Major airlines have started flying to West African countries that were last year hit by one of the worst outbreak of Ebola in the world, as cases of the disease disappear and governments lift bans against flights to the region.

The West African nations of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone were ravaged by an outbreak of the Ebola virus that  killed nearly 11,000 people since march 2014, before being contained and a vaccine developed by global drug companies.

In August 2014, regional and international airlines including Kenya Airways, South African Airways, Air Côte d’Ivoire, Nigeria’s Arik Air, Togo’s ASKY Airlines, British Airways and Emirates Airlines ignored the World Health Organization’s (WHO) advice and cancelled flights to these countries after an estimated 1,145 people had died.

A year later, Liberia was declared Ebola-free earlier in September, while the number of cases in the other two countries has reduced significantly, according to WHO.

Kenya Airways, which started flying to Liberia in May, this week got a green light from the country’s ministry of health to fly to Sierra Leone and Guinea.

This came as a relief to the loss-making national carrier that makes 44 scheduled flights a week to 10 West African cities. The region accounts for more than 10 percent of its revenue, Business Daily reported.

Suspension of flights to the three Ebola-hurt nation cost the Kenyan carier about four percent of  its annual revenue, the airline’s chief executive, Mbuvi Ngunze, said last October.

‘Africa is not Ebola’

Brussels Airlines, which maintained a ‘Africa is not Ebola’ mantra during the height of the crisis in 2014 and flew twice to Monrovia and Freetown every week, has now increased its frequency to the region to four.

“We always continued our flights to these countries during the Ebola crisis and this … doubling of our flight offer enables us to actively contribute to the very necessary economic and social revival of the region,” Brussels Airlines’ CEO Bernard Gustin said in a statement on Sept 10.

“Despite the difficult operational circumstances we never ceased flying to both countries. Our ‘Africa is not Ebola’ initiative is intended to raise a broader awareness that the crisis is being overcome,” he added.

The tourism sector in Africa, which had been affected by the Ebola outbreak, is showing signs of recovery, with traffic from Asian nations such as China, India and Malaysia growing by about 20 percent year on year according to data from Asian tour firms.

“The Ebola crisis absolutely hammered us. People don’t realize that Paris and London were closer (to the Ebola-affected areas) than where we were.” Dave van Smeerdijk, sales and marketing director of Asilia Africa, the operator of luxury safaris in Kenya, Tanzania & Zanzibar, told TTG Asia e-Daily.