Ebola news 9/2

[Buster's Uncle]

Liberian doctors strike, food prices spike as West Africa struggles to contain Ebola outbreak
Reuters
By James Harding Giahyue  34 minutes ago



Medical staff pursue a man infected with Ebola through a market near Monrovia as transfixed crowds watch



MONROVIA (Reuters) - Doctors in Liberia were out on strike on Tuesday as they struggled to cope with the outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus, while the United Nations warned the spread of the disease in West Africa was causing food shortages in one of the world's poorest regions.

Governments and aid organizations are scrambling to contain the disease, which has killed more than 1,500 since March. Medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said 800 more beds for Ebola patients were urgently needed in the Liberian capital Monrovia alone, while in Sierra Leone highly infectious bodies were rotting in the streets.

MSF called for rich nations to send military medical teams to support buckling healthcare systems in West Africa.

U.S. missionary organization SIM USA said on Tuesday that an American doctor treating obstetrics patients at the ELWA hospital in Monrovia had tested positive for Ebola. The doctor, who was not working in the hospital's Ebola treatment center, was in an isolation ward at the hospital and was responding well so far, SIM said on its Web site.

Scores of staff went on strike at the John F. Kennedy Medical Center (JFK) in Monrovia in a protest over unpaid bonuses and working conditions. More than 120 healthworkers have died in West Africa during the Ebola outbreak amid shortages of equipment and trained staff.

"Health workers have died (fighting Ebola), including medical doctors at ... JFK and to have them come to work without food on their table, we think that is pathetic," George Williams, secretary general of the Health Workers Association of Liberia, told Reuters.

Williams said healthcare workers at JFK, the country's largest referral hospital, had gone unpaid for two months.

The strike followed a one-day protest over pay and conditions at the Connaught hospital in Sierra Leone's capital Freetown on Monday. Staff at the main Ebola clinic at Kenema in eastern Sierra Leone also walked off the job last week, in protest at conditions.



A man washes his hands at a tap outside the Green Pharmacy at Area 8 in Abuja, September 1, 2014. REUTERS/Afolabi Sotunde


The World Health Organization and other international bodies are rushing to support fragile healthcare systems in affected countries, but additional staff and resources have been slow to arrive.

The president of MSF, Joanne Liu, said in a speech to U.N. members in New York that the outbreak was now an issue of international security and needed specialized biological disaster response teams to contain it, both civilian and military.

"Six months into the worst Ebola epidemic in history, the world is losing the battle to contain it," Liu said, slamming what she called "a global coalition of inaction."

Liu called for the urgent dispatch of field hospitals with isolation wards and mobile medical laboratories to West Africa.


FOOD PRICES SURGE

In Monrovia, MSF said its new ELWA 3 center, which has 160 beds, was already overflowing with patients. "Every day we have to turn sick people away because we are too full," said Stefan Liljegren, MSF coordinator at the site.

Putting further pressure on the ability of the region's governments to spend money on healthcare, the epidemic has also put harvests at risk and sent food prices soaring in West Africa, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said.

The FAO issued a special alert over food security for Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, the three countries most affected by the outbreak, which was detected in the forests of southeastern Guinea in March.

Restrictions on people's movements and the establishment of quarantine zones to contain the spread of the hemorrhagic fever has led to panic buying, food shortages and price hikes in countries ill-prepared to absorb the shock.

"Even prior to the Ebola outbreak, households in some of the most affected areas were spending up to 80 percent of their incomes on food," said Vincent Martin, head of an FAO unit in Dakar coordinating the agency's response. "Now these latest price spikes are effectively putting food completely out of their reach."

The director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Tom Frieden, said the outbreak was accelerating very fast and urged more global support to combat it.

"It's spiraling out of control. The situation is bad and it looks like it's going to get worse quickly. There is still a window of opportunity to tamp it down but that window is closing," he told NBC News following a visit to the region.

    "This is different than every other Ebola situation we've ever had. It's spreading widely, throughout entire countries, through multiple countries, in cities and very fast," he said.

    Frieden called on health officials to reverse the outbreak by sending in more resources and specialized workers, adding that the U.S. government now had 70 people in the region.

The death toll from an Ebola outbreak in the Djera region of northern Democratic Republic of Congo has risen to 31, Minister of Health Felix Kabange Numbi told Reuters on Tuesday.

The outbreak in Congo's Equateur province is thought to be separate from the West African epidemic.

(Additional reporting by Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva, Isla Binnie in Rome, Umaru Fofana in Freetown, Susan Heavey in Washington and Bienvenu-Marie Bakumanya in Kinshasa; Writing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg and Bate Felix; Editing by Daniel Flynn and Susan Fenton)


http://news.yahoo.com/liberia-doctors-strike-u-n-warns-food-shortages-140846320--sector.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Another American medical missionary has Ebola
Yahoo News
By Jason Sickles, 30 minutes ago



UN peacekeepers wear a face mask to protect themselves from the Ebola virus as they patrol in Kandopleu, Ivory Coast, in August the border with Guinea and Liberia (AFP Photo/Issouf Sanogo)



UN peacekeepers wear a face mask to protect themselves from the Ebola virus as they patrol in Kandopleu, Ivory …
Another American doctor working in West Africa has tested positive for the deadly Ebola virus, a missionary group announced on Tuesday.

