Will
Pooley, outside the Ebola isolation unit at Connaught Hospital in Freetown,
Sierra Leone. Photograph: Michael Duff
The aid
worker, who is fighting Ebola in Sierra Leone after having previously
contracted and beaten the disease, says the charity single was ‘just a bit
much’
Will
Pooley, the British aid worker who made headlines after contracting Ebola in
Sierra Leone, has criticised the Band Aid 30 charity single released to raise
money for the crisis.
“It’s
Africa, not another planet,” Pooley told the Radio Times. “Stuff about Do They
Know It’s Christmas? It’s just like, actually people live normal lives here and
do normal things. That sort of cultural ignorance is a bit cringeworthy.
There’s a lyric about ‘death in every tear,’ it’s just a bit much.”
Pooley
made his comments from Sierra Leone, where he has returned to continue his work
following his successful recovery from the disease. Asked if he had a message
for people back in Britain, he said: “I would say that it’s a good idea to read
as much as you can about what’s going on in west Africa, and if you feel so
inclined then donate some money to one of the charities, like King’s, that are
working out here, directly caring for Ebola patients.”
Others
have also labelled the single insensitive. Emeli Sande said that “a whole new
song is required”, while Fuse ODG, writing for the Guardian, said he was
“shocked and appalled” by the lyrics and pulled out of the recording as a
result. “I, like many others, am sick of the whole concept of Africa – a
resource-rich continent with unbridled potential – always being seen as
diseased, infested and poverty-stricken.”
Geldof has
been nonchalant about the criticism, telling the BBC: “Where Band Aid is
effective is that it creates all this noise. It creates this argument, it
creates this debate. People find it very hard to understand that I love the
level of criticism. I personally enjoy it.”
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When asked
by the Telegraph for a response to Pooley’s comments, Geldof said: “Please.
It’s a pop song. Relax,” before saying that critics of the song could “fuck off
... I couldn’t give a toss ... If it’s a pop song that can help ease the pain,
the agony, if they can die with a little more dignity then, yeah, I’m there.
It’s pretty simple.”
The song,
which features Rita Ora, Disclosure and Zoella, among others, as well as
artwork by Tracey Emin, reached No 1 in November. It is currently at No 12
after falling 10 places last week.
During a
recent interview with the Mirror, Geldof was asked why Paul McCartney wasn’t
involved after the Beatle appeared in the first two versions of the single. He
replied: “On this we’ve got from the newest to the hippest to the oldest … and
he hasn’t made the cut. What can I tell you?
“You try
and make it the girls and the boys, that’s the first thing. Then it’s who’s
happening in America – that’s really important as sales are quantifiably more
over there. Ellie Goulding, Ed Sheeran, One Direction, Coldplay, Sam Smith, U2
… all these people are caning it in America.”
Pooley
meanwhile, from Eyke, Suffolk, has been back in Sierra Leone since October and
yesterday told the Guardian about the life-saving plasma donation he gave to a
US doctor who caught Ebola just weeks after he had.
He is
working in a 16 bed isolation ward in the Connaught government hospital in
Freetown and has told of dealing with up to eight corpses a day, as patients
succumb to the disease which can kill within five days.
Will
Pooley in Sierra Leone, pictured some of the people he helped nurse to
recovery. Photograph: Michael Duff for the Guardian
So
impoverished is the health system in Sierra Leone that doctors on general wards
at the Connaught went on strike yesterday in protest against the lack of
general equipment. They took the action after the 10th doctor in the country,
including a general surgeon from the Connaught, died from Ebola.
Pooley
said that aid was “filtering through at a glacial pace” and that people were
still piling up in the temporary tent outside the main gates of the hospital.
“Governments
pledged money months ago... I don’t know whether it’s working. I’m sure it’s
better to donate than not, but it’s just a shame it gets tied up in lots of
bureaucracy,” he said.
He added:
“There are still people outside the front of the hospital dying of Ebola
because there aren’t enough beds for them. I had hoped that by now that would
have been over.”
Pooley,
who is currently on a week’s holiday, told the Guardian he had the opportunity
to come home for Christmas but was more likely to stay in Sierra Leone where he
felt he was needed.
“I’m
working with masses of local staff who are risking death,” he said.
He said
the local staff, who face stigmatisation from their families and delays in
payment of their risk wages, needed more support from the West.
“The big
problem at the moment is they haven’t been paid for months – which sounds bad
enough to English ears, but in Sierra Leone if you’re not getting paid, then
you’re facing starvation. But they’re still coming to work. They are the
heroes.”
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