Ebola news 10/2

[Buster's Uncle]

Dallas Ebola patient vomited outside apartment on way to hospital
Reuters
By Lisa Maria Garza  5 hours ago



A general view of The Ivy Apartments in Dallas, Texas October 1, 2014. REUTERS/Mike Stone



DALLAS (Reuters) - Two days after he was sent home from a Dallas hospital, the man who is the first person to be diagnosed with Ebola in the United States was seen vomiting on the ground outside an apartment complex as he was bundled into an ambulance.

The Dallas Ebola case, involving a man who flew back to the United States last month from Liberia, has prompted national concern over the potential for a wider spread of the deadly virus from West Africa, where at least 3,338 people have died in the worst outbreak on record.

U.S. health officials have said the country's healthcare system is well prepared to contain any spread of Ebola through careful tracking of people who had contact with the patient and appropriate care for those admitted to hospital.

"His whole family was screaming. He got outside and he was throwing up all over the place," resident Mesud Osmanovic, 21, said on Wednesday, describing the chaotic scene before the man was admitted to Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital on Sunday where he is in serious condition.

The hospital cited the stricken man's privacy as the reason for not identifying him. However, Gee Melish, who said he was a family friend, identified the man as Thomas Eric Duncan.



A student walks past Emmet J. Conrad High School in Dallas, Texas October 1, 2014, where a fellow student came into contact with a man diagnosed with the Ebola virus. REUTERS/Mike Stone


The New York Times said that Duncan, in his mid-40s, helped transport a pregnant woman suffering from Ebola to a hospital in Liberia, where she was turned away for lack of space. Duncan helped bring the woman back to her family's home and carried her into the house, where she later died, the newspaper reported.

Four days later Duncan left for the United States, the Times said, citing the woman's parents and neighbors.

Texas health officials said that up to 18 people, including five children, had contact with the Ebola patient since he returned to the United States in late September. The children had gone to school early this week but have since been sent home and are being monitored for symptoms.

Ebola spreads through contact with bodily fluids such as blood or saliva, which health experts say limits its potential to infect others, unlike airborne diseases.

Still, the long window of time before patients exhibit signs of infection, such as fever, vomiting and diarrhea, means an infected person can travel without detection.



A general view of The Ivy Apartments in Dallas, Texas October 1, 2014.REUTERS/Mike Stone


Airline and hotel company shares dropped sharply on U.S. markets on Wednesday over concerns that Ebola's spread outside Africa might curtail travel.

Drugmakers with experimental Ebola treatments in the pipeline saw their shares rise.


SENT HOME

The Dallas patient had initially sought treatment at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital late last Thursday and was sent home with antibiotics rather than being observed further, even though he told a nurse he had recently returned from West Africa. By Sunday, he needed an ambulance to return to the same hospital, where he was admitted.

A nurse asked about the travel as part of a triage checklist and was told about it. “Regretfully, that information was not fully communicated throughout the full teams. As a result, the full import of that information wasn’t factored into the full decision making,” Texas hospital official Mark Lester said.



A security guard waits in front of an apartment unit at The Ivy Apartments in Dallas,Texas October 1, 2014. REUTERS/Mike Stone


Infectious disease experts said that time gap represented a critical missed opportunity that may have led others to be exposed to the virus.

At the apartment complex, Osmanovic said he met the man three times over the years when he was visiting his family. Most of the neighborhood is from Liberia, Somalia or Sudan. Osmanovic is from Bosnia.

The only sign on Wednesday of the family's presence was someone occasionally pulling back the white blinds to peek out into the parking lot. A security officer blocked the entrance to the complex, with instructions only to let residents in and out.

Dr. Christopher Perkins, Dallas County Health and Human Services Medical Director, said that of the 18 people who had been in contact, many were "close family members".

The children among them "did not have any symptoms and so the odds of them passing on any sort of virus is very low", said Mike Miles, Dallas Independent School District superintendent.



Texas Governor Rick Perry speaks at a media conference at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, Texas October 1, 2014. REUTERS/Mike Stone


Miles said the four different schools they attended would be staffed with additional health professionals and classes would remain in session.

Texas officials said health workers who took care of the patient had so far tested negative for the virus and there were no other suspected cases in the state. Texas Governor Rick Perry told a news conference he was confident the virus would be contained, as did other officials.

While past outbreaks of Ebola killed as many as 90 percent of victims, the current epidemic's fatality rate has averaged about 50 percent in West Africa.

The patient arrived in Texas on Sept. 20, and first sought treatment six days later, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. The Liberian government said that the man showed no signs of fever or other symptoms of Ebola when he left the country on Sept. 19.

A Liberian official said the man traveled through Brussels to the United States. United Airlines said in a statement that the man took one of its flights from Brussels to Washington Dulles Airport, where he changed planes to travel to Dallas-Fort Worth.



A general view of Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, Texas October 1, 2014. REUTERS/Mike Stone


A spokesman for Brussels Airlines, the only airline to fly direct scheduled services between Brussels and Monrovia, said he could not confirm that the passenger had flown with the company.

"We also have not been contacted by anyone to tell us to take measures or contact passengers because of an infected passenger traveling with us," spokesman Geert Sciot said.

Separately on Wednesday, citing a "heightened sense of awareness of Ebola", the Queens Medical Center in Honolulu, Hawaii, said it was treating a patient in isolation.

"At this time the patient's history and clinical presentation do not appear to be consistent with Ebola and the patient may be diagnosed with a number of conditions other than Ebola," the statement said.

(Additional reporting by Jon Herskovitz in Austin, Texas, Jeffrey Dastin in New York, Susan Heavey and Alphonso Toweh in Washington, David Lewis in Dakar and Robert-Jan Bartunek; Writing by Grant McCool; Editing by Michele Gershberg and Dominic Evans)


http://news.yahoo.com/dallas-ebola-patient-vomited-outside-apartment-way-hospital-064730195--finance.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Scores possibly exposed to U.S. Ebola patient; four isolated
Reuters
By Lisa Maria Garza  12 minutes ago



The number of people being monitored in Texas, after they had contact with Thomas Eric Duncan, has grown substantially.



DALLAS (Reuters) - More than 80 people had direct or indirect contact with the first person to be diagnosed with the deadly Ebola virus in the United States, health officials said Thursday, as four members of the patient's family were quarantined as a precaution.

Dallas County officials said 12 to 18 people had direct contact with the Texas patient, and they in turn had contact with scores of others. All were being monitored and none had shown any symptoms.

A top health official urged U.S. hospitals to heed lessons from Dallas, where a hospital initially sent the ailing patient home, despite information that he had recently visited West Africa, potentially exposing more people to the virus.

Texas health officials told four "close" relatives of the patient not to entertain visitors and said they could be arrested if they leave their homes without permission through Oct. 19. The four did not exhibit symptoms, they said.

"We have tried and true protocols to protect the public and stop the spread of this disease," said Dr. David Lakey, the Texas health commissioner. "This order gives us the ability to monitor the situation in the most meticulous way."