SIM USA, an international Christian mission organization, said the unnamed doctor was treating obstetrics patients at the group’s hospital in Monrovia, Liberia when he felt Ebola symptoms and immediately quarantined himself.

The group said the doctor has since been transferred to an Ebola isolation unit and is, “doing well and is in good spirits.”

The Charlotte-based group didn’t reveal the doctor’s age or how long he had been working in West Africa. They said specifics on how the doctor contracted the virus haven’t been determined.

Two American medical missionaries contracted Ebola in Monrovia in late July and were eventually evacuated to an Atlanta hospital, marking the first time a patient with a known case has been treated in the United States.

Nancy Writebol, also a SIM missionary, and Dr. Kent Brantly were deemed to be symptom-free and released from the hospital two weeks ago. A SIM spokesperson didn't immediately respond to an email asking if the latest doctor will also be brought to the U.S.

The Ebola outbreak in West Africa has been described as the worst-ever. More than 1,550 people have died since it was first reported in the forests of southeastern Guinea in March.

“My heart was deeply saddened, but my faith was not shaken, when I learned another of our missionary doctors contracted Ebola,” Bruce Johnson, president of SIM USA, said in a written statement. “As a global mission, we are surrounding our missionary with prayer, as well as our Liberian SIM/ELWA colleagues, who continue fighting the Ebola epidemic in Liberia. We have gifted Liberian doctors, medical staff and support staff who are carrying on the fight.”

— This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.


http://news.yahoo.com/another-american-medical-missionary-has-ebola-173553117.html

[Buster's Uncle]

World 'losing battle' to contain Ebola
AFP
By Frankie Taggart  1 hour ago



International medical agency Medecins sans Frontieres said Tuesday the world was "losing the battle" to contain Ebola as the United Nations warned of severe food shortages in the hardest-hit countries.

MSF told a UN briefing in New York that world leaders were failing to address the epidemic and called for an urgent global biological disaster response to get aid and personnel to west Africa.

"Six months into the worst Ebola epidemic in history, the world is losing the battle to contain it. Leaders are failing to come to grips with this transnational threat," said MSF international president Joanne Liu.

"The (World Health Organization) announcement on August 8 that the epidemic constituted a 'public health emergency of international concern' has not led to decisive action, and states have essentially joined a global coalition of inaction."

Liu called for the international community to fund more beds for a regional network of field hospitals, dispatch trained personnel and deploy mobile laboratories across Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

MSF said in a statement accompanying the briefing that the crisis was particularly acute in Liberia's capital, Monrovia, where it is estimated that "800 additional beds are needed".

"Every day we have to turn sick people away because we are too full", said Stefan Liljegren, MSF's coordinator at the ELWA Three Ebola unit in Monrovia.

"I have had to tell ambulance drivers to call me before they arrive with patients, no matter how unwell they are, since we are often unable to admit them."

MSF said that while its care centres in Liberia and Sierra Leone were overcrowded, people were continuing to die in their communities.

"In Sierra Leone, highly infectious bodies are rotting in the streets," their statement said.

The Ebola outbreak has killed 1,552 people and infected 3,062, according to the latest figures released by the WHO.



In this photo taken on Friday, Aug. 29, 2014, a health worker measures a patient's temperature at the Connaught Hospital, which has suffered the loss of medical workers in the past from the Ebola virus, in Freetown, Sierra Leone. Dr. Sheik Humarr Khan was one of those on the front lines of the Ebola outbreak. The tireless Khan was jovial but forceful, doling out praise and criticism to junior doctors at his hospital. But Khan became infected and died, and so have at least 120 other medical workers in Sierra Leone and in three other countries, creating immediate and long-term impacts in a region that already had an understaffed and under equipped health care system. (AP Photo/ Michael Duff)


At current infection rates, the agency fears it could take six to nine months and at least $490 million (373 million euros) to bring the outbreak under control, by which time over 20,000 people could be affected.


- Plunged into poverty -

The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization issued an alert that restrictions on movement in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone had led to panic buying, food shortages and severe price hikes.

"Access to food has become a pressing concern for many people in the three affected countries and their neighbours," said Bukar Tijani, FAO Regional Representative for Africa.

"With the main harvest now at risk and trade and movements of goods severely restricted, food insecurity is poised to intensify in the weeks and months to come.

"The situation will have long-lasting impacts on farmers' livelihoods and rural economies."

The food security alert was sounded as the WHO announced a separate Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo has now killed 31 people, although it added that the contagion was confined to an area 800 kilometres (500 miles) north of Kinshasa.

The WHO had previously given a death toll of 13 for the country.

Quarantine zones imposed in the epicentre of the west African outbreak will lead to food shortages for "large numbers" of people, the FAO said, with the main harvest season for rice and maize just weeks away.

Production of cash crops like palm oil, cocoa and rubber is also expected to be seriously affected, throwing people further into poverty.

Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone rely heavily on imports for cereals and other commodities.


- Emergency operation -

The closure of border crossings where the three countries meet, as well as reduced trade at seaports, is strangling supply and sending prices soaring, the FAO said.

