West Africa Ebola Outbreak [11,313 dead]

[techead]

This thing is heading south... Crap

 

[LazyLion]

NIGERIA RECORDS TWO NEW CASES OF EBOLA: HEALTH MINISTER

Nigeria on Friday said that two more people had tested positive for Ebola, taking the total number of confirmed cases of the deadly virus in the country to 14, including five deaths.

"Nigeria has now recorded the first two cases of Ebola Virus Disease in secondary contacts of the index case," Health Minister Onyebuchi Chukwu told a news conference in Abuja.

"The two patients are spouses of primary contacts of the Liberian American," the minister said, referring to Patrick Sawyer, who died in a private Lagos hospital on July 25.

The 40-year-old Liberian finance ministry consultant was taken for treatment after arriving at Lagos airport visibly unwell on a flight from Monrovia.

Two doctors and two nurses who treated Sawyer, as well as an official from the West African regional bloc ECOWAS who picked him up from the airport died from the disease.

The World Health Organization said on Tuesday that it was encouraged by the situation in Nigeria, given that all of the confirmed cases came from a single chain of transmission.

Five people confirmed to have the virus have been "successfully managed and discharged", Chukwu said, adding that the two new cases were among four currently being treated at an isolation unit.

Ebola has killed 1,350 people this year, with most deaths in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.


Source : Sapa-AFP /ar
Date : 22 Aug 2014 13:53

 

[Nanfeishen]

Some further developments :erm:

Two men, displaying suspected symptoms of the Ebola virus, ran away from a rural health center located in the Madinah province of Saudi Arabia on Sunday, a Saudi daily reported.

“The two African nationals, who did not have residency permits or any other documentation, came to see the doctor at the health center, complaining of difficulty breathing and bleeding while passing urine,” an official who requested anonymity told Arab News.

Medical officials were unable to conduct a thorough examination and confirm that the patients were infected with the Ebola virus as they ran away after being asked to produce their residency permits.

The doctor present had instructed the center to take the patients to a hospital with better facilities before the duo took off.

The matter was reported to police instantly, the source said.

The police are still searching for the patients, the report added.

http://gulfbusiness.com/2014/08/two...ents-flee-hospital-saudi-arabia/#.U_cwm6PcCCc

http://www.dubaichronicle.com/2014/08/22/fears-deadly-outbreaks-increase-saudi-arabia/

 

[Albereth]

Two men, displaying suspected symptoms of the Ebola virus, ran away from a rural health center located in the Madinah province of Saudi Arabia on Sunday, a Saudi daily reported

If they could run away it seems that they weren't that ill.

 

[LazyLion]

SENEGAL CLOSES BORDER AS UN WARNS ON EBOLA FLARE-UP
by Selim SAHEB ETTABA with Zoom DOSSO in Monrovia

Senegal has become the latest country to seal its border with a west African neighbour to ward off the deadly Ebola virus, as the new UN pointman on the epidemic said preparations must be made for a possible flare-up of the disease.

Senegal's decision to close its land border with Guinea, announced by the interior ministry on Thursday, is part of intensifying efforts to contain the outbreak that has killed 1,350 people since March in Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone.

David Nabarro, a British physician who the United Nations appointed last week to coordinate the global response to the crisis, was in the Liberian capital Monrovia on Friday for the second day of a tour of the region.

"We're either close to a plateau, but then we'll drop, or we're in a phase -- an inflexion point -- where it is going to increase, and I absolutely cannot tell," Nabarro told AFP during a stopover at Conakry airport en route to Monrovia.

He said he was determined to "ensure that every piece of our apparatus is at its optimum so it could deal possibly with a flare-up if that's necessary".

Nabarro is also due to visit Freetown, Conakry and Abuja in Nigeria during the trip, where he is tasked with revitalising the health sectors of Ebola-hit countries.

Authorities have been hampered in their fight against Ebola by the deaths of several top health officials and numerous frontline doctors to the virus.

However, two American missionaries who contracted Ebola while treating patients in Liberia and were taken to the US for treatment, have left hospital after making a full recovery.

Kent Brantly, 33, and Nancy Writebol, 60, were given experimental drugs before being airlifted to a hospital in Atlanta where they were treated for the last three weeks.

