During the Ebola crisis, I was willing and I was able to work as a 00:01:00responder for my county, which is Sinoe County. We went on response to the EVD [Ebola virus disease] where we were trained how to use PPE [personal protective equipment], and then we went in fourteen days as a response, visiting every community, enlightening our citizenry, educating them about Ebola virus.

Q: I forgot to ask you, where and when were you born?

JORGBOR: I was born June 14th, 1988, in Lofa County, Liberia.

Q: When did you move down to Sinoe?

JORGBOR: I moved down to Sinoe July, 2014.

Q: Why did you go?

JORGBOR: I went there to do work that was community work as a supervisor for 00:02:00gCHVs [general community health volunteers]. In that incident, I met up with a crisis, which I have to go down, not to do the community work because of the crisis. So I had to break in. Then I went on the response.

Q: Can you tell me how exactly you got involved in the response?

JORGBOR: I worked with one NGO [nongovernmental organization], which is the Christian Health Association of Liberia. In 2013, I moved over to Sinoe to work for that entity, and when I got there, the crisis had already started. We helped the county health team because they didn't have enough manpower to move into the field. They incorporated us as NGOs, saying you people can come onboard and help 00:03:00us in the response. So we went. The county health team invited us. We were trained how to wear PPE, how to prevent yourself. Then we went on the response in the various communities.

Q: Can you tell me about your training?

JORGBOR: Yes. The training was mostly IPC [infection prevention and control]. This is where we were dropped as Liberians. You come across such a dangerous disease and you don't have any other information on how to prevent it. So we started a training, how to wash your hands. The first base of information is how to get hold of your home, which is if you have to see a patient of Ebola, what to do at home. We were taught if you don't have hand gloves, you put on black 00:04:00plastic to make sure you don't touch vomit, don't touch if a person is bleeding? Take them into isolation where you will control the children or yourself not to get in contact. Then later on, when we go to the hospital. When we started to go for the response, there where they started training us on PPEs. We trained on PPE, how to wear it, put on your overalls, put on your rain boots, your hand gloves, your mask, face shield, everything how to put it on and how to remove the PPE. We were trained. Then we were dispatched to go into the various communities for fourteen days.

Q: Thank you. Can you tell me about what happened then?

JORGBOR: When we got into the field, the perceptions our people had was Ebola 00:05:00was misleading information. The government just trying to use it to gain some money, to gain international attention. When we got there, we said, "No, this is not it. We are from the health center, we are telling you the dangerous disease that is coming after us, harming our people, we've seen it. This is not because of money. Take on the task, you as a community." The first community I arrived in, I was trained to conduct a meeting, and the meeting is to sensitize the people about the Ebola virus. I conducted a meeting, being a supervisor because it was just a two-man team. I carried on a meeting, took attendance. They asked me questions. I explained to them in depth where the disease derived from. Lofa County, the border between Guinea and Liberia. That was the first community, I 00:06:00visited and it when well.

The next day I moved to the next community. I conducted similar meeting and everything went well. The larger community to my surprise, which I should get to and give more attention, the information already reached there. We got some health workers already in the field. "They are the ones carrying the Ebola viruses around." When we got there to conduct the meeting, we met up with strong resistance where they had to boo at us, block roads, threaten to kill. It was of no option.

Now, because I was trained to give first-hand information, this is what I got, I have received the information that some twins left home, the neighboring county 00:07:00which is Grand Kru; arrived in Greenville, which is the capital for Sinoe County; and they slept there. Then the town, which is Togbaville, when I went to conduct the meeting, the twins also reached there. When the twins arrived, they died.

They said when you get into the field, if there is death, try to investigate. I tried to acquire what was the cause of that death, but the resistance was too high. Knowing fully well that those twins that died, it was a positive case that came from Grand Kru. We were driven away. We identified that particular case, it was a positive case. We couldn't moved on because we were stopped and blocked, 00:08:00we couldn't reach the other communities that followed. So we turned around and we went back Greenville sent our report in, that there is a suspected case. We are sending alert of something that we are not sure. There is a case, and if the county health team doesn't respond, it will cause a big problem.

Then for CDC [note: WHO, World Health Organization], at that time we had Dr. Boris [Pavlin] from the United States of America who was spearheading everything. He said we have to move in, we have to move in during that terrible time. The roads have cut off, during the rainy season. So they move in, and then when they found out we had a positive case, the grandmother who bathed the children when they passed off, she fell ill and she passed off. The same resistance continued until the superintendent for the county had to reach there.

We also had another partner. I think she is also from CDC. She was there, and then a person who was quarantined, [more or less a parable] person, suspecting that maybe they may come down within that twenty-one days. The tension reached, and he went ahead to spit in the woman's eyes. She was very, very mad. From there, we tried to come up with a system. The OIC [officer in charge] at the time for Togbaville Clinic, because he had a relationship with the twins that came in, he moved over to Greenville to see his wife. Now, when the twins came from Grand Kru, they transited in Greenville which was his wife, too, came in contact with the twins. So he went there, his wife was already sick. This is how 00:10:00he got in contact with his wife [open lines] and he himself became infected.