"The order is in place until the incubation period has passed and the family is no longer at risk of having the disease," Lakey said.



Students disembark from a school bus outside The Ivy Apartments, where a man diagnosed with the Ebola virus was staying in Dallas, Texas October 1, 2014. (REUTERS/Mike Stone)


Public health authorities have been calling on U.S. healthcare workers to screen patients for signs of illness, and to question patients about their travel history in order to rule out Ebola for those who have been to West Africa, where more than 3,000 people have died in this year's epidemic.

"Unfortunately, that did not happen in this case," said Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. "We just need to put that behind us and look ahead and make sure that in the future that doesn't happen again."

"This will certainly serve for the rest of a country as a cogent lesson learned," he added in an interview on MSNBC.

The Dallas patient, who had flown from Liberia, initially sought treatment at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital late last Thursday but was sent home with antibiotics, despite telling a nurse he had recently arrived from West Africa. By Sunday, he needed an ambulance to return to the same hospital.

On Wednesday, hospital officials admitted that the man's travel information had not been shared with other staff who were treating him.



Students leave Tasby Middle School, where a fellow classmate who was in contact with a man diagnosed with the Ebola virus had been removed from school in Dallas, Texas October 1, 2014. (REUTERS/Mike Stone)


WARNING CALL?

The patient has not been named by the hospital for privacy reasons. However, Gee Melish, who said he was a family friend, identified the man as Thomas Eric Duncan.

Duncan's nephew, Josephus Weeks, told NBC on Wednesday night that his uncle was not treated for Ebola until Weeks personally called the federal Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta to report the suspected illness. He said he made the call on the day that Duncan had returned to the Dallas hospital.

A CDC spokesman said Thursday the agency was seeking to confirm if and when such a call was placed.

The New York Times said Duncan, in his mid-40s, helped transport a pregnant woman suffering from Ebola to a hospital in Liberia, where she was turned away for lack of space. Duncan then brought her back to her family's home and carried her into the house, where she later died, the newspaper reported.

The case has sparked concern nationwide over the potential for a wider spread of the virus from West Africa, where at least 3,338 people have died in the worst outbreak on record.

While past outbreaks of Ebola killed as many as 90 percent of victims, the current epidemic's fatality rate has averaged about 50 percent in West Africa.

U.S. health officials have said the country's healthcare system was well prepared to contain the disease's spread by careful tracking of those who have had contact with the patient and appropriate care for those admitted to hospital.

Federal officials are working to sharply increase production of the experimental drug ZMapp, which many experts believe is the most promising treatment for Ebola, the Times reported on Thursday.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is trying to enlist Caliber Biotherapeutics in Texas to produce the drug, the newspaper reported, citing unidentified federal officials and drug industry executives.

The Ebola scare spooked U.S. markets on Wednesday. Airline and hotel shares slumped on fears that the virus's spread outside Africa might curtail travel.

Separately, the Queens Medical Center in Honolulu, Hawaii, said Wednesday it was treating a patient in isolation, citing a "heightened sense of awareness of Ebola."

"At this time, the patient's history and clinical presentation do not appear to be consistent with Ebola and the patient may be diagnosed with a number of conditions other than Ebola," the statement said.

(Reporting by Susan Heavey in Washington, Colleen Jenkins in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Lisa Maria Garza and Marice Richter in Dallas and Jim Forsyth in San Antonio; Writing by Jim Loney; Editing by Doina Chiacu and Bernadette Baum)


http://news.yahoo.com/texas-officials-80-people-may-exposed-ebola-patient-120536909--finance.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Many sick in US Ebola patient's Liberia hometown
Associated Press
By KRISTA LARSON  32 minutes ago



Mercy Kennedy, 9, cries Thursday Oct. 2, 2014. as community activists approach her outside her home on 72nd SKD Boulevard in Monrovia, Liberia, a day after her mother was taken away by an ambulance to an Ebola ward. Neighbors wailed Thursday upon learning that Mercy’s mother had died; she was among the cluster of cases that includes Thomas Eric Duncan, a Liberian man now hospitalized in Texas. On Thursday, little Mercy walked around in a daze in a torn nightgown and flip-flops, pulling up the fabric to wipe her tears as a group of workers from the neighborhood task force followed the sound of wailing through the thick grove of banana trees and corn plants.(AP Photo/Jerome Delay)



MONROVIA, Liberia (AP) — Thomas Eric Duncan rushed to help his 19-year-old neighbor when she began convulsing days after first complaining of stomach pain. Everyone assumed her health problems were related to her being 7 months pregnant. Still, no ambulance came as Ebola decimates Liberia's capital.

Soon Duncan, Marthalene Williams' parents and several others tried to hoist her into a taxi cab bound for a hospital downtown. Within weeks, everyone who helped Williams that day was either sick or dead. The virus is spread through direct contact with saliva, sweat and blood, and all had touched the sick woman's body.

Duncan is now hospitalized in a special isolation ward in Texas after he fell ill only after leaving Liberia, where nearly 2,000 people have died this year from Ebola. He was traveling to visit his family in the United States while still in Ebola's incubation period, which can last up to 21 days, and officials said airport screeners in Monrovia did nothing wrong in letting him board the flight.

He has since become a symbol of how Ebola could spread within the United States. Here in Liberia, however, he is just another neighbor infected by a virulent Ebola cluster ravaging this neighborhood of tin-roof homes along 72nd SKD Boulevard.

"My pa and four other people took her to the car. Duncan was in the front seat with the driver and the others were in the backseat with her," recounted her 15-year-old cousin Angela Garway, standing Thursday in the courtyard between the homes where they all lived. "He was a good person."

And after several including Duncan became sick through a risky act of compassion, on Thursday neighbors were no longer willing to take that risk.



Neighbors sit in front of the house that Thomas Eric Duncan, a Liberian man now hospitalized in Texas, rented on 72nd SKD Boulevard during his stay in Liberia, in Morovia, Thursday Oct. 2, 2014.  (AP Photo/Jerome Delay)


As 9-year-old Mercy Kennedy sobbed along with neighbors mourning news of her mother's death, not a person would touch the little girl to comfort her.

Mercy's mother had helped to wash the pregnant woman's clothes, and had touched her body after she died at home when no hospital could find space for her, neighbors said. On Thursday, little Mercy walked around in a daze in a torn nightgown and flip-flops, pulling up the fabric to wipe her tears as a group of workers from the neighborhood task force followed the sound of wailing through the thick grove of banana trees and corn plants.

"We love you so dearly, yeah," one man wearing rubber gloves told her from a safe distance. "We want to take care of you. Have you been playing with your friends here?"

With Mercy's mother dead, neighbors fear it is only a matter of time before she too shows signs of the virus and they want to know which other children may have come into contact with her while she was fetching water.