In Liberia, which has been hardest-hit with 694 deaths, the price of the national staple cassava in market stalls in Monrovia went up 150 percent within the first weeks of August, the FAO said.

"Even prior to the Ebola outbreak, households in some of the affected areas were spending up to 80 percent of their incomes on food," said Vincent Martin, Head of FAO's Resilience Hub in Dakar, Senegal.

"Now these latest price spikes are effectively putting food completely out of their reach. This situation may have social repercussions that could lead to subsequent impact on the disease containment."

The UN's World Food Programme (WFP) launched an emergency operation on Tuesday to get 65,000 tonnes of food to 1.3 million people in the worst-hit areas.

It said it was deploying 50 additional staff across the three most affected countries.

The outbreak of Ebola, transmitted through contact with infected bodily fluids, has sparked alarm throughout west Africa but also further afield, with international flights being cancelled and countries scrambling to come up with a cure.

Japanese researchers said Tuesday they had developed a new method to detect the presence of the Ebola virus in 30 minutes, with technology that could allow doctors to quickly diagnose infection.


http://news.yahoo.com/world-losing-battle-contain-ebola-145522273.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Group says world is losing battle against Ebola
Associated Press
By ALEXANDRA OLSON and SARAH DILORENZO  44 minutes ago



UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The international group Doctor Without Borders warned Tuesday that the world is losing the battle against Ebola and lamented that treatment centers in West Africa have been "reduced to places where people go to die alone" as authorities race to contain the disease.

In Liberia, a missionary organization announced that another American doctor has become infected.

Doctors Without Borders President Joanne Liu said her organization is completely overwhelmed by Ebola outbreak in four West African countries. She said treatment centers can offer little more than palliative care and called on other countries to contribute civilian and military medical personnel familiar with biological disasters.

World Health Organization Director Margaret Chan warned that the outbreak would "get worse before it will get better" and would require a larger global response. She thanked countries that have helped but said: "We need more from you. And we also need those countries that have not come on board."

The latest missionary to come down with the disease, a male obstetrician, was not immediately identified by the group Serving In Mission. He did not work in an Ebola ward. The group did not specify how he contracted Ebola, but it can be spread through vaginal fluids.

Bruce Johnson, the group's president, said the organization was "surrounding our missionary with prayer" and Liberian colleagues who continue fighting the epidemic.

Last month, two Americans, including one from SIM, were evacuated to the United States for treatment after contracting Ebola in Liberia. The two received an experimental drug known as ZMapp and recovered. The manufacturer says it has run out of supplies of the drug and it will take months to produce more.

David Nabarro, who is coordinating the U.N. response, said the world body is "bringing in outside health workers as much as we can."

But Ameerah Haq, head of U.N. peacekeeping's Department of Field Support, warned that before bringing in external expertise, guarantees are needed for medical evacuations and treatment for any workers who become infected. Haq said "without one, the other will not happen."

The Ebola outbreak in West Africa has killed more than 1,500 people in Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria.

Earlier Tuesday, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization warned that food in countries hit by Ebola is becoming more expensive and will become scarcer as farmers can't reach their fields.

Authorities have cordoned off entire towns in an effort to halt the virus' spread. Surrounding countries have closed land borders, airlines have suspended flights to and from the affected countries and seaports are losing traffic, restricting food imports to the hardest-hit countries. Those countries — Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone — all rely on grain from abroad to feed their people, according to the U.N. FAO.

For instance, the price of cassava root, a staple in many West African diets, has gone up 150 percent in one market in Liberia's capital, Monrovia.

"Even prior to the Ebola outbreak, households in some of the affected areas were spending up to 80 percent of their incomes on food," said Vincent Martin, who is coordinating the food agency's response to the crisis. "Now these latest price spikes are effectively putting food completely out of their reach."

An estimated 1.3 million people in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone will soon need help feeding themselves, said the U.N.

Chan and other officials at the U.N. forum criticized the border closures because they are preventing supplies from reaching people in desperate need.

"The three worst-hit countries are isolated," Chan said. "We cannot fly in our experts for help."

The situation will likely worsen because restrictions on movement are preventing laborers from getting to farms and the harvest of rice and corn is set to begin in just a few weeks, the FAO said.

Ivory Coast decided Monday night to keep its borders with Guinea and Liberia closed but said it would open a humanitarian corridor to allow supplies in.

A separate Ebola outbreak has hit a remote part of Congo, in Central Africa, the traditional home of the disease. So far, 53 cases consistent with Ebola have been identified there, of whom 31 have died, WHO said Tuesday.

___

Associated Press Writer Marc-Andre Boisvert in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, contributed to this report.


http://news.yahoo.com/un-warns-food-prices-rising-ebola-hit-countries-095309306.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Ebola threatens food security in West Africa: FAO
Reuters
8 hours ago



A resident of West Point neighbourhood, which has been quarantined following an outbreak of Ebola, receives food rations from the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) in Monrovia August 28, 2014 REUTERS/2Tango



ROME (Reuters) - The world's worst Ebola epidemic has put harvests at risk and sent food prices soaring in West Africa, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said on Tuesday, warning the problem would intensify in coming months.