"The discharge from the hospital of both these patients poses no public health threat," said Bruce Ribner, director of Emory Hospital's Infectious Disease Unit.

Liberia, which has seen the biggest toll in this epidemic with 576 deaths, has witnessed chaotic scenes in recent days following a surge in cases.

The Red Cross said the crematorium in Monrovia was struggling to deal with the dozens of bodies being brought in each day.

Workers were having to return corpses to a hospital in the city because they "did not have the capacity to cremate all the bodies", Fayah Tamba, the head of the charity's Liberian office, told a local radio station.

Her comments came a day after troops used tear gas to disperse protesting crowds after President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf ordered a nightime curfew and quarantine zone in Monrovia's West Point slum and Dolo Town, to the east of the capital.

Fear of the virus spreading to other continents has seen flights to the region cancelled, and authorities around the world have adopted measures to screen travellers arriving from affected nations.

Air France is one of the few airlines running daily routes to and from Sierra Leone. On a flight this week from Freetown to Paris, via the Guinean capital Conakry, fear of the virus was ubiquitous.

"I had to close my textile shop and return to China," said Wu Guo Gang, 60, on the flight with his wife.

"Many Chinese are leaving. If they stay, they may die," he added.

The couple is leaving behind a business in Freetown as well as their family home. They said they would stay with their son in southern China until the crisis was over.

Other passengers spoke of having to pay for costly diversions due to the many airlines not travelling to the region.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's special representative for Liberia, Karin Landgren, said West Africa was in urgent need of international medical personnel as well as basic supplies including chlorine, gloves and body bags.

"Health-care systems in the most affected countries were weak before the outbreak. Now they are overwhelmed," she said.

Meanwhile, as fears grow that the outbreak will spread across Africa and beyond, DR Congo's Health Minister Felix Kabange Numbi said a haemorrhagic fever of unknown origin had killed 13 people in the country's northwest in the past two weeks.

"All 13 people who have died suffered from a fever, diarrhoea, vomiting and, in a terminal stage, of vomiting a black matter," he said.

The first victim was a pregnant woman and the 12 others -- including five medics -- died after coming into contact with her. About 80 people who had contact with the deceased are also under observation.

Samples taken from the victims are to be tested to find the exact strain of the pathogen and results are expected in a week.


Source : Sapa-AFP /ar
Date : 22 Aug 2014 11:41

 

[LazyLion]

UNIDENTIFIED FEVER KILLS 13 IN DR CONGO IN 10 DAYS

A fever of unidentified origin has killed 13 people in the northwestern Democratic Republic of Congo since August 11, the health minister said.

"All 13 people who have died suffered from a fever, diarrhoea, vomiting and, in a terminal stage, of vomiting a black matter," Dr Felix Kabange Numbi said late Thursday.

So far, about 80 people who came into contact with the deceased are being monitored at their homes, he added.

But a World Health Organization (WHO) official and the medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said Friday it was too soon to tell whether a haemorraghic fever caused the deaths, while an epidemic of often fatal and highly contagious Ebola raged in west Africa to the north.

"Many died presenting haemorragic symptoms, but there is also serious malaria that can cause this type of symptom, or typhoid fever," a WHO official based in Kinshasa told AFP, asking not to be named.

"We're still waiting for biological confirmation to find out what kind of disease this is," said Amandine Colin of MSF, which has teams in the affected territory of Boende, in Equateur province.

Samples have been taken to be examined at the National Institute of Biomedical Research as well as a specialised laboratory in Gabon, Numbi said, adding that the results should come within days.

The outbreak of the Ebola virus in west Africa is the largest ever and has killed 1,350 people in Liberia, Guinea, Sierra Leone and Nigeria since March, according to the latest data released by the WHO.

Ebola was first identified in 1976 in Equateur in the former Zaire, today the DRC. The authorities have taken preventive health measures, including provisions for the safe burial of infected corpses and strict control of passengers arriving from affected countries.

Ebola is spread by contact with an infected person's bodily fluids, such as sweat and blood, and no cure or vaccine is currently available.


Source : Sapa-AFP /nsm/jk/lp
Date : 22 Aug 2014 15:15

 

[LazyLion]

DEAD IRISHMAN TESTS NEGATIVE FOR EBOLA

A man who died in Ireland shortly after returning from Sierra Leone has tested negative for the Ebola virus, health officials said Friday.