Pewu Wolobah, a member of the neighborhood anti-Ebola task force, laments that even as Americans try to trace all of Duncan's contacts there, the virus is spreading through Duncan's old neighborhood faster than anyone can keep track.



Stanley Williams, 3, and Tete Williams, 12, sister of Marthalene Williams, 19, the pregnant woman Thomas Eric Duncan helped when she became ill and who died of Ebola, walk in from of the group of flats where Duncan, a Liberian man now hospitalized in Texas, was a tenant on 72nd SKD Boulevard during his stay in Liberia, in Monrovia, Thursday, Oct. 2, 2014. (AP Photo/Jerome Delay)


The aunt of the pregnant victim died on Wednesday after collapsing in her house just next door to the Williams'. Her 15-year-old daughter Angela is left behind along with the pregnant woman's three younger siblings — Ezo Williams, 16, Tete Williams, 12, and Stanley Williams, 3 — and the family dog.

Their parents left Thursday morning for an Ebola treatment center. As word spreads that they too took a taxi, the health workers express alarm.

"Does anybody know the taxi number or the license plate?" one man calls into the crowd. "We need to find this vehicle!"

All the cases including Duncan appear to have started with Williams, though some wonder how a pregnant woman who stayed at home could have contracted it. Maybe it was her boyfriend Lee — no one has seen him for weeks. Could it have been her close friend known as Baby D, who has since died herself?

Even in death, Williams' tragedy is multiplying. Neighbors and relatives say more than 100 people came to a wake for her. No one can say for sure how many people may have touched her highly contagious body.

"We had a lot of people come from a great distance to sympathize with her family," explains Joseph Dolo from the anti-Ebola task force. "She had a lot of friends; she was a very young girl."


http://news.yahoo.com/texas-ebola-patients-neighborhood-scores-sick-140016735.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Texas Ebola monitoring now beyond initial contacts
Associated Press
By DAVID WARREN  36 minutes ago



DALLAS (AP) — About 80 people are now being monitored for symptoms of Ebola in Texas, a Dallas County Health and Human Services spokeswoman said Thursday.

The people being monitored are the 12 to 18 people who first came into contact with the infected man — which federal health officials have said include three members of the ambulance crew that took him to the hospital, plus a handful of schoolchildren — as well as others those initial people had contact with, spokeswoman Erikka Neroes said.

"The number of people who are now part of the contact investigation has grown to more than 80," she said.

Neroes was unable to specify how those initial 12 to 18 people came in contact with the larger group, nor could she provide specifics about the ages of those being monitored. No one is showing symptoms, she said, and health officials have told them to monitor their own conditions in the coming weeks.

The Texas Department of State Health Services said Thursday it has list of about 100 potential or possible contacts but that the official "contract tracing number will be lower," department spokeswoman Carrie Williams said in a statement. The statement did not say specifically when the official number will be released, but that the current figure is due to caution and includes people who had brief encounters with the patient or the patient's home.

Health officials are focusing on containment to try to stem the possibility of the Ebola virus spreading beyond Thomas Eric Duncan, who traveled from Liberia to Dallas to visit relatives and fell ill on Sept. 24. His sister, Mai Wureh, identified Duncan as the infected man in an interview with The Associated Press.

A Dallas emergency room sent Duncan home last week, even though he told a nurse that he had been in disease-ravaged West Africa. The decision by Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital to release Duncan could have put others at risk of exposure to Ebola before the man went back to the ER a couple of days later when his condition worsened.

"That's how we're going to break the chain of transmission, and that's where our focus has to be," Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said Wednesday.

The patient explained to a nurse last Thursday that he was visiting the U.S. from Africa, but that information was not widely shared, said Dr. Mark Lester, who works for the hospital's parent company.

Hospital epidemiologist Dr. Edward Goodman said the patient had a fever and abdominal pain during his first ER visit, not the riskier symptoms of vomiting and diarrhea. Duncan was diagnosed with a low-risk infection and sent home, Lester said.

Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital is reviewing how the situation would have been handled if all staff had been aware of the man's circumstances.





David Wright, regional director of the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, wouldn't say if the hospital was under investigation. Wright said that in cases they do handle, federal investigators examine if a hospital complied with a "reasonable physician standard" in deciding whether to admit a patient with a potential medical emergency.

But the diagnosis, and the hospital's slip-up, highlighted the wider threat of Ebola, even far from Africa.

"The scrutiny just needs to be higher now," said Dr. Rade Vukmir, a spokesman for the American College of Emergency Physicians.

Duncan has been kept in isolation at the hospital since Sunday. He was listed in serious but stable condition.

Neighbors in Monrovia, Liberia, believe Duncan become infected when he helped bundle a sick pregnant neighbor into a taxi a few weeks ago and set off with her to find treatment. The 19-year-old woman was convulsing and complaining of stomach pain, and everyone thought her problems were related to her pregnancy, in its seventh month. No ambulance would come for her, and the group that put her in a taxi never did find a hospital. She died, and in the following weeks, all the neighbors who helped have gotten sick or died, neighbors said.

Duncan's neighborhood, a collection of tin-roofed homes along 72nd SKD Boulevard, has been ravaged by Ebola. So many people here have fallen ill that neighbors are too frightened to comfort a 9-year-old girl who lost her mother to the disease.

Ebola is believed to have sickened more than 7,100 people in West Africa and killed more than 3,300, according to the World Health Organization. Liberia is one of the three countries hit hardest in the epidemic, along with Sierra Leone and Guinea.

Ebola symptoms can include fever, muscle pain, vomiting and bleeding, and can appear as long as 21 days after exposure to the virus. The disease is not contagious until symptoms begin. It spreads only by close contact with an infected person's bodily fluids.

In Texas, neither the ambulance crew nor the children showed any symptoms and were being monitored at home. It was not clear how Duncan knew the children, but his sister said he had been visiting with family, including two nephews.

Duncan left Liberia on Sept. 19, flying from Brussels to Dulles Airport near Washington. He then boarded a flight for Dallas-Fort Worth, according to airlines, and arrived the next day. He started feeling ill four or five days later, Frieden said.

Dr. Tom Kenyon, director of the CDC's Center for Global Health, said Duncan did not show signs of disease before boarding the plane in Monrovia. Since the man had no symptoms on the plane, the CDC stressed there is no risk to his fellow passengers.

The CDC has received 94 inquiries from states about illnesses that initially were suspected to be Ebola, but after taking travel histories and doing some other work, most were ruled out. Of the 13 people who actually underwent testing, only one — Duncan — tested positive.





Four American aid workers who became infected in West Africa have been flown back to the U.S. for treatment after they became sick. Three have recovered.

