On September 30, 2014, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) received a report of a laboratory-confirmed case of Ebola virus disease (Ebola) in a man who had traveled from Liberia to Dallas, Texas. Two nurses who cared for him were eventually confirmed as having Ebola. Three weeks later, a physician who had recently returned from West Africa to New York City developed symptoms and had laboratory confirmation of Ebola infection. These 4 cases placed an astounding burden of work on the state and local health departments involved and required the efforts of hundreds of health care workers.1–3 The economic impact was steep; Congress allocated more than $570 million to CDC for the US domestic Ebola response as part of a larger $5.4 billion appropriation for Ebola and health security.4 The 4 cases of Ebola illustrate how the interconnectedness of today’s world brings an increased risk for disease acquisition, both in the United States and abroad.

Health communication and social mobilization efforts to improve the public's knowledge, attitudes, and practices (KAP) regarding Ebola virus disease (Ebola) were important in controlling the 2014-2016 Ebola epidemic in Guinea (1), which resulted in 3,814 reported Ebola cases and 2,544 deaths.* Most Ebola cases in Guinea resulted from the washing and touching of persons and corpses infected with Ebola without adequate infection control precautions at home, at funerals, and in health facilities (2,3). As the 18-month epidemic waned in August 2015, Ebola KAP were assessed in a survey among residents of Guinea recruited through multistage cluster sampling procedures in the nation's eight administrative regions (Boke, Conakry, Faranah, Kankan, Kindia, Labe, Mamou, and Nzerekore). Nearly all participants (92%) were aware of Ebola prevention measures, but 27% believed that Ebola could be transmitted by ambient air, and 49% believed they could protect themselves from Ebola by avoiding mosquito bites. Of the participants, 95% reported taking actions to avoid getting Ebola, especially more frequent handwashing (93%). Nearly all participants (91%) indicated they would send relatives with suspected Ebola to Ebola treatment centers, and 89% said they would engage special Ebola burial teams to remove corpses with suspected Ebola from homes. Of the participants, 66% said they would prefer to observe an Ebola-affected corpse from a safe distance at burials rather than practice traditional funeral rites involving corpse contact. The findings were used to guide the ongoing epidemic response and recovery efforts, including health communication, social mobilization, and planning, to prevent and respond to future outbreaks or sporadic cases of Ebola.