An illness that has killed more than 160 people in southeastern the Democratic Republic of the Congo has been confirmed as Ebola, a highly contagious fever that kills up to 90 percent of people infected and has no cure or treatment.
The United States' Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta and another lab in Gabon confirmed the disease as a hemorrhagic fever, and specifically as Ebola, Health Minister Makwenge Kaput said on national television on Monday. He did not provide further details.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), five samples have tested positive for Ebola. About 40 more samples are still pending.
At least 167 people have died in the affected region since late August and nearly 400 have fallen ill, said Jean-Constatin Kanow, the chief medical inspector for the affected province. Kinshasa, the capital, is 690 km northwest of the area.
Some of the patients have improved after being given antibiotics, which would have no impact on Ebola, WHO experts said. The experts said that led them to suspect that shigella, a diarrhea-like disease, or typhoid has broken out in the same area. Symptoms for the three diseases are similar in early stages. In severe cases of shigella and typhoid, hemorrhaging can also occur.
In the Congolese hospital where patients were being treated - a mud hut with a corrogated roof - patients are not being isolated. That means that patients who have shigella, which is not usually a fatal disease, might be mixed with those who have Ebola, putting them at risk at catching the highly fatal fever.
"There's no way we can be sure at this time how many cases are shigella and how many cases are Ebola," said Gregory Hartl, a WHO spokesman.
Yesterday, WHO issued an alert to its international partners, requesting more doctors and other experts, to travel to the Congo to help contain the outbreak. Experts from Medecins Sans Frontieres are already treating patients, but more help is needed.
Ebola is spread through direct contact with the blood or secretions of an infected person, or objects that have been contaminated with infected secretions. It is not known where the initial infection came from, though medical researchers say it is likely from contact with an infected animal.
In the past, Congo has seen large outbreaks of Marburg and Ebola, both hemorrhagic fevers caused by viruses that, in severe cases, attack the central nervous system and cause bleeding from the eyes, ears and other parts of the body. By the end of August, four villages had been affected and 217 people had come down with the illness, including 103 who died. About 140,000 people live in the Mweka area.
Congo's last major Ebola outbreak struck in Kikwit in 1995, killing 245 people. Kikwit is about 300 km from the site of the current outbreak.
Source: China Daily/agencies
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