___

Associated Press writers Nomaan Merchant and Paul J. Weber in Dallas and Emily Schmall in Fort Worth; Krista Larson and Jonathan Paye-Layleh in Monrovia, Liberia; Juergen Baetz in Brussels; Lauran Neergard and Matt Small in Washington, D.C.; and researcher Rhonda Shafner in New York contributed to this report.


http://news.yahoo.com/dallas-er-sent-ebola-infected-patient-home-050718374.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Britain asks for foreign help against Ebola in Sierra Leone
AFP
By Alice Ritchie, Jacques Klopp  33 minutes ago



London (AFP) - Britain asked for foreign help Thursday to battle Ebola in its former colony of Sierra Leone, as a charity warned that five people were infected every hour in the west African nation.

The plea was made at a London conference gathering ministers, diplomats and health officials from around 20 countries and world organisations. Sierra Leone President Ernest Bai Koroma had been due to attend but his plane broke down.

"The UK is leading and coordinating the response in Sierra Leone but we need international help," Britain's foreign minister, Philip Hammond, said after the meeting.

A British nurse who contracted Ebola while volunteering in Sierra Leone but survived thanks to treatment, Will Pooley, also attended.

The Save the Children charity urged international action to combat a "terrifying" rate of infection in Sierra Leone, which, with Liberia and Guinea, has been the centre of an unprecedented outbreak of Ebola since the start of the year.

"The scale of the Ebola epidemic is devastating and growing every day, with five people infected every hour in Sierra Leone last week," said chief executive Justin Forsyth.



Health workers in protective suits treat a woman and her two children on October 1, 2014 at an Ebola treatment centre in Monrovia (AFP Photo/Pascal Guyot)


"We need a coordinated international response," the charity said.

Britain has so far provided 143 new treatment beds and promised almost 600 more in the coming months. It is also piloting a way of providing basic care in the community that could eventually reach 10,000 people.

But Save the Children said this was not enough and urged other countries to join the fight, warning that the infection rate could rise to 10 people an hour by the end of the month.

The World Health Organization estimates that more than 2,300 people have been infected and 622 have died from Ebola in Sierra Leone, out of a global toll of more than 7,000 infected and more than 3,300 killed.



Health workers prepare to enter a decontamination room on October 1, 2014 at an Ebola treatment centre in Monrovia (AFP Photo/Pascal Guyot)


- Aid cuts behind Ebola surge? -

Britain organised Thursday's half-day conference to raise awareness of the outbreak, share best practice and secure pledges of financial support or promises of medical staff.

Officials warn Sierra Leone is at a "tipping point", with a current rate of infection at 1.7, meaning that for every 10 people with Ebola, another 17 people become infected.

But the conference got off to a bad start when the plane due to deliver the guest of honour to London broke down.

"The chartered plane he was scheduled to fly on experienced significant technical difficulties prior to take-off," a Foreign Office spokesman told AFP.

The Liberian and Guinean ambassadors were on the list of participants as well as the Ghanaian deputy foreign minister and representatives from Nigeria, the United States, Canada, Cuba, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and many European Union nations.

Britain has pledged £125 million ($200 million, 160 million euros) to help the Ebola fight in Sierra Leone. But prior to the outbreak it had planned to cut aid to the country, according to a new parliamentary report.

The international development committee said the 2014-2015 budget for Sierra Leone and Liberia would have seen bilateral funding cut by 18.6 percent on the previous year.

"The scale of the Ebola crisis now unfolding in Sierra Leone and Liberia may well be connected to declining levels of international support," said committee chairman Malcolm Bruce.

A spokesman for Britain's development ministry said the report was "out of date" and noted the planned reduction in funding had been overtaken by events.

Britain has promised £5 million to support NGOs fighting Ebola in Sierra Leone, £20 million to improve public health services, and £100 million to deliver a wider "action plan".

This plan includes providing treatment but also training health workers and setting up a central command with military, humanitarian and medical experts to organise the response.


http://news.yahoo.com/sierra-leone-leader-misses-london-ebola-talks-plane-084940275.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Australia lifts Ebola donation to $16 million
Associated Press
By ROD McGUIRK  9 hours ago



CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Australia more than doubled its donation to the fight against Ebola in West Africa to 18 million Australian dollars ($16 million) on Thursday, but resisted demands to send personnel.

Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said an additional AU$10 million had been provided in response to a United Nations' appeal for $50 million to meet needs over the next month.

"The government has assessed that, at this stage, financial contributions are the best and most efficient way Australia can make a rapid contribution to the global response and support front line health services in the affected countries," Bishop said in a statement.

The Doctors Without Borders aid group and the Australian opposition party have called on the government to send a medical team to assist in a worsening doctor shortage in West Africa where the worst-ever outbreak of Ebola has killed more than 3,300 people.

The Australian charity Save the Children on Thursday called on Australia to follow the United States' example by sending troops.

President Barack Obama last month announced 3,000 U.S. troops will be sent to Liberia to set up facilities and form training teams to help the Africans treat Ebola victims.

But Bishop said Australia does not have the capacity to evacuate any Australian who became infected with the viral disease. The government would not send Australians unless they could be safely evacuated.

She told parliament on Wednesday that Australia did not have a plane suitable for evacuating an Ebola patient. Even if Australia did, the 30-hour flight from West Africa would be too long for effective medical treatment.

Australia was asking other governments if it could use their aircraft to evacuate an Australian Ebola patient to a hospital closer to West Africa, she said.


http://news.yahoo.com/australia-lifts-ebola-donation-16-million-051652474.html

[Buster's Uncle]

GSK, NewLink working to bring Ebola vaccines online - WHO
Reuters
By Stephanie Nebehay  8 hours ago



The signage for the GlaxoSmithKline building is pictured in Hounslow, west London June 18, 2013. REUTERS/Luke MacGregor



GENEVA (Reuters) - Both GlaxoSmithKline and NewLink Genetics are working to boost their capacity to make Ebola vaccines, with a goal of a "very significant increase in scale during the first half of 2015", the World Health Organization said on Wednesday.

Even under the best conditions, if the experimental vaccines are proven to be safe and confer protection in clinical trials, a significant number of doses will not be available until late in the first quarter of 2015, the WHO said.

GSK and NewLink are conducting phase 1 trials in healthy volunteers currently or soon in more than 10 sites in Africa, Europe and North America, the WHO said in a statement after hosting a two-day meeting of 70 experts.

Initial safety data was expected by year-end, with phase II trials early next year to generate more data.

"Both companies are working to augment their manufacturing capacity. The goal is a very significant increase in scale during the first half of 2015," the U.N. agency said.

"The next step is to make these vaccines available as soon as possible – and in sufficient quantities – to protect critical frontline workers and to make a difference in the epidemic’s future evolution," it said.

At least 3,091 people have died from Ebola in the worst outbreak on record of the haemorrhagic disease that has been ravaging Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea in West Africa.

More than 6,500 cases have been diagnosed, and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control has warned that the number of infections could rise to up to 1.4 million people by early next year without a massive global intervention to contain the virus.

Some 800 vials of the NewLink vaccine, donated by the government of Canada, could yield from 1,500 to 2,000 doses, and priority should be given to consenting health workers, WHO said. The vaccine was developed by Canada's Public Health Agency but the commercial license is held by Iowa-based NewLink.

