[SHARCbits] Ebola outbreak in history surpassed 700 deaths

[Gaetano Fida]

DAKAR, Senegal (AP) - The worst recorded Ebola outbreak in history surpassed
700 deaths in West Africa as the World Health Organization on Thursday
announced dozens of new fatalities.

In Sierra Leone, President Ernest Bai Koroma vowed to quarantine sick
patients at home and have authorities conduct house-to-house searches for
others who may have been exposed as the country struggles with families
resisting treatment at isolation centers. Some have kept loved ones at home
given the high death rates at clinics where Ebola patients are quarantined.

His announcement late Wednesday came as neighboring Liberia also ramped up
its efforts to slow the virulent disease's spread, shutting down schools and
ordering most public servants to stay home from work.

"It could be helpful for the government to have powers to isolate and
quarantine people and it's certainly better than what's been done so far,"
said Dr. Heinz Feldmann, chief of virology at U.S. National Institute of
Allergy and Infectious Diseases. "Whether it works, we will have to wait and
see."

The U.S. Peace Corps also was evacuating hundreds of its volunteers in the
affected countries. Two Peace Corps workers are under isolation outside the
U.S. after having contact with a person who later died of the Ebola virus, a
State Department official said.

Ebola now has been blamed for 729 deaths in four West African countries this
year, and has shown no signs of slowing down particularly in Liberia and
Sierra Leone. On Thursday, the WHO announced 57 new deaths - 27 in Liberia,
20 in Guinea, nine in Sierra Leone and one in Nigeria.

Among the deaths this week was that of the chief doctor treating Ebola in
Sierra Leone, who was to be buried Thursday.

The government said Dr. Sheik Humarr Khan's death was "an irreparable loss
of this son of the soil." The 39-year-old was a leading doctor on
hemorrhagic fevers in a nation with very few medical resources.

Ebola cases first emerged in the nation of Guinea back in March, and later
spread across the borders to Liberia and Sierra Leone. The outbreak is now
the largest recorded in world history, and has infected three African
capitals with international airports. Officials are trying to step up
screening of passengers, though an American man was able to fly from Liberia
to Nigeria, where authorities say he died days later from Ebola.

Ebola has no vaccine and no specific treatment, with a fatality rate of
about 60 percent in this particular outbreak. But experts say the risk of
travelers contracting it is considered low because it requires direct
contact with bodily fluids or secretions such as urine, blood, sweat or
saliva. Ebola can't be spread like flu through casual contact or breathing
in the same air.

Patients are contagious only once the disease has progressed to the point
they show symptoms, according to the World Health Organization. The most
vulnerable are health care workers and relatives who come in much closer
contact with the sick.

In Liberia, authorities say 28 out of the 45 health workers who have
contracted the disease so far have died. Two American health workers sick
with the virus remain in isolation.

___

Larson reported from Dakar, Senegal. Associated Press Medical Writer Maria
Cheng in London and Jonathan Paye-Layleh in Monrovia, Liberia contributed to
this report.

 

 

 

73 de WB0YSX

Gaetano (Tim) Fida

 

 



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