WHO warns six African countries after Ebola outbreaks

CONAKRY (Reuters) – The World Health Organization has called on six African countries to be alert for possible Ebola infections, as Guinea reported new cases on Tuesday and the Democratic Republic of Congo said its new infections resurfaced an earlier outbreak.

Guinea on Sunday declared an outbreak of the virus on the first return of the disease there since the 2013-2016 outbreak, while the Congo has confirmed four new cases this month.

Health officials have been quick to respond to cases in Guinea, eager to prevent a repeat of the latest outbreak in West Africa, which killed more than 11,300 people, mostly in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, in the worst Ebola epidemic on record.

“We have already alerted the six surrounding countries, including, of course, Sierra Leone and Liberia, and they are moving very quickly to prepare and be ready and look for any possible infection,” said Margaret Harris of the WHO, at a briefing in Geneva on Tuesday.

Guinea’s neighbors include Senegal, Guinea Bissau, Mali, Côte d’Ivoire, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

So far, Guinea has reported up to ten suspected cases of Ebola and five deaths. Since declaring the outbreak on Sunday, it has identified 115 contacts from known cases in the south-eastern city of Nzerekore and 10 in the capital Conakry, the health ministry said on Tuesday.

According to the WHO, gene sequencing of Ebola samples from Congo and Guinea is being conducted to learn more about the origins of the outbreaks and to identify the strains.

As a result, Congo has confirmed that its latest cases are not related to a new variant of Ebola, but represent a resurgence of its tenth outbreak, the second largest recorded that caused more than 2,200 deaths in 2018-2020 .

“As for the infection, we are not yet able to identify its origin,” said Provincial Health Minister Eugene Nzanzu Salita, referring to how the first person to fall ill in this resurgence caught the virus.

Since the devastating epidemic in West Africa, the development of vaccines and treatments has greatly improved survival rates and containment efforts.

A new spread of the disease could paralyze the region’s underfunded health systems, which are also battling the coronavirus pandemic. Ivory Coast, Mali and Sierra Leone have launched plans to stop any possible spread and strengthen border controls.

The Ebola virus can cause severe bleeding and organ failure and is spread through contact with body fluids. It has a much higher mortality rate than COVID-19, but unlike coronavirus it is not transmitted by asymptomatic carriers.