The overall challenge is to achieve clinical and regulatory work that normally takes from two to four years "within a matter of months" without compromising safety and efficacy standards, it said.

"All agreed on the ultimate goal: to have a fully tested and licensed product that can be scaled up for use in mass vaccination campaigns," it said.


http://news.yahoo.com/gsk-newlink-working-bring-ebola-vaccines-online-065312761--finance.html

[Buster's Uncle]

How the CDC uses contact tracing to stop Ebola's spread
Yahoo News
By Dylan Stableford  2 hours ago



This undated file image made available by the CDC shows the Ebola Virus. U.S. health officials have warned for months that someone infected with Ebola could unknowingly carry the virus to this country, and on Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2014, came word that it had happened: A traveler in a Dallas hospital became the first patient diagnosed in the U.S. (AP Photo/CDC, File)



The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is working to determine if a man hospitalized in Dallas with the first confirmed case of Ebola diagnosed in the United States transmitted the deadly virus to others — a process called "contact tracing."

"Contact tracing is a core public health function. We do it in a very systematic manner," CDC Director Tom Frieden said this week. "It's what we do day in and day out and what we will be doing here to ensure there aren't further chains of transmission."

So how exactly does contact tracing work?

According to the CDC and other health officials, this is what happens:

— Interviewing the infected patient, if possible, and the patient's family members;
— Outlining all of the movements that could have occurred from the onset of symptoms until isolation;
— Developing a list of anyone the infected patient came into contact with when he was exhibiting symptoms;
— Interviewing those contacts to establish a map with concentric circles indicating the level of exposure in each case (high, low or intermediate);
— And monitoring those contacts for 21 days.

"We always err on the side of contacting more contacts than less," Frieden said. "Then, in a cascading manner, we identify every other individual who can add to that information."

Thursday morning the Texas Department of State Health Services said investigators are tracking about 100 potential or possible contacts.

"Out of an abundance of caution, we're starting with this very wide net, including people who have had even brief encounters with the patient or the patient's home,"  Carrie Williams, state health department spokesperson, said in a written statement. "The number will drop as we focus in on those whose contact may represent a potential risk of infection."​

If a contact shows symptoms of Ebola — high fever, severe headaches, muscle pain, weakness, diarrhea, vomiting, abdominal pain or unexplained bleeding — he or she is immediately isolated, tested and asked about their contacts, who are also monitored for 21 days. The cycle is repeated until there are no new potential Ebola patients. "Even one missed contact can keep the outbreak going," the CDC warns on its website.

"It's like an ember in a forest fire," Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN's chief medical correspondent, told Yahoo News on Wednesday night.

In this case, the patient, Thomas Eric Duncan, a 42-year-old Liberian man, arrived in Dallas on Sept. 20. On Sept. 26, he told a nurse at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital that he first began experiencing Ebola symptoms two days earlier, but a communication breakdown between the nurse and doctors at the hospital resulted in Duncan being sent home with antibiotics. He returned in an ambulance on Sept. 28, when he was admitted to the isolation unit in critical condition. Duncan was upgraded to serious but stable condition on Wednesday.

That means anyone who came into contact with Duncan on or after Sept. 24 needs to be monitored, including the paramedics who transported Duncan to the hospital. Two Dallas Fire-Rescue paramedics and one paramedic intern are being monitored and will remain at home for 21 days, Dallas Fire-Rescue Lt. Joel Lavender said on Tuesday night.

Frieden said the health department was "forward-leaning" and had been developing the contact list before Duncan's diagnosis.

But according to the Frieden, the list will not include fellow passengers on Duncan's flight from West Africa to the United States, because he did not show symptoms before or during the flight.

There was "zero risk of transmission” to other passengers, he said. According to the CDC, Ebola cannot be spread until symptoms appear and can be spread only through bodily fluids.

"Ebola doesn't spread before someone gets sick, and he didn't get sick until four days after he got off the airplane."

On Wednesday, Texas Gov. Rick Perry said five school students apparently had contact with Duncan over the weekend. The students, who attend four separate schools in the Dallas area, returned to school but did not show symptoms of Ebola. But since Duncan's diagnosis, they are being held out of school out of an abundance of caution, Texas school officials said.

In West Africa — where the World Health Organization estimates the Ebola outbreak has resulted in a total of 6,574 Ebola cases and 3,091 deaths since March — contract tracing is more complicated in a war-torn region inhabited by people often mistrusting of doctors.

Last month, the Washington Post reported that more than 477 people were being monitored for Ebola in Port Harcourt in Nigeria after the death of a doctor there. The first known case of Ebola, from a Liberian-American man who became sick on a flight to Lagos in July, resulted in more than 18,500 face-to-face visits from health workers and 894 people under surveillance, the CDC said on Tuesday. All 894 had exited the monitoring phase without showing signs of the virus.

On Tuesday, Frieden characterized the number of those Duncan might have come into contact with as "a handful" — mostly family members — but one source close to the CDC told Yahoo News that as many as 18 people who might have come into contact with Duncan during that time are being monitored.

“It is certainly possible that someone who had contact with this individual could develop Ebola in the coming weeks," Frieden said. "But there is no doubt in my mind that we will stop it here."

One reason for the CDC's confidence, Gupta said, is that very few Ebola patients are in a position to infect others when they're experiencing symptoms, shrinking the contact list significantly.

"With this infection, you're pretty sick," Gupta said. "You're either in bed or in the hospital. It's not like you're out walking through the mall. So it makes it a little easier to track."



(Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)


http://news.yahoo.com/how-the-cdc-maps-ebola-outbreak-165347158.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Food crisis looms as Ebola rampages through West Africa
Reuters
By Misha Hussain and Chris Arsenault  12 minutes ago



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



DAKAR/ROME (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - The mango season finished early for Mamadou Barry, a fruit vendor in Marche Kermel, an old covered market in the Senegalese capital Dakar. Where stalls once brimmed with tropical produce imported from neighbouring Guinea, the Ebola-related border closure has emptied the tables.

Barry, of Guinean origin like many storekeepers in Senegal, has been going back and forth between the two countries for three years. He says the government's positive aim of keeping Senegal Ebola-free has had a negative impact on his livelihood.

"With the shortage of fruit coming in our income has decreased. Some people manage to sneak across the border and get back without being caught, but most of us don't take that risk so we can't provide for our families,” said Barry, 55, as he closed down his stall for the day.

Much of the produce in Kermel makes its way via the southern towns of Diaoube and Kedougou, which act as important commercial hubs, linking traders from Senegal, Mali, Sierra Leone, Guinea, Guinea Bissau and the Gambia.

However, Senegal and a handful of West African nations have closed their borders with the Ebola-stricken countries in order to control the importation of the deadly virus, which has killed more than 3,000 people since March, about half of those it infects.

Experts say border closures, enforced by the Senegalese government contrary to advice given by the World Health Organization, could have a serious impact on regional trade and disproportionately affect the poor during a record year for hunger in the region.