The FAO issued a special alert for Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, the three countries most affected by the outbreak, which has killed around 1,550 people since the virus was detected in the remote jungles of southeastern Guinea in March.

Restrictions on people's movements and the establishment of quarantine zones to contain the spread of the hemorrhagic fever has led to panic buying, food shortages and price hikes in countries ill-prepared to absorb the shock.

"Even prior to the Ebola outbreak, households in some of the most affected areas were spending up to 80 percent of their incomes on food," said Vincent Martin, head of an FAO unit in Dakar which is coordinating the agency's response.

"Now these latest price spikes are effectively putting food completely out of their reach," Martin said in a statement, adding the food crisis could hinder containment of the disease, which is typically spread via the bodily fluids of the sick.

Rice and maize production will be scaled back during the fast-approaching main harvest season as migration and movement restrictions cause labour shortages on farms, FAO said.

Cash crops like palm oil, cocoa and rubber will be seriously affected, squeezing the purchasing power of many families, who will also lose income and nutrition due to the ban on bush meat.

Border crossing closures and the reduction of trade through seaports have tightened food supplies in the three countries, which are all net cereal importers, and propelled prices upwards, exacerbated by higher transport costs.

The U.N. World Food Programme and FAO have approved an emergency programme to deliver 65,000 tonnes of food to 1.3 million people affected by Ebola over a three-month period.

The price of cassava at a market in the Liberian capital Monrovia rose 150 percent in the first weeks of August, the FAO said, adding that currency depreciation in Sierra Leone and Liberia was likely to force prices up further.

(Reporting by Isla Binnie; editing by Andrew Roche)


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-threatens-food-security-west-africa-fao-094313397.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Ebola kills 31 people in DR Congo: WHO
AFP
2 hours ago



Dr. Tom Frieden, Director of the Center for Disease Control, warns the Ebola epidemic "is likely to get worse."



Kinshasa (AFP) - An outbreak of the Ebola virus in the Democratic Republic of Congo has killed 31 people and the epidemic remains contained in a remote northwestern region, UN the World Health Organization (WHO) said Tuesday.

"There are now 31 deaths," Eugene Kambambi, the WHO's head of communication in DR Congo, told AFP, citing Congolese authorities and stressing that the epidemic "remains contained" in an area around 800 kilometres (500 miles) north of the capital Kinshasa.

Health officials had previously given a death toll of 13 people from the lethal haemorrhagic fever since August 11 around the isolated town of Boende, surrounded by dense tropical forest in Equateur province.

Kabambi was speaking by telephone from Mbandaka, the provincial capital, where he was accompanied by Health Minister Felix Kabange Numbi and the WHO representative in DRC, Joseph Cabore. The three were due to travel later Tuesday to the Boende area, which has already been quarantined.

Kabamba added that there were "53 confirmed, suspected or likely cases" of Ebola, while 185 people were under medical watch because they had admitted to contact with patients or were believed to have had dealings with people stricken by the highly contagious disease.

The government announced on August 25 that the DRC was facing its seventh Ebola outbreak since the disease was first identified in the former Zaire in 1976.



Health care workers, wearing protective suits, work at the Elwa hospital in Monrovia on August 30, 2014 (AFP Photo/Dominique Faget)


The health minister has ruled out any link with a serious Ebola epidemic sweeping parts of west Africa, at a cost of more than 1,500 lives, on the grounds that there had been no contact between those distant nations and Boende. The WHO has taken the same position.

Health authorities state that the outbreak is confined to four medical zones around Boende, where some personnel from the WHO and the charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) have been working with specialised epidemiologists since mid-August.

MSF on Monday told AFP that reinforcements had reached the affected area and were setting up an Ebola clinic. The deep forest location makes it hard for health teams to get to Boende, along with medical supplies to treat symptoms of the disease.

On the basis of WHO figures, Ebola kills a global average of 61 percent of those infected, causing unstoppable bleeding and the collapse of internal organs in its final stages.

While there is no vaccine, patients can be helped through the early phases of infection, marked by severe headaches, muscle pains and dehydration because of vomiting and diarrhoea.


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-kills-31-people-dr-congo-102448943.html

[Buster's Uncle]

U.S. CDC says Ebola threatening stability of affected countries
Reuters
1 hour ago



U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) educational materials are displayed at a hearing of a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee, about the Ebola crisis in West Africa, on Capitol Hill in Washington August 7, 2014. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst



CHICAGO (Reuters) - The Ebola outbreak is threatening the stability of affected and neighboring countries in West Africa and swift action is needed to scale up the "massive" response that will be required to tamp it down, the head of the U.S. for Disease Control and Prevention said on Tuesday.

Dr Thomas Frieden, director of the U.S. health agency who had just returned from a tour of West Africa, said he expected the number of Ebola cases to accelerate in the next two weeks and urged governments to act now to respond.

"The challenge isn't knowing what to do. The challenge is doing it now," Frieden said in a conference call with reporters.

He said the current outbreak now affecting Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Nigeria is "threatening the stability" of affected and neighboring countries.