The Health Service Executive had said Thursday the man's death was "a suspected case" of the tropical virus and quarantined his body until tests could be carried out.

But it said in a statement on Friday that laboratory test samples had proved negative for Ebola.

The man, Dessie Quinn, who was in his mid-40s, had returned from working as an engineer in Sierra Leone, one of the countries worst affected by the west African Ebola outbreak, his company KN Network Services said.

KNNS said it had pulled all of its staff from Sierra Leone as a precaution.

Local media reported that Quinn was receiving treatment for malaria since his return to Ireland.

The HSE rejected media claims that Quinn's family did not know he was at the centre of an investigation into a suspected Ebola case.

"The HSE was in contact with some family members from the outset of the tragic situation," it said.


Source : Sapa-AFP /nsm
Date : 22 Aug 2014 15:08

 

[Nanfeishen]

And the numbers climb again

The World Health Organization has said the speed and extent of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa is "unprecedented".

The WHO's Dr Keiji Fukuda expressed concern over so-called "shadow zones", areas which cannot be reached and where patients are not being detected.

The organisation confirmed 142 new cases of the disease had been reported since 19 August, as well as 77 deaths.

Already more people have died in this outbreak of Ebola than in any other.

At least 1,427 people have now died in the outbreak so far, with the number of cases now standing at 2,615.

Speaking at a news conference in the Liberian capital Monrovia, Dr Fukuda said combating the disease would take "several months of hard work".

"We haven't seen an Ebola outbreak covering towns, rural areas so quickly and over such a wide area," he added.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-28905382

Ebola virus disease update - west Africa
Deaths 1 427
http://www.who.int/csr/don/2014_08_22_ebola/en/

 

[Garson007]

Africa has far too many hungry mouths in it already, a nice disease like Ebola can fix that.

Lack of food is not the problem. Neither is the right to have kids. All Africa's population problems can be solved with wealth that currently exists.

 

[OrbitalDawn]

Blaming Ebola on God's wrath is worse than you think

As the deadly Ebola virus continues to spread in Liberia, religious leaders there are claiming that "immoral acts" are responsible for the catastrophic outbreak. Christian leaders meeting at the Liberian Council of Churches unanimously agreed: "God is angry with Liberia." The statement released by the council declared: "Ebola is a plague. Liberians have to pray and seek God's forgiveness over the corruption and immoral acts (such as homosexualism, etc.) that continue to penetrate our society." Their recommended solution to the disease ravaging the nation is that everyone should stay indoors for a three-day period of fasting and prayer.

The belief that Ebola is a sign of judgement is shared by some in the evangelical community. "Bring on the Ebola virus," one website proclaims. "God does not exist to give us what we want, and if killing off our loved ones is going to help us realize this, then this is what He will do." The Christian radio host Rick Wiles warned that "if Ebola becomes a global plague, you better make sure the blood of Jesus is upon you, you better make sure you have been marked by the angels so that you are protected by God".

Providence

There is something insidious about the notion that God protects the health of the faithful and punishes the sick.

The "God is angry" explanation for the Ebola outbreak is reminiscent of the reaction to other recent episodes of crisis and disaster, as is the broad targeting of "corruption and immoral acts". Similar responses came in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, the Asian tsunami of 2004, and Hurricane Katrina, the last of which was blamed on everything from abortion to homosexuality to antagonism against Islam to insufficient support for the state of Israel. "Providence punishes national sins by national calamities," said the group Columbia Christians for Life. "We believe that God is in control of the weather," announced the head of the evangelical group Repent America. The specific mention by the Liberian council of "homosexualism" is also a familiar refrain: In the 1980s the religious right claimed that AIDS was a judgement on gay people.

Commentators have argued that divine punishment is simply a well-established mechanism for understanding horrifying disaster. They note that during the Black Death of the Middle Ages, the personification of death as the Grim Reaper emerged, the very embodiment of the pervasive cultural fear of contagion. The reaction we are seeing in Liberia, it is argued, is nothing more than human nature: This is how we make sense of disease and disaster seemingly beyond our control.

