DR Congo: Ebola Outbreak Confirmed As Two Deaths Reported
By Staff Writer
The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has confirmed that an outbreak of haemorrhagic fever in the north of the country has been identified as Ebola Virus, which has so far killed 1, 427 people and infected other 2, 615 in West Africa since March.
Health Minister Dr. Felix Kabange Numbi on Sunday August 24, said tests on two people send in Gabon for retesting had confirmed the disease in Equateur province, where 13 had already died.
World Health Organization (WHO) spokesman, Gregory Hartl, yesterday also confirmed the samples tested at a national laboratory were positive for Ebola.
Dr. Numbi he said the deaths occurred in an isolated area and the disease seemed a different strain to West Africa’s, as11 people was sick and in isolation and that 80 contacts were being traced.
Numbi said a quarantine zone was being set up in a 100-km (62-mile) radius in Boende where the cases had been registered to contain the disease, as the cases are the first reported outside West Africa since it’s outbreak.
WHO said the outbreak of hemorrhagic gastroenteritis in Boende region had already killed 70 people in recent weeks before the two cases were confirmed as Ebola.
The speed and extent of the outbreak has been "unprecedented", the World Health Organization (WHO) says.
There is no known cure but some affected people have recovered after being given an experimental drug, ZMapp. However, supplies are now exhausted.
On Sunday August 24, the first case of a Briton health worker contracting the virus in Sierra Leone was reported and was flown back to the UK on an RAF jet.
Among the 13 who died in the past month after contracting an unidentified fever in the Equateur region of the DRC, included five health workers.
He said this marked the seventh outbreak in DRC, since the virus was first identified in the country in 1976 near the Ebola River.
On Saturday, Sierra Leone parliament passed a new law making it a criminal offence to hide Ebola patients and if ascended by the president, those caught face up to two years in prison.
The move came after the Ivory Coast closed its land borders to prevent the spread of Ebola on to its territory.
The country has already imposed a ban on flights to and from Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, with Gabon, Senegal, Cameroon and South Africa having taken similar measures.
WHO says travel bans do not work, and that what is needed is more doctors and officials to help trace those infected with Ebola, as well as more mobile laboratories.
Last week, two US doctors were discharged from a hospital in Liberia after being given the ZMapp drug, while three Liberian medics are also recovering well.
Ebola is spread between humans through direct contact with infected body fluids. It is one of the world's deadliest diseases, with up to 90% of cases resulting in death.