(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)


http://news.yahoo.com/u-cdc-says-ebola-threatening-stability-affected-countries-170800934.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Japanese researchers develop 30-minute Ebola test
AFP
4 hours ago



A health care worker disinfects around the high-risk area at Elwa hospital, run by Medecins Sans Frontieres, in Monrovia on August 30, 2014 (AFP Photo/Dominique Faget)



Tokyo (AFP) - Japanese researchers said Tuesday they had developed a new method to detect the presence of the Ebola virus in 30 minutes, with technology that could allow doctors to quickly diagnose infection.

Professor Jiro Yasuda and his team at Nagasaki University say their process is also cheaper than the system currently in use in west Africa where the virus has already killed more than 1,500 people.

"The new method is simpler than the current one and can be used in countries where expensive testing equipment is not available," Yasuda told AFP by telephone.

"We have yet to receive any questions or requests, but we are pleased to offer the system, which is ready to go," he said.

Yasuda said the team had developed what he called a "primer", which amplifies only those genes specific to the Ebola virus found in a blood sample or other bodily fluid.

Using existing techniques, ribonucleic acid (RNA) -- biological molecules used in the coding of genes -- is extracted from any viruses present in a blood sample.

This is then used to synthesise the viral DNA, which can be mixed with the primers and then heated to 60-65 degrees Celsius (140-149 Fahrenheit).

If Ebola is present, DNA specific to the virus is amplified in 30 minutes due to the action of the primers. The by-products from the process cause the liquid to become cloudy, providing visual confirmation, Yasuda said.

Currently, a method called polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, is widely used to detect the Ebola virus, which requires doctors to heat and cool samples repeatedly and takes up to two hours.

"The new method only needs a small, battery-powered warmer and the entire system costs just tens of thousands of yen (hundreds of dollars), which developing countries should be able to afford," he added.

The outbreak of the Ebola virus, transmitted through contact with infected bodily fluids, has sparked alarm throughout western Africa and further afield.


http://news.yahoo.com/japanese-researchers-develop-30-minute-ebola-test-061658028.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Travel restrictions could worsen Ebola crisis: experts
AFP
By Olivier Thibault  7 minutes ago



Health care workers wearing full body suits burn infected items at the Elwa hospital run by Medecins Sans Frontieres in Monrovia on August 30, 2014 (AFP Photo/Dominique Faget)



Paris (AFP) - Travel restrictions could worsen West Africa's Ebola epidemic, limiting medical and food supplies and keeping out much-needed doctors, virologists said Tuesday as the disease continued its deadly spread.

The worst-ever outbreak of the haemorrhagic fever, which has hit Sierra Leone, Liberia, Nigeria and Guinea the hardest, has seen airlines cancel flights and several countries barring people from affected nations.

"If we impose an aerial quarantine on these countries, we undermine their fight against the epidemic: the rotation of foreign medical staff and distribution of supplies, already inadequate, will become even more difficult," said Sylvain Baize, head of the Pasteur Institute's viral haemorrhagic fever centre in Lyon, France.

This should be weighed against a "very limited" risk of infection for flight crews, given that the virus can only be passed on once symptoms appear and only through physical contact with the body fluids of someone who is ill, he told AFP.

The World Health Organisation has appealed for the reversal of flight cancellations to West Africa, where Ebola has killed more than half of the 3,000-plus people it has infected.

There is no vaccine or licenced cure.

Air France has suspended its service to Freetown, and British Airways its flights to Freetown and Monrovia.

Royal Air Morocco is now the only airline providing a regular service to the capitals of Sierra Leone and Liberia, while Brussels Airlines offer an irregular schedule.

South Africa has issued a ban on non-citizens travelling from Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, Saudi Arabia has stopped granting visas to workers from these countries, and several West African neighbours closed their land borders with worst-affected states.

"Ebola virus is an infection that, understandably, provokes great fear and apprehension. So perhaps it is not surprising that some states or carriers are imposing travel bans," University of Nottingham virology professor Jonathan Ball told AFP.

"However, it's important to get the risk into perspective. Provided that the necessary airport exit and border monitoring takes place (for people displaying symptoms), then the risk of export of Ebola virus is limited.

"Even in the rare event of an exported infection, provided countries know how to identify a possible infection, then respond appropriately, the risk of wider infection...is low."

The current outbreak, the biggest since Ebola was first identified in the former Zaire in 1976, was detected in Guinea in March, from where it spread to Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria and most recently Senegal.

An outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo is believed to be unrelated the West African epidemic.


- Don't close your eyes -

Experts say the focus should be on helping affected countries contain the virus, and preparing themselves to deal with any cases that may arrive.

The best approach is to try and contain the epidemic by isolating as many infected people as quickly as possible and tracking down and monitoring everyone they had been in contact with.

"Closing the borders is like closing your eyes," said Michael Kinzer of the US-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), who led a recent surveillance and advisory Ebola mission to Guinea.

"It makes more sense for countries to spend their money and energy on preparing their health systems to recognise an Ebola case and respond correctly... so that the virus does not spread."

Liberia and Sierra Leone were in special need of assistance, added Baize. With not enough hospital beds available to isolate patients, the virus remain out there, passing from person to person.

"There are not enough teams on the ground to go out searching for patients in the furthest corners of villages and towns," he said.