To an extent they are right: The outbreak of Ebola, a truly horrific and devastating disease, taps our most primitive fears and is met with our most weighty emotional and theological response. But to attribute these theories of divine punishment merely to the need to understand an outbreak of disease, to limit them to something like an emergency response, is mistaken. The religious connection between sickness and sin is a constant, as present in times of calm as it is in times of crisis.

Biblical plagues

In the Bible, where most people mentally situate the word "plague" and envision just the sort of grand catastrophes that are being invoked in the Ebola crisis – picture the 10 plagues of Egypt – the link between disease and divine punishment is pervasive. Individuals who offend God, or God's agents, are suddenly struck with a variety of ailments: skin disease, infertility, blindness, or just generalised "sickness" are all levelled as punishments by an angered deity. And, in turn, these conditions are "cured" only as a result of prayer, a display of faith, or beseeching the forgiveness of the offended God. Even if Jesus says on one occasion in the Gospel of John that a man's blindness is not the result of either his own or his parents' sins, the rest of the gospels portray Jesus as a physician to sinners who constantly equates sin and sickness. The dominant biblical understanding of disease is that it is caused by sin and cured by God.

This broad view that illness is the result of sin and can be cured only by God is known to scholars as the "religious model" of disability. In contrast to other models of disability, which find the causes or origins of disability in medical diagnoses or in socio-cultural definitions of "wholeness" and attitudes toward the impaired, the religious model is specifically interested, like so much in the history of religious thought, in generating a narrative of human action and divine reaction. And while it is tempting to relegate such explanatory considerations to the pre-modern world that produced Greek myths and biblical stories, this religious world view is more pedestrian and more deeply entrenched in contemporary culture than is usually admitted.

The Bible may be 2000 years old, but we should not discount its influence on a culture in which, according to a Gallup poll, three out of four Americans believe the Bible to be either divinely inspired or the literal word of God.

Faith is health

Biblical ideas about disability and divine judgement are filtered through sermons and contemporary self-help books, such as the 2005 volume Infertility in the Bible: How the matriarchs changed their fate, how you can too, which suggests that the devoted infertile person should "look for a character flaw in yourself … understand what mistake you're making, and hope that your new insight will lead to divine intervention now that you are no longer blinded by goals that contradict God's plan." Belief and obedience equal health – a religious tenet that has begun to infiltrate the ostensibly secular world. An oft-cited study from Duke University claimed (beggaring the fundamental understanding of cause and effect) that religious practices can boost the immune system.

There is something insidious about the notion that God protects the health of the faithful and punishes the sick, which is probably why it is rarely spoken aloud. (The seemingly random nature of illness makes it the kind of thing that people have less control over than, say, whether they are wealthy or poor, another dichotomy that is more often openly associated with divine favour or disfavour. Of course wealth and health are far more closely related than anyone espousing the heavenly origin of either would probably care to admit.) Yet even in whispers, this idea is quietly ubiquitous, even in modern America.

When Liberian religious leaders attribute Ebola to God's will, they are not reaching for an ornamental and rarely used theological concept. They are simply raising to prominence a standard element of the theological repertoire. Those commentators who chalk up this religious response to nothing more than human nature in the face of crisis are missing the fact that this idea is a constant and subtle presence in religious explanations of disease.

Stigmatising the sick

What makes the persistence and prevalence of the association between disease and divine punishment so important to recognise, and so problematic, is the effect that this perspective has on the lives of the sick themselves. When illness is seen as punishment, the ill are seen as punished. Stigmatising sickness is dangerous: it renders the sufferer as "other" and becomes a protective mechanism by which the healthy distance themselves, physically and psychologically, from the unwell. The sick are cursed, and the healthy, by necessary contrast, are blessed. This cannot but have an effect on how those suffering from illness are treated: If disease is divine punishment, then by definition they "deserve it", as homophobes were so happy to proclaim at the height of the AIDS crisis. The sick are seen as implicitly and personally culpable for their own conditions.

The dehumanising idea that illness is connected to sin is a common feature of religious thinking about disease and sickness in general. Periods of crisis, like this one, may empower religious leaders to speak openly about the way that their traditions understand disease, but these explanations are not the product only of such exceptional moments of crisis. They are, rather, deep, long-lived and fundamental aspects of how religious communities think about the sick among them. Both the leaders who present Ebola and other crises as divine punishment and the commentators who attribute this perspective to human nature under stress – and thereby excuse it – are participating in the perpetuation of a dangerous and destructive mode of thinking.

