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Introduction

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Chapters

This web documentary lasts about 30 minutes. Click continue to begin or select an individual chapter.

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Finding my father’s grave

Mariama B Jalloh

The Ebola crisis may be coming to an end, but the search for those that died continues.

As numbers fade on poorly marked graves, time is running out for hundreds of families who may never find the final resting place of loved ones lost to Ebola.

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Reporter Bio

Mariama B Jalloh, 25, Makeni

Mariama, a student from Northern Sierra Leone, lost 27 members of her family to Ebola. She shared her story with the BBC the day that her father died. During the outbreak, she reported on her experience of isolation and the double burden of being a disabled woman with polio during a time of extraordinary crisis.

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Closed for business

Moses Fallah James

During the crisis, banks, borders and markets were closed for over six months.

Livelihoods were destroyed. The ban on Sunday markets is yet to be lifted.

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Love in the time of Ebola

Bankolay Turay

For over a year during the crisis, physical contact was reduced to a bare minimum to avoid contagion.

No handshakes, no hugging, no kissing.

Can romance blossom on Whatsapp alone?

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For better or for worse

Moses Fallah James

Relationships are tested in times of crisis. Not all of them survive.

Ebola tore into the fabric of family life, and the relationships that bind them.

These are two similar stories, with very different endings.

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The baby is ours

Elizabeth Katta

Many families faced financial hardship during the outbreak. Girls felt the need to help take care of their families. Some men took advantage, offering support in return for sex.

My 12 year-old sister was one of many young girls who fell pregnant.

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Clean break

Sixty Kamara

At the peak of the crisis, the government implemented a national lockdown. The entire population was forced to remain at home.

For one street beggar, the lockdown proved to be a blessing in disguise.

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Gaddafi and the Tripoli Boys

Mohamed Kamara and Amjata Bayoh

When Ebola entered an overcrowded Freetown slum, people feared the worst. However, a gang of unlikely heroes emerged to lead the fightback.

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Football is coming home

Amjata Bayoh

During the Ebola outbreak, all public gatherings were banned. After almost 2 years, the nation comes together once again to watch the national team play its first match on home turf.

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About the project

Back in Touch is an interactive documentary about life in post-Ebola Sierra Leone.

Produced by On Our Radar in partnership with New Internationalist, it has been driven by a group of passionate and dedicated citizen journalists, whose stories offer a deep and unmediated insight into the aftershocks of the deadly Ebola epidemic in West Africa.

The print version of these stories was released in the June edition of New Internationalist as a 10-page special in the magazine.

“Story behind the story”: editor’s note
Story development scrapbook
Covering the Ebola crisis
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Credits

Reporting by Amjata, Mariama, Med, Moses, Bankolay, Elizabeth, Sixty, Patrick and the rest of the On Our Radar citizen journalist network in Sierra Leone.


Produced, directed and filmed by Paul Myles

Edited by Davide Morandini

Web design by David Hill

Music by 19 Sound

Assistant Producer and Photographer - Laurence Ivil

Associate Producer - Hazel Healy

Production and Web Design Coordinator - Paula Hämäläinen

Production Assistant and Researcher - Jake Leyland

Consultant - May Abdalla


With thanks to:

NEON; Health Poverty Action; Morris and friends at the Sensi Hub

Flo, Erica, Georgina, James, Tiana, John, Sophie and Hana

And a special thank you to Libby, Adam and Tobias

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