THE GUARDIAN by Lisa O'Carroll                         Feb. 27, 2015

Efforts to beat Ebola in Sierra Leone have been dealt a setback after 31 new cases were recorded in one village.

                            Red Cross healthcare workers. 

The community of 500 just outside the town of Makeni has now been put in lockdown by the army amid fears that more could be infected.

The World Health Organisation said cases have been linked to one man who escaped a quarantine in Freetown to go home to his village to get treatment from a traditional faith healer.

The quarantine area is a fishing community, yards from the hotel where many of humanitarian agencies have stayed.

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http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/27/ebola-sierra-leone-village-lockdown-31-new-cases

REUTERS by Stephanie Nebehay                                                             Feb. 27, 2015

GENEVA -- An independent advisory body will decide in August at the earliest on whether to recommend widespread introduction of an Ebola vaccine, depending on results of clinical trials and the epidemic's course, the World Health Organization said on Friday.

All three worst-hit countries in West Africa - Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone - aim to conduct phase III final-stage clinical trials of experimental vaccines.

Liberia is already testing both the GlaxoSmithKline and Merck-NewLink vaccines, while Sierra Leone and Guinea are due to announce plans soon....

WHO spokesman Christian Lindmeier, reporting on a three-day meeting of experts, told a news briefing: "Vaccine introduction is by no means a given and will depend on the results of clinical trials and recommendations from WHO's Strategy Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE) on vaccines and immunization....

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REUTERS    by  James Harding Giahyue                                                          Feb. 26, 2015

MONROVIA -- The United States military officially ended a mission to build treatment facilities to combat an Ebola outbreak in Liberia on Thursday, months earlier than expected, in the latest indication that a year-long epidemic in West Africa is waning.

Washington launched the mission five months ago and the force peaked at over 2,800 troops at a time when Liberia was at the epicenter of the worst Ebola epidemic on record....

"While our large scale military mission is ending...the fight to get to zero cases will continue and the (Joint Force Command) has ensured capabilities were brought that will be sustained in the future," U.S. Army Major General Gary Volesky....

Speaking to lawmakers during a visit to Washington on Thursday, Liberia's President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf thanked the United States for its support during the crisis.

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http://uk.reuters.com/article/2015/02/26/us-health-ebola-usa-idUKKBN0LU2HR20150226

ASSOCIATED PRESS By YOUSSOUF BAH                       Feb. 25, 2015
MELIANDOU, Guinea (AP) — Here at ground zero of West Africa's Ebola outbreak, a local traditional healer returned to complete the removal of a curse residents believe could have been placed on their village in Guinea.

In this photo taken on Feb. 23, 2015, traditional healers, right, take part in a exorcism as villagers hand them a chicken, in Meliandou, Guinea. Here at ground zero of West Africa’s Ebola outbreak, a local traditional healer returned to complete the removal of a curse residents believe could have been placed on their village in Guinea. (AP Photo/Youssouf Bah)

It is the same village where experts believe 2-year-old Emile Ouamouno was the first person to have died from Ebola, on Dec. 28, 2013, in the outbreak that has slowed in recent months but has not been completely stamped out....Hundreds abandoned the village, believing the Ouamouno family or the entire village, was cursed, the village chief Amadou Kamano remembered.