MOSCOW, December 11 (Sputnik) – The victory of the doctors who are fighting the Ebola virus in Time's Person of the Year poll is well-deserved, the World Health Organization (WHO) and Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres – MSF) told Sputnik Thursday.
On Wednesday, Time magazine declared health workers fighting the virus as the winners of its annual Person of the Year poll.
"If there is someone who should be given an appraisal and then a reward, it's definitely health workers, because health workers are risking their lives to try to help those who are infected… And I am talking especially here about national health workers, because they are the ones who are doing most of the work," WHO spokesperson Tarik Jasarevic told Sputnik.
Editor @nancygibbs explains TIME's choice for Person of the Year 2014 http://t.co/eMn0PQz54H #TIMEPOY pic.twitter.com/SrtSvqkuuh
— TIME.com (@TIME) December 11, 2014
Jasarevic also noted that since the beginning of Ebola outbreak, more than 340 health workers have died, and some 650 have been infected.
Doctors Without Borders, an international medical humanitarian organization, has also welcomed the recognition of the doctors involved in fighting the virus, "especially the health care and other workers from the worst-affected countries, who have been working tirelessly for months to help their fellow citizens, despite the risks they face and the stigma they so often encounter," MSF spokesperson Tim Shenk told Sputnik.
"They are living in danger 24/7. For me, they are the real heroes," MSF Ebola Field Communications Coordinator Caitlin Ryan told Sputnik.
The current Ebola epidemic started in southern Guinea in December 2013 and soon spread to Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria and Senegal. As of December 8, there have been 17,800 confirmed, probable, and suspected cases of Ebola, with a total of 6,331 having been killed by the virus, according to WHO estimates.
Time magazine has carried out a Person of the Year poll since 1927 to award symbolic figures or groups. Ferguson protesters and Russian President Vladimir Putin took the second and third place respectively in this year's poll.