On Tuesday, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization warned of "grave food security concerns" through the disruption of cross-border trade.


http://news.yahoo.com/travel-restrictions-could-worsen-ebola-crisis-experts-190447097.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Ebola-denial a revolt against colonial mindset: expert
AFP
By Malick Rokhy Ba  13 hours ago



Women of the group "Peace Mothers" hold placards to raise awareness for the Ebola epidemic in central Monrovia on September 1, 2014 (AFP Photo/Dominique Faget)



Dakar (AFP) - It has been one of the more bizarre features of a deadly epidemic: a vocal minority in west African society denying that Ebola exists even as family and friends die around them.

The outbreak has cut a swathe through the region, killing more than 1,500 people since the start of the year, yet the work of medics and nurses has been disrupted by angry mobs claiming Ebola is an invention.

A leading social anthropologist who spent a month among communities in the epicentre claims that "Ebola-denial" is perhaps more complex than it first appears.

"When people say that Ebola does not exist, they are rebelling against something," Senegalese university professor Cheikh Ibrahima Niang told AFP.

"They are in situations where they were not consulted and feel that they are treated with a lot of paternalism."

Doctors and nurses -- often from global aid agencies -- are not only fighting the disease, but also a deep mistrust in communities often in the thrall of wild rumours that the virus was invented by the West or is a hoax.

Seventeen Ebola patients in the Liberian capital Monrovia fled from a guarantine centre two weeks ago after it was attacked by club-wielding youths shouting "there's no Ebola" in the latest of a series of such incidents across the region.

"We need to ask what is making them say that," Niang told AFP in an interview at Dakar's Cheik Anta Diop University.

"People have the impression that they are not getting all the necessary information or they do not agree with the prevention measures and medical procedures being imposed on them."

Niang spent July in Sierra Leone's eastern districts of Kenema and Kailahun, on the front line of the fight against the outbreak, as part of a mission for the World Health Organization (WHO).

The epidemic, which emerged in Guinea at the start of the year before spreading to Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria, is the worst Ebola outbreak since the haemorrhagic fever was first identified in 1976.


- Colonial legacy -

More than 3,000 people have been infected, with 1,552 deaths: 694 in Liberia; 430 in Guinea; 422 in Sierra Leone and six in Nigeria, according to the latest WHO figures.

Niang believes that "counterproductive" border closures were an example of the wrong approach, giving at-risk populations a false sense of security and propagating complacency.

"There is a very important African metaphor that says a forest fire which has spread to a town or community needs to be fought at its origins. Barricading myself at home and stockpiling water for when it arrives will not put it out," he said.

"How many people cross the border at night, by bush tracks and trails, because this border, a colonial legacy, is artificial?" he asked.

Niang said the strictly clinical approach to combating Ebola had provided "relatively limited" success because it failed to take into account local sensitivities.

"It only sees the disease and not the context. This is one of the reasons why the problem has been slow to have an adequate response," he told AFP.

Niang believes that talk of the African reluctance to accept modern clinical practices comes from a "reductive medical vision".

The problem is not that locals don't accept medicine can work, it's that they are mistrustful of an invading culture coming into their homeland telling them how they should behave.

Niang believes that western models of targeting individuals in education campaigns have been equally wrong-headed, when it is families who are primarily affected by the virus.

He said the response to the epidemic was being led by men and called for more women to be placed in decision-making positions.

"Ebola is transmitted by a virus, but the outbreak of the epidemic comes at a time when there is a social, political, cultural and historical context which is facilitating its spread," said Niang.

He called for "greater political will of our (west African) states, resources to be mobilised to send teams to provide clinical and sociological answers".


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-denial-revolt-against-colonial-mindset-expert-054418266.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Obama warns stopping Ebola 'will not be easy'
AFP
18 minutes ago



A picture taken on August 25, 2014 in Monrovia shows nurses wearing a protective suit escorting a man infected with the Ebola virus to a hospital (AFP Photo/Zoom Dosso)



Washington (AFP) - US President Barack Obama told West Africans on Tuesday that Ebola could be beaten but cautioned that it would not be easy to stem the spread of the deadly disease.

Obama appeared in a YouTube video to underline that it was vital to take basic precautions when dealing with those afflicted and in burying the dead to thwart infections.

"Stopping this disease won't be easy. But we know how to do it," said Obama, who feels a special kinship with Africa owing to his ancestral ties to the continent.

"You are not alone, together we can treat those who are sick with respect and dignity.

"We can save lives and our countries can work together to improve public health so this kind of outbreak doesn't happen again," said Obama in the video, which appears on the White House website and was aimed especially at Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria and Guinea.

The president noted that Ebola could not be contracted through the air or from sitting next to someone on a bus, but was spread through the exchange of bodily fluids or sometimes through direct contact with the bodies of those who had died of the disease.

The head of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Tom Frieden, said that despite tremendous efforts from the US government, and affected West African nations, the number of Ebola infections was continuing to grow.

The Ebola outbreak has killed 1,552 people and infected 3,062, according to the latest figures released by the World Health Organization.

"I'm afraid that over the next few weeks, those numbers are likely to increase further and significantly," Frieden said.

