The World Health Organization said yesterday that the number of confirmed Ebola cases dropped to its lowest levels, although worries remain, especially in Guinea. The health body said 30 new cases were recorded last week, the lowest weekly total since the third week of May 2014.
The Ebola epidemic began in December 2013 but its impact has been felt globally. It has claimed 10,572 lives among 25,515 known cases. It spiked around July 2014 and soon after spread from Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia to Nigeria, Mali, Senegal, the United States, Spain and the United Kingdom. While the latter countries are now free of the virus, the former are yet to fully overcome the epidemic, although their numbers are getting better.
The number of cases have decreased in Guinea, from 57 to 21 in the week up to April 5, said the World Health Organisation (WHO). Sierra Leone has also experienced its fifth consecutive week of decreasing new cases and reported zero new cases on three days in the same week. Liberia had the most positive of results as it had no new confirmed cases in the same period. There were also no new cases of Ebola amongst healthcare workers.
However, WHO says it is worried about the situation in Guinea. It lamented that unsafe burials of bodies persist in the country and warned that “unknown chains of transmission could be a source of new infections in the coming weeks.” The health body also disclosed that Ebola is still spreading in western Guinea, including the capital Conakry, although detection of the disease has improved. It has announced that a three-day door-to-door campaign will begin on 10 April (Friday) in order to improve community participation in surveillance activities, and identify suspected cases.
The Ebola situation in Liberia is more positive. The last known case in the country was a patient who died on March 27. “The victim’s 332 contacts are being monitored but none have shown symptoms thus far,” WHO said, adding that heightened vigilance is being maintained throughout the country. WHO also disclosed that, as in Liberia, treatment capacity also exceeds demand in Sierra Leone, and that it is offering technical advice to national authorities in both countries on the “phased safe decommissioning of surplus facilities.” However, each country would retain strategically located high-quality Ebola treatment centres and rapid-response capacity to ensure complete geographic coverage.
The recession of the virus has caused the WHO to call for review of the emergency status of the virus outbreak. It said independent experts are set to determine on Friday whether the outbreak still constitutes a “public health emergency of international concern”, a status it declared in August 2014.
