The title according to the magazine goes to a person, group, idea or object that has done the most to influence the events of the preceding year. This year, Ebola Fighters won the Person of the Year award. After disease outbreak in West Africa, the doctors, nurses, ambulance drivers and first responders deliberately put themselves in danger to help others by fighting the disease and working to stop the epidemic.

According to WHO, Ebola virus disease (EVD), formerly known as Ebola haemorrhagic fever, is a severe, often fatal illness in humans. The Ebola virus causes an acute, serious illness which is often fatal if untreated. Ebola virus disease (EVD) first appeared in 1976 in 2 simultaneous outbreaks, one in Nzara, Sudan, and the other in Yambuku, Democratic Republic of Congo. The latter occurred in a village near the Ebola River, from which the disease takes its name.

The current outbreak in West Africa, (first cases notified in March 2014), is the largest and most complex Ebola outbreak since the Ebola virus was first discovered in 1976.

In an article on the Time website, Editor Nancy Gibbs praises "the people in the field, the special forces of Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), the Christian medical-relief workers of Samaritan's Purse and many others from all over the world" who "fought side by side with local doctors and nurses, ambulance drivers and burial teams."

Gibbs noted that the disease also struck doctors and nurses.

"The rest of the world can sleep at night because a group of men and women are willing to stand and fight," she wrote. "For tireless acts of courage and mercy, for buying the world time to boost its defenses, for risking, for persisting, for sacrificing and saving, the Ebola fighters are Time's 2014 Person of the Year."

Dr. Shima Naghavi, Director of International Affairs