On the day Mercy Kennedy lost her mother to Ebola, it was hard to imagine a time when Liberia would be free from one of the world's deadliest viruses. It had swept through the 9-year-old's neighborhood, killing people house by house.

Neighbors were so fearful that Mercy, too, might be sick that no one would touch her to comfort her as tears streamed down her face. She had only a tree to lean on as she wept.

Now, seven months later, Liberia officially marked the end of the epidemic on Saturday that claimed more than 4,700 lives, and Mercy is thriving in the care of a family friend not far from where she used to live.