The international community has responded to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa with an approach that could be described as ‘top down’. Small groups of elite scientists, health policy makers, pharmaceutical company executives, and the staff of the World Health Organization (WHO), governmental agencies, and non-governmental institutions have decided how to implement interventions for outbreak control and containment and develop new Ebola vaccines and treatments. These ‘top down’ interventions have built Ebola treatment units and organized the delivery of supplies, communications, and surveillance that have been essential for outbreak control.
