Love in a Time of Ebola would be a short sequel. The no-touch rule tends to constrain any amorous tendencies.

The whole international aid community seems to have descended on the country and inevitably there are couples working in the same or connected aid projects. The tough decision for these folk is whether to follow the no-touch rules themselves.

Some argue that the rule is set to prevent population transmission, so restricting touching to each creates little risk. Others decide that it is safer to separate so that if one of the couple gets infected, the other will be protected, and they go into self-imposed celibacy and separation.

The no-touch rule is all pervasive, although one of the paradoxes is that teenage pregnancies have shot up. The closure of all the schools has left a generation of school children hanging around their communities, idle and bored.

It is not surprising that teenage kicks trump health promotion messages from the Well Body Ministry. The collapse of the countries' family planning services, as with all health services, compounds the problem.

We are making progress at our Ebola hospital though I fear our opening day is receding slowly. It is now planned for the 17th.

Our wards are fully ready for action. Our pharmacy is stocked. Our staff are all trained but now need to have some final dress rehearsals with the infection control teams synchronising with our clinical teams.

We are still struggling with our PPE - searches continue around the world for suitable biohazard coveralls. We have even turned to the blackmarket to find what we need.

Rather strangely, four army Gurkhas turned up at the gate yesterday offering to help, and we have put them to work moving equipment and lending shoulders to the final push. A spirit of cooperation has descended on our divided parties and we are all now working to one common goal: our first patient.

Actually a little excitement this morning as we did indeed get our first patient, but sadly/luckily not Ebola related. One of the Norwegian base camp team tripped over one of his sturdily erected tent ropes and dislocated his shoulder.

There was a rush of clinicians to help him, deprived of patients for too long and desperate for action. A potent cocktail of midazolam/ketamine/fentanyl and lots of brute force and he has his shoulder back in place, but will be heading home tomorrow.

All the other Ebola Centres have had delays in their openings. If we open on Wednesday we will still be one of the first, having begun the race as the penultimate centres to open. All have had similar challenges of norming and storming between multilateral, multinational partners.

There will be many lessons to emerge from this mammoth task about the mistakes we have made. And then at the next global emergency we will repeat them all over again.

MORE BLOG POSTS FROM PROFESSOR JOHN WRIGHT