Fond memories of Ebola victim Eric Duncan, anger over his death (Grab a [sanitary] hanky)

Minnesota Public Radio ^ | October 9, 2014 | Jason Beaubien

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He liked to joke around with his neighbors. And he always gave them a helping hand. The neighbors that Thomas Eric Duncan's generous spirit is what cost him his life.

Duncan, 42, was the first person diagnosed with Ebola in the United States and the first to die of the disease on American soil. He likely contracted the disease in Liberia when he carried a pregnant woman, sick with Ebola, into her house after no clinic would admit her.

That was just before Sept. 19, when Duncan flew from Monrovia to Dallas with stopovers in Brussels and Washington, D.C. He was traveling to Texas to visit his fiancee and son. His relatives insist he didn't know he'd been exposed to Ebola when he boarded that fateful flight to the United States.

In East Monrovia, where Duncan rented a room, he was known as "Eric." And he was well-liked by his neighbors.

"Eric is a nice man," says 31-year-old Irene Seyou, who lived next door. "He ain't got a problem with nobody."

She saw him carry the landlord's pregnant daughter into her house just days before he left for the United States. The girl was bleeding profusely from her mouth and could no longer walk, says Seyou.

"Eric helped the family," she says. "He carried her inside."

The pregnant woman died of Ebola the next day. Three other members of her family died from the disease soon after. Yesterday the girl's father was lying on the porch of the house, barely able to lift himself from a mat, his eyes bloodshot in what Ebola doctors refer to as "black and red." Sweat glistened across his cheeks....

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Thanks For The Ebola

Thanks for the ebola
Of sickly afternoons, dieing body fumes
Bathroom trips and burning lips and spurning forks and spoons
How lovely it was