A recent anecdotal survey by the Word Food Programme (WFP) showed current trade volumes in these markets were 50 percent below the levels at the same time last year, a direct result of the August border closure, the second this year.

At the weekly market in Diaoube, only half the stalls were set up on Wednesday, the official market day. Only 10 to 20 large trucks are supplying Diaoube now, compared with 100 on an average market day last year, the survey report said.

As a result palm oil, garri (local flour), fruit and coffee from Guinea are in short supply. The price of palm oil, an important food item for many poor households in the region that is traded in large quantities, has increased 40 percent in four weeks, the report said.

"The government closed the border to stop contamination between countries, not to stop trade, but people are still crossing the border and trade has stopped. It's counterproductive," said Jerome Bernard, food assistance expert at ECHO, the European Union's humanitarian arm.

"If Ebola remains unchecked and the border remains closed, there is high risk for prices to increase and disrupt regional trade in these grain-producing areas, especially during the upcoming harvest," Bernard said, noting that if the sea ports closed too it would spell catastrophe.


ABANDONED FARMS

At the supply end in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, farmers frightened of contracting Ebola are staying away from their fields, prompting fears that a food crisis could follow the epidemic.

In Sierra Leone, for instance, preliminary data from the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) indicates that up to 40 percent of farms have been abandoned in the worst-affected areas.

"The Ebola outbreak is having a devastating impact on the agricultural and food sector of these countries," FAO economist Jean Senahoun told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in an interview.

"GDP growth has been cut in most of the affected countries. People will be out of work and won't be able to buy food, even if it's available in the markets," he said.

Agriculture drives economic growth in all three countries worst afflicted by Ebola. They stand to lose $359 million in economic output this year, according to the World Bank.

While worries of famine loom on the horizon, international organisations on the ground are focused on fighting immediate perils caused by the epidemic. The WFP has distributed around 6,000 tonnes of food to 430,000 people across the three countries since April.

"At the moment, the food response we are providing is really part of the medical response," WFP spokesman Alexis Masciarelli said in an interview with the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

A special vitamin-rich porridge, usually reserved for children suffering from malnutrition, is being fed to Ebola patients to help them regain strength during treatment and recovery.

Masciarelli worries that food prices could rise drastically in the medium term, but for now, treating Ebola victims is the first priority.

Back in Senegal, just days before the Muslim festival of sacrifice, Eid-al-Azha, which is observed in much of West Africa, Barry says opening the borders would be the best Eid present, but his thoughts are with his fellow countrymen.

"This year I don't have enough money to celebrate Eid, but for all my misfortune, the people in Guinea have it much worse than we do. I pray they can overcome this disease," he said.


http://news.yahoo.com/food-crisis-looms-ebola-rampages-west-africa-150511740.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Air industry battles Ebola with heat scans and handwash
Reuters
By Victoria Bryan  15 minutes ago



BERLIN (Reuters) - Airlines and airports handling travel to countries worst hit by the Ebola epidemic are trying to prove that flying to West Africa is safe, following concerns that the first case diagnosed in the United States could curtail worldwide services.

Some airlines have already suspended or cut back flights since the summer, and only one European carrier now offers direct services to Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia. However, those still operating have taken measures to protect passengers and crew, along with airports in the region and beyond.

The Dallas Ebola case, involving a man who returned to the United States from Liberia last month, has led to worries about a spread of the virus outside West Africa, where at least 3,338 people have died in the worst outbreak on record.

Shares in airline and travel stocks fell on Thursday, with European travel and leisure shares down 1 percent, against a 0.6 percent fall for European stocks.

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) said on Thursday that the Ebola crisis has taken on a "new dimension" with the case in the United States, but it repeated that flying remained safe.

The virus is not transmitted through air, but by contact with bodily fluids and is contagious only once there are symptoms such as fever, vomiting and diarrhea. These symptoms are so crippling that it is nearly impossible for anyone suffering them to board a plane, experts say.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has not placed any restrictions on travel and has encouraged airlines to keep flying to the worst-hit regions. British Airways and Emirates airlines [EMIRA.UL] have suspended some flights.

"Travellers should be reassured. WHO has clearly said that the risk of Ebola transmission on board an aircraft is very low," IATA Director General Tony Tyler said on Thursday.

Working with the WHO and IATA, the United Nations airline body ICAO came up with guidelines for airlines on contagious diseases following the outbreak of SARS in 2003, which resulted in $7 billion of lost revenue to Asia-Pacific and U.S. airlines, according to IATA estimates.

At airports in Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Nigeria - which has suffered a relatively small number of cases - and also in African hubs such as Addis Ababa, passengers entering and leaving have to undergo temperature scans and fill in questionnaires indicating places they have visited.

Airports in the crisis-hit areas are well-stocked with antibacterial handwash and plastic gloves. Brussels Airlines, the sole European airline still flying directly to the three worst-hit countries, says its crew also have permission to refuse boarding to anyone who appears to be ill.

Moroccan state-owned Royal Air Maroc, which still flies to Conakry, Freetown and Monrovia, says crews are trained to detect Ebola symptoms.

"If the proper procedures are put in place, the risk is miniscule," Peter Fowler, chief executive of security firm Westminster Group, told Reuters.

Westminster Group provides security services, including at Sierra Leone's international airport, and has brought in scanners to screen passengers' body temperature there.

The number of people coming in and out of the airport has also been restricted and it has isolation areas available should there be suspected cases.

However, the president of Emirates Airline [EMIRA.UL] said on Thursday that demand for flights to Africa from Asia had fallen due to concerns over the virus.

A spokesman for Ethiopian Airlines [ETHA.UL], which serves 49 destinations in Africa, said customers were more cautious in bookings, but that its planes were still full and there had been no cancellations.

Royal Air Maroc said flights to Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia had become unprofitable because they were usually empty on the way out and full only on the way back.

"It is going to have a big impact on West Africa, for places like Ghana for example where the tourism trade will be affected by association," Westminster Group's Fowler said. "Africa is coming up in the world, this is the last thing it needs. But they will get through it."

Brussels Airlines said the outbreak meant it has had to change the way it operates and crews no longer stay overnight in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia. It also carries Ebola kits on board that enable it to isolate a passenger should symptoms develop during a flight.

The airline, 45 percent owned by Lufthansa, used to combine flights to Conakry, Freetown and Monrovia with a stop in other African countries, but now has to fly directly from Brussels due to restrictions placed by neighboring west African countries.

This means it now has more seats available to those places as it can no longer to sell tickets to two different destinations on one flight.

"We do have extra costs, yes, but there is a need to travel. Passengers that used to fly with other airlines now have to fly with us," a Brussels Airlines spokesman said. He said the airline was also transporting aid workers and was prioritizing medical cargo.

"Ebola is not new for us," he said. "Logistically, it's not easy, it is a challenge, but it's our humanitarian duty to keep flying."

