Officials in Sierra Leone admitted Thursday that 500 people have been placed under quarantine after a man died from Ebola in a part of the nation where the disease was believed to have been eradicated for months.
Hassan Abdul Sesay, a member of the Sierra Leone parliament, told reporters that the victim had contracted the virus in the capital city of Freetown and then brought it to his home village where he want to mark the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
A troubling aspect of the revelation of the outbreak was that the patient was not immediately diagnosed with Ebola and the national hotline for cases was not called until later in the disease’s progression. The patient only presented a fever when they went to the hospital.
The victim’s entire home village and at least 30 medical professionals are part of the quarantine.
Authorities are also concerned because the victim’s father is a taxi driver who used his car to take his son to at least two hospitals. The victim was also not buried using the special instructions to keep victims from spreading ebola after death.
The news of the quarantine was a black mark on an otherwise good week for news on the Ebola fight. The World Health Organization (WHO) said this week that they have the lowest number of new Ebola cases in a year in West Africa.
Sierra Leone officials remain confident they will eradicate the disease despite the recent blow up.
“Sierra Leone is on the last lap to get to zero number of cases, and we are bringing in the Sierra Leone police and military to enforce the Ebola by-laws and get people to comply with the restrictions,” said retired Maj. Alfred Palo Conteh, head of the Ebola response centre.
The massive 7.8 earthquake that rocked Nepal and left hundreds dead still hasn’t been fully noted by the government but a report on the state of the healthcare system shows the country is in serious trouble.
A new report given to the Nepal planning commission shows that one third of the nation’s healthcare system has been destroyed or severely damaged to the point it is currently inoperable. Almost 450 public health facilities in the nation were completely destroyed by the quake and its aftershocks.
Over 700 public health facilities have been reported with significant damage although they are still able to provide some services.
The total value of the damage is estimated to be around $58 million and the estimate cost to rebuild is close to $110 million over the next five years.
The situation is being complicated by the monsoon season with landslides threatening some of the remaining damaged healthcare structures.
The WHO said Nepal was one of the worst nations in the world for healthcare before the quake, with only 2.1 doctors per 10,000 residents of the population. The WHO says native doctors head for more industrialized nations in search of better pay and working conditions.
“Health services must be rebuilt and made accessible to all, while risk-reduction programmes must be implemented at the sub-national level,” Poonam Khetrapal Singh, the WHO regional director for Southeast Asia, wrote last week. “Soil testing, the enforcement of health facility-related building codes, and investment in design of quake-proof facilities and homes must be encouraged across the country.”
The World Organization for Animal Health says the bird flu outbreak that is currently killing millions of birds in the United States has impacted 35 countries around the world.
The major strain in the U.S. that has led to the deaths of 33 million birds since last December is H5N2. The USDA is now admitting that the H5N8 strain of bird flu has also been found in the United States.
The OIE says that the H5N8 strain was discovered in Korea and China before moving to Japan.
“From there the strain probably spread with migratory wild birds to India, Europe, Canada and later the United States of America,” the OIE said in a statement.
The OIE has requested that the 180 member countries apply better biosecurity measures at farms, live bird markets and in trades. They’ve also requested an increase in surveillance to try and stop outbreaks before they can infect more than one location.
The OIE added that while the main focus is on H5N2 and H5N8, the H5N1 virus that lead to a worldwide outbreak in 2004 and also infected humans is still out there. The virus has most recently been found in Africa.
The World Health Organization has declared Liberia to finally be free of Ebola.
The death toll from the virus was listed as 4,700 by WHO officials.
“The outbreak of Ebola virus disease in Liberia is over,” WHO representative Dr. Alex Gasasira said at a press conference in the capital city of Monrovia on Saturday, reading his group’s statement.
The announcement comes 42 days after the last reported case of the virus. The standard for declaring a nation free of a virus is twice the cycle of infection which is 21 days for Ebola.
“Interruption of transmission is a monumental achievement for a country that reported the highest number of deaths in the largest, longest, and most complex outbreak since Ebola first emerged in 1976,” WHO said in the statement.
The peak of the virus was August and September 2014 where 300 to 400 cases were being confirmed each week.
“During those 2 months, the capital city Monrovia was the setting for some of the most tragic scenes from West Africa’s outbreak: gates locked at overflowing treatment centers, patients dying on the hospital grounds, and bodies that were sometimes not collected for days,” WHO said. “Flights were cancelled. Fuel and food ran low. Schools, businesses, borders, markets, and most health facilities were closed. Fear and uncertainty about the future, for families, communities, and the country and its economy, dominated the national mood.”
Officials with the WHO have previously admitted the death toll could be much higher than the official toll because of families that would bury their dead and not report relatives who succumbed to the virus.
The latest in footwear isn’t about style, but about longevity.
Inventor, Kenton Lee, has created a new shoe called Shoe That Grows, a shoe that can adjust its size as the wearer grows. The shoe can adjust both it’s length and width, giving it a size range from 5-12. It also lasts for at least five years.
