COVID-19 continues to disrupt every aspect of life, striking particularly hard within wealthy, Western countries. However, epidemics are nothing new in Africa, given the developing world bears most of the infectious disease burden. As Mauss (Mauss, 1916; Burawoy, 1992; Klinenberg, 2005) note, institutions tend to reveal themselves during times of crisis. Ebola, like COVID-19, uncovered everyday micro and macro processes and brought them to the surface due to the exigency of a global health crisis. The 2013-2016 West Africa Ebola Epidemic ended less than five years ago, and bears striking similarities to our current experience in the West, despite occurring in a different context. In mid-February 2021, Ebola surfaced once again in the same region it emerged in 2013. While Western expertise is frequently exported to the developing world, what can the West learn from the recent West Africa Ebola Epidemic, not only in terms of pandemic politics, but also in terms of local management of crisis?