 

[Lycanthrope]

Religious opportunists exploiting the fears of the ignorant, vulnerable and desperate? What a shock.

As long as religion and superstition are allowed to brainwash en masse, that's the only purpose religion has ever served and ever will serve.

 

[Techne]

Serious Darwin award contenders here:
Mob Destroys Ebola Center In Liberia Two Days After It Opens

 

[techead]

That is hectic...

 

[LazyLion]

EBOLA TAKING TOLL ON WEST AFRICAN ECONOMY
by Zoom Dosso

The worst-ever outbreak of the Ebola virus is taking a heavy toll on west Africa's economy as crops rot in the fields, mines are abandoned and goods cannot get to market.

The epidemic has ravaged the region since it erupted in the forests in the south of Guinea earlier this year, killing 1,427 people and infecting thousands more.

On Friday health officials said the fever had spread to every corner of Liberia, the worst-hit country in the grip of the epidemic where 624 people have died so far.

But beyond the mounting death toll, the disease is also undermining the region's economic growth and threatening the long-term development of some of the world's poorest countries.

"It is a total catastrophe. We are losing lots of money," said Alhaji Bamogo, who sells clothes in the market in the Liberian capital Monrovia.

"All those who are coming to the market come only to buy food or products for the disinfection of Ebola," he said.

Across the resource-rich countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea and Nigeria, companies are suspending operations due to fears of the haemorrhagic fever, which is spread through contact with bodily fluids.

Steel giant ArcelorMittal this month said the contractors at its expanding iron ore works in Liberia had suspended operations and were pulling out staff.

Several international airlines have halted their flights to west Africa in a move that Moody's ratings agency warns "will exact an economic toll" on the region.

And in Nigeria, Africa's top oil producer and most populous country where 15 cases have been identified and five people have died, experts warn that the impact for the regional economy could be dire if the disease takes hold.

"The Ebola epidemic is not just a public health crisis, but an economic crisis... affecting many sectors of activity," the president of the African Development Bank, Donald Kaberuka warned this month.

Philippe Hugon, Africa research director at the French think-tank IRIS, said the biggest threat for west Africa is a long-term pullout of global companies that the region relies on.

"Everything depends on whether this stays limited or whether the epidemic continues to spread in a prolonged way. The heads of foreign businesses on the ground are very concerned," he said.

The epidemic may "reinforce the idea that Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia are countries where it is dangerous to live -- because of diseases like Ebola and AIDS -- and thus to invest in," he said.

The disease is also exacting a direct economic toll on the countries where it is spreading by sapping already stretched government budgets.

Moody's warned it will squeeze state coffers from all sides, by forcing both "increased health expenditures, and... an Ebola-induced economic slowdown on government revenue generation".

This month the African Development Bank pledged $60 million to support the over-stretched health systems of the four affected countries.

Critics have accused west Africa's governments of being slow to admit the extent of the problem because of the cost of deploying resources to fight the disease.

Amadou Soumah, a trade union official in Guinea, which only last week declared a national emergency despite being at the epicentre of the outbreak earlier this year, said the government had played down the crisis "to stop investors fleeing".

And now "Guinea is going to deploy its forces along the border to rack up even more spending," he added, referring to the closure of its frontiers with Liberia and Sierra Leone.

For people on the ground, the epidemic has created an even more pressing problem: food shortages.

In the markets, supplies of staple commodities such as rice are already dwindling, with only the bravest traders willing to venture far afield to buy stocks.

In quarantined zones in Sierra Leone and Liberia, key cash crops such as cocoa and coffee have been left rotting in the fields as farmers fear to stray far from home.

"People are going to move around less and less," said Philippe De Vreyer, a specialist in west African economics and professor at the University of Paris.

"For instance, the man who usually goes to the local market to sell his vegetables will decide to stay home. People are not going to get their supplies, with all that entails."

In Nigeria, even though it is the least hit by the epidemic, Ebola fears are already keeping people indoors.

So far the epidemic has not threatened the economically vital oil industry, which is centred in the southern Niger Delta about 1,000 kilometres (600 miles) from Lagos, where the cases have been found.