"We need action now to scale up the response. We know how to stop Ebola. The challenge is to scale it up to the massive levels needed to stop this outbreak. This is really the first epidemic of Ebola the world has ever known."

The US warnings echoed those of international medical agency Medecins Sans Frontieres, which said the world was "losing the battle" to contain Ebola and called for a global biological disaster response to get aid and personnel to West Africa.

"Six months into the worst Ebola epidemic in history, the world is losing the battle to contain it. Leaders are failing to come to grips with this transnational threat," MSF international president Joanne Liu told a UN briefing in New York.


http://news.yahoo.com/obama-warns-stopping-ebola-not-easy-191139178.html

[Buster's Uncle]

U.S. missionary doctor in Liberia tests positive for Ebola
Reuters
20 minutes ago


(Reuters) - An American doctor working in Liberia has tested positive for the Ebola virus after working with obstetrics patients at a missionary hospital in Monrovia, the Christian organization SIM USA said on Tuesday.

The North Carolina-based group did not identify the doctor, who had not been treating the Ebola patients hospitalized in isolation on the missionary's sprawling campus.

It is not yet known how the physician contracted the often deadly virus, the organization said.

"The doctor is doing well and is in good spirits," SIM USA said in a statement.

The worst Ebola outbreak in history has infected more than 3,000 people and killed some 1,550 since it was first detected early this year in West Africa, according to the World Health Organization.

The crisis appears to be worsening, U.S. health officials said on Tuesday, predicting the number of Ebola cases will keep rising in the next two weeks.

Missionaries from SIM USA, based in Charlotte, have been on the front lines of the epidemic. Another of its U.S. aid workers, Nancy Writebol, contracted the virus in July, also while working in Liberia.

She went home two weeks ago after receiving care in an isolation unit at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. She was also one of a few patients to receive an experimental treatment called ZMapp, although doctors at Emory said they could not determine whether it had helped her recovery. She has since been resting in an undisclosed location.

The U.S. doctor involved in the new Ebola case immediately isolated himself when symptoms began, according to a SIM USA news release.

He was later transferred to the Ebola isolation unit on the group's 136-acre (55-hectare) campus in Monrovia.

The missionary group could not immediately be reached to discuss the doctor's condition and plans for his medical treatment.

"My heart was deeply saddened, but my faith was not shaken, when I learned another of our missionary doctors contracted Ebola,” said Bruce Johnson, president of SIM USA said in a statement.

(Reporting by Letitia Stein in Tampa, Fla., David Morgan in Washington and Bangalore Newsroom; Editing by Diane Craft and Eric Beech)


http://news.yahoo.com/u-missionary-doctor-liberia-tests-positive-ebola-group-172705013--finance.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Ivory Coast will allow Sierra Leone team in
Associated Press
By MARC-ANDRE BOISVERT  9 hours ago



This Aug. 12, 2014 file photo shows a healthcare worker walking near a Ebola isolation unit wearing protective gear against the virus at Kenema Government Hospital in Kenema, Sierra Leone. Federal researchers next week will start testing humans with an experimental vaccine to prevent the deadly Ebola virus. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced Thursday that it is launching the safety trial on a vaccine developed by the agency’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and GlaxoSmithKline. They will test 20 healthy adult volunteers to see if the virus is safe and triggers an adequate response in their immune systems. (AP Photo/ Michael Duff, File)



ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP) — The Ivory Coast government decided late Monday to allow Sierra Leone's team to enter the country, giving the go-ahead for an African Cup qualifier after fears over Ebola put the game and Ivory Coast's place in the tournament in doubt.

The Ivorian government announced the decision late into the night after a meeting of its National Security Council.

It said it had been given guarantees by Sierra Leone's football federation that none of the 20 players and four coaches traveling had been in Sierra Leone or any other country affected by Ebola in the last 21 days — the time it takes for Ebola symptoms to emerge.

Ivory Coast has restrictions on travel from countries affected by the deadly virus like Sierra Leone and initially said its squad would not be allowed in. Ebola has killed more than 1,500 people in Sierra Leone, Guinea, Liberia and Nigeria and has now appeared in a fifth West African country, Senegal, in the worst outbreak ever recorded.

The Confederation of African Football has temporarily moved games out of Guinea and Sierra Leone but insisted Saturday's match should go ahead as planned in the Ivorian capital Abidjan or Ivory Coast would forfeit its place in the African Cup of Nations.

The Ivorian government said in a statement that was read on national TV that it was allowing the game to go ahead after Sierra Leone picked a squad of foreign-based players and would allow its party to be screened on arrival in Ivory Coast, the Ivorian government said.

Ebola is spread through contact with bodily fluids like blood, sweat and saliva but health experts say banning travel to or from affected countries will not help curb the outbreak.

No African Cup qualifiers will take place in Sierra Leone and Guinea until at least mid-September, when CAF will reassess the situation. However, CAF ordered other games to go ahead, including Sierra Leone's visit to Ivory Coast, Republic of Congo's trip to Nigeria and Cameroon's away match in Congo, where there is a second, unrelated Ebola outbreak.

