Sierra Leone, which was hard hit by the Ebola outbreak, has hired Glover Park Group to promote its role as a regional leader in western Africa.

“Mathis”Sierra Leone President Ernest Bai Koroma, left, Liberian Pres. Elen Johnson Sirleaf, Pres. Barack Obama, and Guinean Pres. Alpha Conde at the White House this week.

The WPP property also will promote Sierra Leone's bilateral relations with the US.

The $50K project for the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development began March 9 and runs through the end of May.

The World Health Organization on April 10 said the Ebola crisis that killed more than 10,500 people in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia during the past year and remains an international crisis though the number of new cases has declined dramatically.

School children in Sierra Leona returned to class on April 14 after staying at home for the last nine months because of the outbreak.

The US Centers for Disease Control, Sierra's Health Ministry and Sierra Leone's College of Medicine began testing an experimental Ebola vaccine this week.

Merck & Co. and NewLink Genetics have licensed the vaccine called rVSV-EBOV.