The service industry is feeling the effects, however.

"Bookings to hotels have dropped by almost 30 percent so far this month, as have orders for food and drink for large social gatherings like weddings and funerals," said Bismarck Rewane, head of the Lagos-based Financial Derivatives Company.


Source : Sapa-AFP /ma
Date : 24 Aug 2014 12:39

 

[Nanfeishen]

And now confirmed in the DRC

Authorities in the Democratic Republic of Congo say two people have died from Ebola in the country's north-west.

They are the first reported Ebola cases outside West Africa since the outbreak there began, although it is not clear if they are directly linked to that outbreak.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-28922290

The bolded bit is a little concerning, not sure if directly linked could that imply a second outbreak ? :wtf:

 

[Ockie]

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-28922290

The bolded bit is a little concerning, not sure if directly linked could that imply a second outbreak ? :wtf:

Mmmm well Congo is the place where it first started was it not? Or it was Zaire at that time?

 

[Sinbad]

It's weird

Two of the books I've randomly picked up to read in the last week have been about ebola. Neither of them obviously so from the title or cover.

 

[LazyLion]

JAPAN READY TO OFFER TRIAL EBOLA DRUG

Tokyo stands ready to offer an experimental drug developed by a Japanese company to help stem the global tide of the deadly Ebola virus, the top government spokesman said Monday.

"Our country is prepared to provide the yet-to-be approved drug in cooperation with the manufacturer if the WHO requests," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has been discussing the use of unapproved drugs as a way of getting a handle on an outbreak in Africa that has already cost more than 1,400 lives, with thousands more people infected.

There is currently no available cure or vaccine for Ebola, and the WHO has declared the latest outbreak a global public health emergency.

Several drugs are under development.

The use of an experimental drug called ZMapp on two Americans and a Spanish priest infected with the virus while working in Africa has opened up an intense ethical debate.

The drug, which is in very short supply, has reportedly shown promising results in the two Americans, although the priest died.

US company Mapp Bioparmaceutical which makes the drug said this month it had sent all its available supplies to west Africa.

The WHO earlier said a panel of medial experts had determined it is "ethical" to provide experimental treatments.

Suga said Monday: "Even before the WHO reaches a conclusion, we are ready to respond to individual requests (from medical workers) under certain conditions if it is an urgent case."

The medication Suga was referring to is Avigan, a drug in tablet form that was approved as an anti-influenza drug in Japan in March and is currently in clinical tests in the United States.

Its developer Fujifilm Holdings said it had received inquiries from abroad but declined to say how many and from which countries.

The company, which has diversified into healthcare fields, has "no problem" over the amount of stockpiles, according to spokesman Takao Aoki.

"We have sufficient supplies for more than 20,000 people," he said.


Source : Sapa-AFP /dm
Date : 25 Aug 2014 07:21

 

[LazyLion]

DR CONGO CONFIRMS FIRST EBOLA CASES

The Democratic Republic of Congo confirmed its two first cases of Ebola this year, but claimed they were unrelated to the epidemic raging in four countries of West Africa.

The UN's World Health Organization (WHO) meanwhile announced that one of its health experts, an epidemiologist, had been infected while working in Sierra Leone.

Also on Sunday, Britain's first Ebola patient, a male nurse who contracted the disease in Sierra Leone, was admitted to a London hospital.

The sobering news of Ebola's spread came as UN officials pledged to step up efforts against the lethal tropical virus, which has infected more than 2,600 and killed 1,427, according to WHO figures released Friday.

In Kinshasa, Congolese Health Minister Felix Kabange Numbi said that two of eight samples taken from victims of a mystery fever had tested positive for Ebola.

"The results are positive. The Ebola virus is confirmed in DRC," Kabange told AFP.

Speaking later on public television, he said the confirmation marked the seventh outbreak of Ebola in DR Congo, where the virus was first identified in 1976 near the Ebola River.

But he said the two new cases had "no link to [the epidemic] raging in West Africa" and were different strains from one another.

Authorities immediately imposed a quarantine around the affected area in Equateur province near Jera, more than 1,200 kilometres (750 miles) northeast of the Congolese capital Kinshasa.

Medical aid group Doctors Without Borders said it was sending a crew to help handle patients in the area.

