Time magazine named health workers caring for Ebola victims in west Africa its person of the year, comparing the caregivers to military special forces who volunteered to fight the epidemic when governments were unprepared.
“There was little to stop the disease from spreading further,” Time said in an article announcing its choices. “Governments weren’t equipped to respond; the World Health Organization was in denial and snarled in red tape.”
“But the people in the field, the special forces of Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), the Christian medical-relief workers of Samaritan’s Purse, and many others from all over the world, fought side-by-side with local doctors and nurses, ambulance drivers and burial teams,” the magazine said.
Ebola health workers were selected from a shortlist of eight candidates who, the magazine says, “influenced the world, for better or worse”.
The seven other contenders, were: protesters in Ferguson, Russian president Vladimir Putin, pop star Taylor Swift, Alibaba founder Jack Ma, Apple CEO Tim Cook, the president of Iraq’s Kurdish region Masoud Barzani, and the NFL commissioner Roger Goodell.
Last year, the magazine chose Pope Francis, the first pontiff to be chosen from outside Italy. Francis is also the first to choose the name Francis, from Saint Francis of Assisi, a saint widely associated with caring for the poor. The magazine’s editors have chosen a person of the year since 1927.