Guinea will play Togo in neutral Morocco in the first round of matches in the 2015 African Cup's final qualifiers, which begin on Friday.


http://news.yahoo.com/ivory-coast-allow-sierra-leone-team-091415297.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Ebola Cases Likely to Increase in Coming Weeks, CDC Director Says
LiveScience.com
By Rachael Rettner, Senior Writer  38 minutes ago



A microscopic view of the Ebola virus.



The number of people infected with Ebola in West Africa will likely increase significantly over the next few weeks, according to the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who just returned from the region.

"As bad as the situation is now, everything I've seen suggests that over the next few weeks, it's likely to get worse," Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the CDC, said today (Sept. 2) in a news conference. "We're likely to see significant increases in cases."

The current Ebola outbreak, which is occurring in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, is the largest in history. It has killed at least 1,552 of the more than 3,000 people infected to date, according to the World Health Organization.

Although health officials know how to stop the spread of Ebola, the current response needs to be scaled up in order to end the outbreak, Frieden said.

"The challenge is that the number of cases is so large, the outbreak is so overwhelming, what it requires now is an overwhelming response," Frieden said. "The virus is moving faster than anyone has anticipated, so that's why we need to move fast."

The region needs more resources and more health-care workers and emergency managers, Frieden said. In one treatment facility that the director visited, many patients were lying on the ground because there were not enough beds for everyone, he said. In some areas, the teams in charge of burying the dead were finding it hard to keep up with the increasing number of dead bodies, he said. "I could not overstate the need for an urgent response," he added.

Frieden said the CDC is looking to have experts stay in the region for longer periods, because the longer people can stay, the more effective they will be.

Urgent action against Ebola is not just in the interest of the countries affected by the outbreak; the longer that the outbreak continues, the greater the likelihood that it will spread to new regions, Frieden said.

"This is not just a problem for West Africa. It's not just a problem for Africa. It's a problem for the world, and the world needs to respond," Frieden said.

There is also a very small chance the virus could mutate and become easier to spread, Frieden said. "That risk may be very low, but it's probably not zero. And the longer it spreads the higher the risk," Frieden said. So far, health officials do not have evidence that the virus is mutating.

Frieden said he did not feel in danger when he visited the Ebola treatment centers. "When I was inside the Ebola treatment unit run by MSF, I felt completely safe, because you're basically swaddled in protective gear," Frieden said, using the abbreviation for Médecins Sans Frontières (or Doctors Without Borders), a humanitarian aid organization assisting with the outbreak response.

A larger risk is when health-care workers don't know a patient has Ebola, because early symptoms of the disease can appear similar to other conditions such as malaria, Frieden said. So health officials have emphasized that anyone who might have Ebola should be treated as if they have Ebola, until proven otherwise, Frieden said.

Frieden said he remains confident that it's not too late to stop the outbreak. "What has worked to stop every Ebola outbreak will work here, if we can get it to scale."


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-cases-likely-increase-coming-weeks-cdc-director-195057395.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Wealthy countries must send medical teams to halt Ebola: Medecins Sans Frontieres
Reuters
1 minute ago



UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The worst ever outbreak of the Ebola virus will not be halted unless wealthy nations dispatch specialized biological disaster response teams to West Africa to stop its spread, the head of medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres said on Tuesday.

"Six months into the worst Ebola epidemic in history, the world is losing the battle to contain it," MSF President Joanne Liu said in a speech to United Nations member states. She said aid charities and West African governments did not have the capacity to stem the outbreak and needed intervention by foreign states. The organization is known in the United States as Doctors Without Borders.

The United Nations and its World Health Organization have also appealed for more global help to stop the deadly disease.

Deputy U.N. Secretary-General Jan Eliasson said an international response with more involvement of U.N. member states may be needed, and referenced operations after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami and the Haiti earthquake in 2010.

David Nabarro, senior U.N. coordinator for the outbreak, said more health workers and treatment beds were needed, along with food, money, equipment, materials, vehicles, training, information systems support and communications guidance.

"The way to deal with Ebola is well known; it's just a question of putting it into practice," Nabarro said. "The outbreak is advancing ahead of us, it's accelerating ahead, and we in our control efforts, collectively, are falling behind."

"Every country in the world needs to be thinking 'what can we do to help?' Because if we don't get on top of this outbreak as a global community then this could effect all of us in unexpected ways," he warned.

Governments and aid organizations are scrambling to contain the disease, which has killed more than 1,500 since early this year.

WHO director-general Margaret Chan said the outbreak was the largest, most severe and complex ever seen in the 40-year history of the disease.

"The outbreak will get worse before it gets better and it requires a well coordinated, big surge and huge scale up of outbreak response urgently," she told the U.N. briefing. "The whole world is responsible and accountable to bring the Ebola threat under control."

White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters on Tuesday that U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Tom Frieden had been providing regular updates for President Barack Obama.

Frieden said on Tuesday that he expected the number of Ebola cases to accelerate in the next two weeks and urged governments to act now.

""We're likely to see significant increases in cases. Already we have widespread transmission Liberia. In Sierra Leone, we're seeing strong signs that that will happen in the near future," he said.

(Writing by Daniel Flynn and Michelle Nichols; Editing by Bate Felix, Toni Reinhold)


http://news.yahoo.com/wealthy-nations-must-send-medical-teams-halt-ebola-140526326--sector.html