Ebola Missions with WHO GISCorps Assists World Health Organization in Mapping Ebola Response ActivitiesIn December 2013, a two-year old

child in a remote village in southeastern Guinea died from a then-unidentified disease. From that beginning arose the unprecedented West Africa Ebola outbreak which eventually infected 26,093 people in 15 countries, caused over 10,000 deaths, and gave rise to fears of a worldwide pandemic. By the end of 2014 these fears were still peaking. For the Ebola crisis, the United Nations (UN) had established the first-ever UN emergency health mission, the UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER). From its headquarters in Accra, Ghana, UNMEER oversaw a huge network of response activities in Africa, and directed the work of tens of thousands of brave response workers. In December 2014, the World Health Organization (WHO) requested the assistance of GISCorps to support UNMEER in the mapping of their West Africa Ebola response activities. Five volunteers, knowledgeable in GIS (Geographic Information Science) and advanced web mapping capabilities, were requested to work from four to six weeks in the three hardest-hit African countries (Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone), as well as in the UNMEER headquarters in Accra, Ghana, and in the WHO headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. GISCorps sent out a recruitment letter on December 6, and within a few days, received responses from 47 volunteers, who wanted to assist in this worldwide crisis, and were willing to forego the holiday season with friends and loved ones to work in potentially hazardous conditions in Africa