The wariness against outside intervention has deep roots. This part of Guinea, known as the Forest Region, where more than 200 people have already died of the disease, is known for its strong belief in traditional religion. The dictator who ruled Guinea with an iron fist for decades, Ahmed Sékou Touré, was only partly successful in a 1960s campaign to stamp out these beliefs, despite mass burnings of fetishes.

Addressing villagers this month in Bawa, where a woman had just died, the regional prefect from Guéckédou, Mohammed Cinq Keita, warned: “There is no root, no leaf, no animal that can cure you. Don’t be fooled.”

Near the border with Sierra Leone this month, Doctors Without Borders discovered an Ebola patient who had been privately “treated” in the village of Teldou and then returned to his relatives in another village, possibly infecting untold others.

“Extremely, extremely concerning,” said Sylvie Jonckheere, the charity’s doctor on the scene. A colleague in full gear lectured the villagers of Teldou as the rain started, but was met with indifference or hostile stares; some turned their backs on him.

As the aid workers drove off, the private nurse who administered a shot to the Ebola patient defended his treatment. “I couldn’t say that he had the illness,” said the nurse, Eduard Leno. “His body was hot, that’s all.”

Asked why the patient had not been sent to the clinic in Guéckédou, he said angrily: “We are in the bush here. You can’t just send someone away. How will society view you?”