The World Health Organisation has said the speed and extent of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa is \u201cunprecedented\u201d.<\/p>\n
The WHO\u2019s Dr Keiji Fukuda expressed concern over so-called \u201cshadow zones\u201d, areas which cannot be reached and where patients are not being detected.<\/p>\n
The organisation confirmed 142 new cases of the disease had been reported since August 19, as well as 77 deaths.<\/p>\n
Already more people have died in this outbreak of Ebola than in any other.<\/p>\n
At least 1,427 people have now died in the outbreak so far, with the number of cases now standing at 2,615.<\/p>\n
Speaking at a news conference in the Liberian capital Monrovia, Fukuda said combating the disease would take \u201cseveral months of hard work\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe haven\u2019t seen an Ebola outbreak covering towns, rural areas so quickly and over such a wide area,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Also on Friday, Nigerian authorities said that they had detected two new cases of the virus, both spouses of medical workers who had direct contact with a man who died from the virus in Nigeria after arriving from Liberia.<\/p>\n
In Liberia on Friday, a boy of 16 shot during a protest about a quarantine died.<\/p>\n
Shakie Kamara was one of three people seriously injured on Wednesday after security forces fired at protesters, angry after blockades were erected around the West Point slum.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Senegal has defended the closure of its border with Guinea because of the Ebola outbreak, despite warnings that such measures are counterproductive.<\/p>\n
The WHO says travel bans do not work, and that what is needed is more doctors and officials to help trace those infected with Ebola, and more mobile laboratories.<\/p>\n
Senegal also banned flights and ships from Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone \u2013 the three worst-hit countries \u2013 however, Senegal\u2019s Health Minister Dr Eva Marie Colle Seck said humanitarian flights would not be affected.<\/p>\n
Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Kenya and South Africa have also imposed travel bans.<\/p>\n
Ebola has no known cure but some affected people have recovered after being given an experimental drug, ZMapp. However, supplies are now exhausted.<\/p>\n
On Thursday, two US doctors were discharged from hospital after being given the drug, while three Liberian medics are also recovering well.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The World Health Organisation has said the speed and extent of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa is \u201cunprecedented\u201d. The WHO\u2019s Dr Keiji Fukuda expressed concern over so-called \u201cshadow zones\u201d, areas which cannot be reached and where patients are not being detected. The organisation confirmed 142 new cases of the disease had been reported since […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-743","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-international-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4oswh-bZ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/743","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=743"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/743\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":744,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/743\/revisions\/744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=743"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=743"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=743"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}