The UN's World Health Organization gave no details of its infected expert, but said the person was "receiving the best care possible" and that it was considering a medical evacuation.

Meanwhile, the British nurse who contracted the virus in Sierra Leone arrived at Britain's only specialist Ebola isolation unit at the Royal Free Hospital in London.

The patient, who is not "seriously unwell" according to the Department of Health, was evacuated in a specially equipped C17 Royal Air Force military plane before being taken by military ambulance across London flanked by a police escort.

Sierra Leone, where 392 Ebola deaths have been recorded, is one of four West African states struggling to control the spread of the aggressively contagious virus, which can spread through bodily fluids including saliva and blood.

Liberia has been particularly hard hit since the outbreak began in March, with 624 deaths, compared with 406 for Guinea and five for Nigeria, according to a WHO count on Friday.

On Saturday the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon's special representative for Liberia, Karin Landgren, pledged the world body would take a "strong role" in coordinating the response to the emergency.

But the WHO has warned that it could take "several months" to bring the epidemic under control, and estimates its count of the infected and dead is likely far too low, due in part to community resistance to outside medical staff and a lack of access to infected areas.

The epidemic, which first erupted in the forests in the south of Guinea, is also taking its toll on the economies of some of the world's poorest countries.

"It is a total catastrophe. We are losing lots of money," Alhaji Bamogo, who sells clothes in the market in the Liberian capital Monrovia, told AFP recently.

"All those who are coming to the market come only to buy food or products for the disinfection of Ebola," he said.

Several international airlines have halted flights to the region in a move that Moody's ratings agency warns "will exact an economic toll".

Steel giant ArcelorMittal said contractors at its iron ore works in Liberia had suspended operations and were pulling out staff.

And in quarantined areas in Sierra Leone and Liberia, cash crops like cocoa and coffee are being left to rot as farmers fear to stray from home.

On Sunday, Benin postponed a meeting of African health ministers scheduled for early September.

Meanwhile the Ivory Coast has closed its borders with Guinea and Liberia, just days after Senegal did the same with Guinea.

And South Africa has banned entry for non-citizens arriving from Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia.

The measures taken against Ebola-afflicted countries, especially by neighbours, have caused friction in the region.

Ibrahim Ben Kargbo, the chairman of Sierra Leone's presidential task force on Ebola, said he was "surprised" by the lack of solidarity among African countries.

It "gives the impression that we are pariah states," Kargo said on state television.


Source : Sapa-AFP /dm
Date : 25 Aug 2014 03:46

 

[LazyLion]

BRITON WITH EBOLA ARRIVES IN LONDON HOSPITAL

A British nurse who contracted the Ebola virus in Sierra Leone arrived at a London hospital on Sunday, the ministry of defence said.

The patient, who is not "seriously unwell" according to the Department of Health, was evacuated from Sierra Leone to London in a military plane.

The Briton is the first person from the country to have contracted the virus in an outbreak that has killed at least 1,427 people in West Africa since March.

The Department of Health said the patient was evacuated in a specially equipped C17 Royal Air Force military plane to RAF Northolt in north west London.

Flanked by a police escort, a special military ambulance took the man across London to Britain's only specialist Ebola isolation unit at the Royal Free Hospital.

His bed will be sealed off with a tent with its own ventilation system, and only specially trained staff can enter the unit.

A spokesman for Sierra Leone's health ministry, Yahya Tunis, said the man was a volunteer nurse working in Kenema in eastern Sierra Leone, one of the areas hardest hit by Ebola which has now been quarantined.

"His colleagues are very sad over the development as he is considered as a valued member," Tunis said, adding that he was involved in "surveillance, contact tracing and the burial of Ebola victims".

England's deputy chief medical officer Professor John Watson insisted that the risk of the virus being spread in Britain remained "very low".

"UK hospitals have a proven record of dealing with imported infectious diseases and this patient will be isolated and will receive the best care possible," he added.

Ebola spreads through direct contact with the blood or bodily fluids of an infected person.

The Ebola epidemic has spread through Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, while Nigeria has also been affected. It is the worst outbreak of the killer virus yet.

The World Health Organization has warned it could take several months to bring the epidemic under control.


Source : Sapa-AFP /dm
Date : 25 Aug 2014 01:08