(Reporting by Victoria Bryan; Additional reporting by Aziz el Yaakoubi in Rabat; editing by David Stamp)


http://news.yahoo.com/air-industry-battles-ebola-heat-scans-handwash-150437361--finance.html

[Buster's Uncle]

New type of clinic eyed to help stop Ebola
Associated Press
By MARIA CHENG and SARAH DiLORENZO  2 hours ago



Health workers in protective gear remove the body of a woman suspected to have died from the Ebola virus, near the area of Freeport in Monrovia, Liberia, Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2014. The first case of Ebola diagnosed in the U.S. has been confirmed in a man who recently traveled from Liberia to Dallas, sending chills through the area's West African community whose leaders urged caution to prevent spreading the virus. (AP Photo/Abbas Dulleh)



LONDON (AP) — Britain and Sierra Leone are appealing for more help to slow the biggest ever Ebola outbreak — and are proposing a new type of clinic to do that.

At a London conference on Thursday, officials are expected to announce plans to build up to 1,000 makeshift Ebola clinics in Sierra Leone. The new clinics will offer little, if any, treatment, but they will get sick people out of their homes, away from their families and hopefully slow the infection rate.

Only a fraction of Ebola patients are now in treatment centers.

"If we don't do anything, we'll just be watching people die," World Health Organization spokeswoman Dr. Margaret Harris said in Sierra Leone.

Sierra Leone is one of the hardest-hit countries in the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, which is believed to have killed more than 3,300 people and infected at least twice as many.

Experts say the disease will continue to spread rapidly unless at least 70 percent of people who are infected are isolated and prevented from infecting other people. Dozens of Ebola treatment centers have been promised, but they could take weeks or even months to go up.



Graphic shows timeline of Dallas patient, Q&A and comparison of global outbreaks.; 3c x 5 inches; 146 mm x 127 mm;


The basic care centers, however, could be put up in as little as a week's time, said Manuel Fontaine, the West Africa regional director for the U.N. Children's Fund, which would help equip them.

"It's not one or the other," Fontaine said. "What we're saying is the care centers need to move fast but that shouldn't be an excuse to slow down the ETUs (Ebola Treatment Units)."

Experts are turning to these imperfect solutions because the scale of the Ebola outbreak is overwhelming the traditional response methods tried so far.

Save the Children noted Thursday that Ebola is spreading at a "terrifying rate," estimating that in recent days five people were becoming infected every hour in Sierra Leone alone. That figure is based on both confirmed cases and an estimate of how many cases are not being reported.

"We need to try different things because of the scale of this outbreak," said Brice de la Vingne, director of operations for Doctors Without Borders.

"We've used these kinds of basic tents in past catastrophes but never for Ebola," he explained. "But right now we're screaming for more isolation centers so patients don't infect their communities."

___

AP Writer Sarah DiLorenzo reported from Dakar, Senegal.


http://news.yahoo.com/type-clinic-eyed-help-stop-ebola-114657680.html

[Buster's Uncle]

UN launches mission to halt worldwide Ebola spread
AFP
By Zoom Dosso  2 hours ago



A health worker puts on protective gear in Liberia, where Ebola has spread across the entire country (AFP Photo/Pascal Guyot)



Monrovia (AFP) - The UN launched a mission on Thursday to prevent the worldwide spread of Ebola as the US hunted for people who came in contact with the first African diagnosed with the deadly virus outside the continent.

Anthony Banbury, the special representative for the UN Mission on Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER), was expected to set ambitious targets for action on the crisis as he began a tour of the three worst-hit nations in the Liberian capital Monrovia.

President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said she had told Banbury the virus had spread to all 15 counties of Liberia, the worst-hit nation with almost two-thirds of the 3,338 deaths in west Africa.

"Affected people are leaving from urban places and hiding out in remote communities," Sirleaf said, according to a statement from the presidency following the meeting on Wednesday.

"If we do not move in as quickly as possible, the virus (will) further spread in rural areas."

Banbury was due to address the media before moving on to Sierra Leone and then Guinea over the coming days, with US health officials scouring the Dallas area for people who came in contact with a Liberian man diagnosed with Ebola.



A health worker in protective gear hangs aprons to dry on October 1, 2014 at a treatment centre in Liberia's capital Monrovia (AFP Photo/Pascal Guyot)


The man first sought treatment in Texas on September 25 but hospital officials have admitted he may have come into contact with many more people than first thought because an apparent miscommunication among staff resulted in his release back into the community for several days.

Ebola is spread through close contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person, and can only be transmitted when a patient is showing symptoms like fever, aches, bleeding, vomiting or diarrhoea.


- 'International crisis' -

The man -- the first person to be diagnosed with Ebola on US soil -- flew from Liberia, the hardest-hit nation in west Africa's deadly Ebola outbreak, and arrived in Texas September 20 to visit family. He fell ill on September 24.

He went to the hospital the next day but was sent home because the medical team "felt clinically it was a low-grade common viral disease", said Mark Lester, executive vice president of Texas Health Resources.

"He volunteered that he had travelled from Africa in response to the nurse operating the checklist and asking that question," Lester added.

"Regretfully, that information was not fully communicated throughout the full team."

The patient is currently in serious but stable condition.

The Liberian government expressed "regret" on Thursday over the spread of Ebola from Monrovia to the US, adding that the incident had demonstrated "the clear international dimension of this Ebola crisis".

The incubation period for Ebola is between two and 21 days. Patients are not contagious until they start to have symptoms but once the disease takes hold it can lead to massive bleeding and fatal organ failure.



Workers set up a new treatment centre as part of the fight against Ebola, on September 28, 2014 in Monrovia (AFP Photo/Pascal Guyot)


Britain hosted a conference in London on Thursday to gather support for the fight against Ebola in Sierra Leone, its former colony which has seen more than 600 deaths.

President Ernest Bai Koroma had been due to be the guest of honour at the half-day meeting, which has brought together ministers, diplomats and health officials from around 20 countries and world organisations.

But a plane chartered to fly him to London was unable to take off due to "technical difficulties", the UK Foreign Office said.


- 'Terrifying' infection rate -

Save the Children warned as the conference began that five people are being infected with Ebola every hour in Sierra Leone and demand for treatment beds is far outstripping supply.

If the current "terrifying" rate of infection continues, 10 people will be infected every hour with the deadly virus in the West African country by the end of October, the London-based charity warned.

"We need a coordinated international response that ensures treatment centres are built and staffed immediately," chief executive Justin Forsyth said in a statement.

Britain has pledged £120 million ($190 million, 150 million euros) to help build an estimated 700 treatment beds, fund new community treatment centres, support existing public health services and support aid agencies in Sierra Leone.

Officials are hoping to secure pledges of support and money at Thursday's meeting, as well as to share best practices with those working in Liberia and Guinea.

The United Nations has announced its first suspected victim of Ebola, a Liberian man who worked for the UN mission in Liberia and died of a probable but unconfirmed infection last week.