We worked on them, took them to the hospital where they had a holding unit. This is why I say, Dr. Boris is one that names that Sinoe County can boast of. That he saved lives. He used to move in the holding unit on his own because nurses, physicians, they had fear. But Dr. Boris moved in, catered to them, even at night until we have survivors from Sinoe. From there, we were now educated on how to control the disease. From there, we started tracking down cases. Tracking down cases. And that's how we cope today with covering the Ebola virus.

But for me, my experience is more where I had another team to go, the surveillance team, to another community far apart, that we used to go talk to the people. In that same town, we had almost like four cases came from there, came positive. We had three deaths from that same place, but we fought hard to continue enlightening the other villages around until we got hold of it. Sinoe County was like--we controlled every situation that came across our way. These were some of the major roles that we played. I can even show you some photos in my phone where you will see how far we went, the places we moved.

Q: Let's do it. And then how did you get involved in specimen transport?

JORGBOR: Very good. Riders for Health. When the Ebola crisis ceased a little bit, because I was introduced to that county with CHAL, which is the Christian Health Association of Liberia. We were trained to do community case management, control gCHV, help them out with [materials] so they can [get in to the field] and control malaria [mainly]. From there, the contract I had with CHAL expired. The county health team was looking at my involvement during the crisis, having the full knowledge on Ebola. This is why they decided, it's okay. But then, we 00:13:00think we can bring you on board for Riders for Health. You are already informed, you know the preventive issues concerning the Ebola virus. This is how I came over. The recommendation came. I applied. I went for an interview. Interview me, "Do you work under tension?" I told them, "Yes, I've been under tension several times." They said, "Okay, you are welcome on board." This is how I came over to Riders for Health. Riders for Health is a very unique organization that is working in the interest of the Liberian people. These are cases that were from the community. People not knowing the result of what is going on. Somebody dies, just throw their body in a hammock, carry it from place to place not knowing the harm. But when we started transporting samples, that's when the surveillance 00:14:00team started seeing that the community, we are looking at this as where we can track down firsthand information concerning diseases that are hammering our country, our county. So this is how I came onboard. I started working, came for the training, in Buchanan [capital for Grand Bassa County] here, motorbike training, 2015. So '15, '16, we are up to '17. Our work keeps on. We are happy doing the work, and we will make sure to keep Riders for Health alive if CDC is willing to fund us or support us in the process.

Q: Is there anything else you would like to say before we conclude the interview?

JORGBOR: My personal thing that happened to me that I would like to express. It 00:15:00was Saturday evening during the heat of the Ebola crisis when I received--in fact, I called my stepfather who was in Gbarnga, Bong County. He worked at CB Dunbar [Maternal] Hospital as a janitor. He called me. I called him. I said, "How are you coming on?" He said, "I'm okay, but I have a friend who was just transported from Lofa County," the epicenter for Ebola at the time, "and he's ill. They brought him at the hospital." I said, "Dad, don't visit him." "Oh, he's a friend." I said, "You don't need to get in contact with him. Don't go there." He said, "No, when I go, I won't touch the bed, I won't go around the bodies." I said, "Okay." In the process, I just dropped the line. Saturday he 00:16:00went, he visited, [he came]. Sunday. Monday. When I called him, "I've been sick for the past four days." I said, "You see? I told you not to go there." He was my stepfather. He born two boys, my little ones, by my mother. I'm the first born from my mother. When I got that information, I said, "Okay, no problem. Remain in the room, don't allow your wife to touch your phone. I will only talk to you on the phone. Tell her that she stand at the window. You give her this information." But he got his big brother, who is a doctor. I told him, I said, "Call your brother, let your brother send the ambulance for you." The ambulance 00:17:00came for him. He was not stopped in Bong County, he was taken over to ELWA-1 [Eternal Love Winning Africa Hospital, Ebola treatment unit 1], Monrovia, E-L-W-A. He was taken there, but at that time, the crisis, the heat, Liberians never knew anything of the disease. Health workers don't know how to get their own way out. According to the information, because we only call him. "How are you? Have the people done your test?" He said, "Yes, they did my test and it's negative." But to our own belief, at that time nurses have fear, don't care, because they themselves don't know their own fate, how to control the disease. Apparently, he might have died from starvation or something. This is how later his phone went off, we tried calling him, no way. And this how today-today my 00:18:00stepfather left in the crisis.

My work now with Riders for Health is helping, my two little brothers, my mother. I am the only person now to help them out. I am the only person. They hope on me in terms of school fees, food, they call me, "We need this, we need that." I try to help them out through my own [work pay]. Riders for Health, they are doing great things for us. If the program can live on, we will survive. If the program is lost, we've got many other people that are depending on us for survival.

So far, that was it. Great experience we went through. You try to tell people, 00:19:00some people want to listen to you, some are not listening. But we as Liberians, we are strong people, we still manage ourselves. But we still need aides to come in, still need help until our health system can be straightened up to control all necessary diseases. [unclear] Now, after high school, I'm just forced to find work to do instead of going to school, but I've still got more interest in going to school, still seeking support so that support can come, we can still further our education. Thank you for the interview.

Q: Thank you, Mr. Jorgbor. This has been a real pleasure listening to you speak, and I'm sorry about everything. Thank you.

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