Africa

Liberia Announces Two More Confirmed Ebola Cases

Wed, 2015-07-01 22:31 — Kathy Gilbeaux

Health workers leave after they took a blood specimen from a child to test for the Ebola virus in a area were a 17-year old boy died from the virus on the outskirts of Monrovia, Liberia, Tuesday, June 30, 2015.

Three cases of the disease have been confirmed in the country, which previously had been Ebola-free for nearly two months.

news.yahoo.com - AFP - by Zoom Dosso - July 1, 2015

Liberia said Wednesday a teenager who died of Ebola fever had spread the virus to at least two more people, confirming the first outbreak of the tropical disease for months. . . .

. . . "One hundred and two contacts have been identified, although that number is expected to increase as investigations continue," the World Health Organization (WHO) said in its latest report on the epidemic.

"At this stage the origin of infection is not known. The case reportedly had no recent history of travel, contact with visitors from affected areas, or funeral attendance." . . .

. . . The news came a day after Health Minister Bernice Dahn announced the first Ebola infection in Liberia for more than three months, warning that it was "likely that we will find additional cases".

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Liberia Registers Second Confirmed Ebola Case - Health Official

Wed, 2015-07-01 07:56 — Kathy Gilbeaux

uk.reuters.com - Reporting by Alphonso Toweh; Writing by Emma Farge; Editing by Daniel Flynn - July 1, 2015

Liberia confirmed a second case of Ebola on Tuesday just a day after authorities said they had detected a new case of the deadly virus previously thought to have been eliminated from the West African country, a senior health official said. . . .

. . . ”We have two confirmed cases today in Liberia," said Dr. Moses Massaquoi, case management team leader for Liberia's Ebola task force. He did not provide details of the new case. . . .

. . . A message from the Twitter account of the Liberian information ministry said that two people from the teenager's home had been confirmed as Ebola positive. It was not immediately possible to verify that information, nor was it clear if that included the case cited by Massaquoi.

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Liberian Official Says Corpse Tests Positive for Ebola

Mon, 2015-06-29 23:22 — Kathy Gilbeaux

submitted by Stephen Morse

“Specimen from the remains of a 17 year old corpse tested positive on two occasions after our burial team moved into the village and safely took the specimen before safe burial of the corpse”, said Nyenswah. We did the test twice and it all came positive but there is no need to panic. Quickly detecting means our system is working”. – Mr. Tolbert Nyenswah, Liberia Incidence Management Team Head

Ebola Back in Liberia: 1 Month, 20 Days After 'Free' Declaration

frontpageafricaonline.com - by Samwar S. Fallah - June 29, 2015

Monrovia - Liberia is reporting a new case of the deadly Ebola virus just one month and 20 days after the World Health Organization declared the country free of the virus transmission. Mr. Tolbert Nyenswah, Deputy Minister - designate for Disease, Surveillance and Epidemic Control confirmed to FrontPageAfrica Monday evening that the case was discovered after the death of the victim.

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Meager Post-Ebola Harvests Worsen Food Insecurity in West Africa

Mon, 2015-06-29 08:53 — Kathy Gilbeaux

Villagers harvest rice in Sierra Leone. Harvesting is often a communal affair in West African nations, but the Ebola crisis interfered with group activities and disrupted many other aspects of agricultural production in the region. Photo credit: ©FAO/Peter DiCampo.

mongabay.com - by Lois Parshley - June 25, 2015

Pedelers Salee Craig used to grow vegetables. Near his home in Monrovia, Liberia, he planted peppers and bitter balls, potatoes and okra. A sturdy 39 year-old man with cheeks etched from former smiles, Craig is passionate and generally optimistic.

But he's not smiling when he talks about the situation in Liberia now. Typically, farmers work to gather crops communally, harvesting together until the season is over. But in 2014, the Ebola crisis restricted travel.

"Everyone was afraid of each other," Craig said. Mandatory government quarantines trapped people within their homes. As the disease spread, fields went unharvested and soon lay fallow.

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Finger-prick, blood test for Ebola takes just minutes

Fri, 2015-06-26 13:19 — mike kraft

THE WASHINGTON POST by Ariana Eunjung Cha June 26, 2015

Public health officials may soon be able to screen patients for Ebola at border crossings and hospitals with a finger-prick blood test that takes mere minutes.