In response to the fast-moving outbreak, the World Bank boosted its aid to the campaign by adding $170 million toward expanding the health-care workforce and buying needed supplies for care and treatment.

The new aid took to $400 million the amount the bank has put toward the fight against the spread of Ebola, which has swept quickly through Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone.


http://news.yahoo.com/un-launches-mission-halt-worldwide-ebola-spread-130038005.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Five people contract Ebola every hour in Sierra Leone: charity
AFP
2 hours ago



A medic works at an Ebola treatment facility in Sierra Leone, where there were an estimated 765 new cases of the virus last week (AFP Photo/Carl de Souza)



London (AFP) - Five people are being infected with Ebola every hour in Sierra Leone and demand for treatment beds is far outstripping supply, the Save the Children charity warned on Thursday.

If the current "terrifying" rate of infection continues, 10 people every hour will be infected with the deadly virus in the West African country by the end of October, the London-based organisation warned.

"The scale of the Ebola epidemic is devastating and growing every day, with five people infected every hour in Sierra Leone last week," Save the Children chief executive Justin Forsyth said in a statement.

"We need a coordinated international response that ensures treatment centres are built and staffed immediately."

The charity issued the appeal as Britain hosted a conference in London to gather support for the fight against Ebola in Sierra Leone, its former colony.

Britain has provided 143 new treatment beds so far and promised almost 600 more in the coming months, but Save the Children said other countries must join the fight.

There were an estimated 765 new cases last week, the charity said, but only 327 beds across the country.

The number of cases was likely to be "massively" under-reported, as "untold numbers of children are dying anonymously at home or in the streets", it said.

"We are facing the frightening prospect of an epidemic which is spreading like wildfire across Sierra Leone, with the number of new cases doubling every three weeks," said the charity's country director in Sierra Leone, Rob MacGillivray.

"Children, more than anyone, are suffering painful, anonymous and undignified deaths at home.

"It's very difficult at this stage to even give accurate figures on the number of children who are dying from Ebola, as monitoring systems cannot keep pace with the outbreak."


http://news.yahoo.com/five-people-contract-ebola-every-hour-sierra-leone-091000374.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Ebola arrival shakes cultural crossroads community in Dallas
Reuters
By Lisa Maria Garza  4 hours ago



DALLAS (Reuters) - In the Dallas community of Vickery Meadow, a cultural polyglot where about three dozen languages are spoken, the one word on everyone's lips is "Ebola."

On Sunday, a group of blighted apartments in a section of the neighborhood favored by West African immigrants was shaken by screams as one family saw a recently arrived relative being carted away in an ambulance.

The man was the first person diagnosed with Ebola in the United States. He was last seen by neighbors in the parking lot vomiting on the street.

"I heard about Ebola on the news, but I didn't know it was right here," said Juan Pablo Escalante, 43, who is from Mexico.

There is little indication a visitor to the community had been infected with a disease that has killed more than 3,000 people in West Africa, in the worst Ebola outbreak on record.

"There's no notes on the doors. No one came to talk to us. I picked up my kids from school down the street and found out it was this close," Escalante said on Wednesday.

Dallas County said it would put "boots on the ground" to monitor those who may have been exposed. In Vickery Meadow, residents worried if that would be enough to prevent an outbreak at what has been dubbed "ground zero" for Ebola in the United States. Vickery Meadow is home to about 25,000 people and more than 30 languages spoken among immigrants who have come to Dallas because it has one of the better job markets in the United States and relatively inexpensive property prices.

Despite an image as the home of oil barons where men wear big hats and women have big hair, as shown around the world in the highly popular TV drama "Dallas" that first aired in the late 1970s, the city is one of the more diverse in the United States.

The community's schools have also been touched by Ebola, with five children coming into contact with the patient. The children went to the four different schools they attend after being exposed. They are now home and showing no symptoms, but parents are worried.

Dozens of comments from parents posted on the Dallas Independent School District's Facebook page said more information was needed, including the names of the potentially exposed children.

"Right now, I'm not sure to take my daughter to school tomorrow," wrote Gabriela Mendoza Villa. "I'm getting so nervous."

(Writing by Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Peter Cooney)


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-arrival-shakes-cultural-crossroads-community-dallas-110154804.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Britain calls for international help on Ebola as London conference begins
Reuters
5 hours ago



A World Health Organization (WHO) health worker gives a demonstration on how to put on a protective suit to health worker trainees in Freetown, Sierra Leone, September 30, 2014. REUTERS/Umaru Fofana



LONDON (Reuters) - Britain made a plea for international help to deal with the world's worst Ebola outbreak at the start of a conference in London on Thursday, with one charity warning that five people are being infected with the virus every hour in Sierra Leone.

Ebola has killed at least 3,338 in West Africa -- mainly in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia -- out of 7,178 cases as of Sept. 28, the World Health Organisation (WHO) says, and cases have been recorded elsewhere, including in the United States.

Sierra Leone's president, Ernest Bai Koroma, canceled his attendance at the conference just hours before it started. His plane had technical problems, Britain's Foreign Office said.

Speaking on Thursday before the "Defeating Ebola" conference began, Britain's Foreign Secretary, Philip Hammond, called for countries to increase financial aid as well as other vital help including medical expertise, transport and supplies.

"We need help from the international community to provide us with the doctors and nurses, so we're asking other countries to piggy back on the structure we've put in place," he said.

"Britain's got a footprint on the ground in Sierra Leone, we've got military engineers there, we've got a big DFID presence, we've got a plan to roll out a large number of additional Ebola treatment beds," he said.

Although WHO said the total number of new cases had fallen for a second week, it warned of under-reporting and said there were few signs of the epidemic being brought under control.

"Transmission remains persistent and widespread in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, with strong evidence of increasing case incidence in several districts," WHO said.

The Save the Children charity warned the authorities faced the prospect of an epidemic "spreading like wildfire" across Sierra Leone, saying there had been 765 new cases reported in the country last week but there were only 327 beds available.

"The scale of the Ebola epidemic is devastating and growing every day, with five people infected every hour in Sierra Leone last week," the charity's chief executive, Justin Forsyth, said.

"We need a coordinated international response that ensures treatment centers are built and staffed immediately."

Although the charity praised UK efforts, a British parliamentary committee said on Thursday that cuts in aid from Britain to Libera and Sierra Leone had compromised the fight against the disease.

"In the midst of this devastating epidemic ... it is wrong for the UK to cut its support to these two countries by nearly a fifth," International Development Committee chairman, Malcolm Bruce, said in a report from the committee.

"The planned termination of further UK funding to the Liberian health sector is especially unwise."

DFID said it had promised 120 million pounds ($200 million) towards helping health services in Sierra Leone.

(This story was refiled to add dropped word in first paragraph)

(Reporting by Michael Holden; Editing by Louise Ireland)


http://news.yahoo.com/britain-calls-international-help-ebola-london-conference-begins-085823570.html