The idea for the Shoe That Grows came to Lee when he noticed a small Kenyan girl with shoes that were too small.
According to the Shoe That Grows website, approximately 300 million children around the world are without shoes. They also state that 2 million people suffer from soil transmitted diseases.
The World Health Organization (WHO) reports that the most common infections are caused by different species of parasitic worms that live in the soil and affect the most deprived communities.
Because International, the company behind Shoe That Grows, is currently distributing the adjustable shoes around the world with the help of partner organizations.
A mysterious disease in Ondo State, Nigeria has left at least 18 people dead since April 13th.
Dr. Dayo Adeyanju, the state commissioner for health, told reporters that 18 people died and 5 others are being treated. Preliminary tests indicate the disease is not contagious according to Dr. Adeyanju.
The symptoms include headaches, blurred vision, blindness and unconsciousness. Victims die within 24 hours of showing symptoms.
Speculation centers on locally brewed alcohol or herbicide.
The World Health Organization (WHO) released numbers that conflicted with Dr. Adeyanju, stating that 13 people were killed in 18 total cases. The WHO said tests in Lagos ruled out viruses and bacteria.
WHO spokesman Dr. Tarik Jasarevic said that they would be conducting toxicological tests on one of the dead to try and determine the source.
Those infected have been quarantined at the General Hospital in Irele and the rest of the hospital has been cleared of patients.
A rare virus that causes intense joint pain and fever has struck a Hollywood actress.
Lindsay Lohan was confirmed by doctors to have contracted Chikungunya, a virus transmitted to humans through mosquitoes. The actress contracted the virus during a trip to French Polynesia.
“Being sick is no fun. But happy new year everyone. Be safe. Love all,” the actress said on Twitter after telling her followers to always use bug spray when you are outside to avoid mosquito borne illnesses.
The disease is gaining attention according to the World Health Organization because it is spreading from Asia, Africa and India to the rest of the world. The virus has been found in parts of Florida in recent years and officials are concerned it could spread in the U.S.
There have been over 4,000 cases of the virus in U.S. territories, mostly in Puerto Rico. The only state that is considered to have “locally acquired” cases is Florida. However, travel related cases have been reported in all states except Alaska, North Dakota, Montana and Wyoming.
The CDC says that most Americans and people in North and South America have no immunity to the virus because it is new to the Western Hemisphere.
Health officials fighting the outbreak of Ebola in Liberia have confirmed that a new wave of the virus has broken out near the Sierra Leone border.
Authorities say that dozens of new cases have been rushing into health centers and marks a huge setback to the nation, which had thought they were bringing the viral outbreak under control.
Assistant Health minister Tolbert Nyenswah said that the new cases could be connected to people traveling across the Sierra Leone border and returning home. Sierra Leone has passed Liberia for the total number of Ebola cases.
Liberia has reported close to 3,400 deaths from Ebola and over 8,000 cases. The World Health Organization says that Sierra Leone has now passed Liberia with 9,000 cases of the deadly virus.
Liberian officials did not say if they would take steps to block border crossings.
Officials in Sierra Leone were forced to admit a major Ebola outbreak went largely unreported to international health officials after the World Health Organization found dozens of Ebola victims’ bodies stacked in a pile at a hospital.
The WHO says a response team has been sent into the Kono district are a reported spike in Ebola cases.
“They uncovered a grim scene,” the U.N. health agency said in a statement. “In 11 days, two teams buried 87 bodies, including a nurse, an ambulance driver, and a janitor drafted into removing bodies as they piled up.”
The WHO team found that Ebola had hit 8 of the 15 chiefdoms in the area and it had not been reported to officials.
“We are only seeing the ears of the hippo,” Dr. Amara Jambai, Sierra Leone’s Director of Disease Prevention and Control told Fox News.
Sierra Leone has seen a significant rise in reported cases of Ebola and has overtaken neighbor Liberia for total number of cases. Liberia, however, has 1,400 more deaths listed in the official death toll.
However, Sierra Leone officials admitted they had only been counting deaths of patients with laboratory confirmed cases of Ebola, so many had died without being tested and confirmed to have the virus.
The long fight against the Ebola virus received very good news Tuesday when two African nations were declared free of the virus.
Nigeria and Senegal, who both combined had 20 cases of the virus and 7 deaths (all in Nigeria), have been free of any new cases for six weeks.
“This is a spectacular success story,” World Health Organization Representative Rui Gama Vaz told Reuters. “It shows that Ebola can be contained, but we must be clear that we have only won a battle, the war will only end when West Africa is also declared free of Ebola.”
The government of Nigeria was given praise considering the virus was discovered in Lagos, a city of 21 million where tracing contacts of residents can be almost impossible.
“Nigeria was not really prepared for the outbreak, but the swift response from the federal government, state governments (and) international organizations … was essential,” said Samuel Matoka, IFRC Ebola operations manager for Lagos. “The swiftness and fastness of the reaction from all parties, helped to contain Ebola in Nigeria.”
The World Health Organization says Nigeria could be a model for nations around the world in dealing with Ebola.