The development of the rapid diagnostic test, reported in The Lancet Thursday, represents a significant victory for scientists around the world who have been experimenting over the past year with all manner of vaccines, treatments and other ways of eradicating the virus.

Developing a way of confirming Ebola in a patient has been one of the top priorities. In the early stages the symptoms -- chest pain, cough, nausea -- can look like many other illnesses, making it very difficult for doctors to triage -- to determine who should be quarantined and who to send home. It can often take days or longer for laboratory tests, the current standard, to return a positive or negative result.

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Neglected Tropical Diseases in the Ebola- Affected Countries of West Africa

Fri, 2015-06-26 12:49 — mike kraft

PLOS EDITORIAL by Peter J. Hotez, Sabin Vaccine Institute June 25, 2015

While global attention in West Africa is focused on the emergence of Ebola virus infection, new information from the published literature and World Health Organization databases reveals that many other neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) are far more widespread and also require urgent attention.

Well before Ebola virus infection emerged in West Africa at the end of 2013, the three

major affected countries--Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone were already known to

be highly affected by NTDs....

Today, new information from the recent literature and the World Health Organization

(WHO) Preventive Chemotherapy and Transmission (PCT) Control databases reveals that

NTDs remain widespread in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. An estimated

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WHO Ebola Situation Report - June 24, 2015 | UNMEER External Situation Report - June 22, 2015

Thu, 2015-06-25 22:27 — Kathy Gilbeaux

who.int - June 24, 2015 ebolaresponse.un.org - June 22, 2015

CLICK HERE - WHO Ebola Situation Report - June 24, 2015

CLICK HERE - UNMEER External Situation Report - June 22, 2015 - (2 page .PDF file)

CLICK HERE - WHO Ebola Situation Reports

CLICK HERE - UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER) Situation Reports

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Liberia: Flirting With Disaster - Porous Border, Close Ebola Recall

Wed, 2015-06-24 09:08 — Kathy Gilbeaux

allafrica.com - Front Page Africa - by Bettie Johnson - June 22, 2015

. . . The country is now in a panic mode after a sick lady from neighboring Guinea was intercepted by security officers at a checkpoint deep inside Liberian territory, raising fears that the episode of 2014 which brought Ebola to Liberia is threatening to reemerge. . . .

. . . A Global Communities Surveillance Officer disclosed that although they are carrying out temperature checks on commuters, people using illegal entry points are moving without going through health screening. . . .

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Ebola Returns to Sierra Leone Capital After Weeks of No New Cases

Tue, 2015-06-23 09:36 — Kathy Gilbeaux

Health workers put on protective gear before entering a quarantine zone at a Red Cross facility in the town of Koidu, Kono district in Eastern Sierra Leone December 19, 2014. REUTERS/BAZ RATNER

Cases found in a densely populated slum

time.com - Alexandra Sifferlin - June 22, 2015

Two new cases of the deadly Ebola virus have been recorded in Sierra Leone’s capital city of Freetown, about three weeks after the most recent new cases were found, underscoring the difficulty of ridding the region of the disease.

“This is worrisome because we had already closed all Ebola quarantine structures in Freetown since we had gone for weeks without a case,” Sidi Yahya Tunis, a spokesman for the National Ebola Response Centre (NERC) told Reuters. The cases were found in a densely populated slum called Magazine.

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(ALSO SEE RELATED ARTICLE HERE)

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Malaria morbidity and mortality in Ebola-affected countries caused by decreased health-care capacity, and the potential effect of mitigation strategies: a modelling analysis

Mon, 2015-06-22 16:27 — mike kraft

LANCET by Patrick G. T. Walker and others Volume 15, No. 7, p825–832, July 2015
The ongoing Ebola epidemic in parts of west Africa largely overwhelmed health-care systems in 2014, making adequate care for malaria impossible and threatening the gains in malaria control achieved over the past decade. We quantified this additional indirect burden of Ebola virus disease.

We estimated the number of cases and deaths from malaria in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone from Demographic and Health Surveys data for malaria prevalence and coverage of malaria interventions before the Ebola outbreak. We then removed the effect of treatment and hospital care to estimate additional cases and deaths from malaria caused by reduced health-care capacity and potential disruption of delivery of insecticide-treated bednets. We modelled the potential effect of emergency mass drug administration in affected areas on malaria cases and health-care demand....

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