Ebola Virus cases continue to spread in Congo
Pastor Dale Morgan
*Ebola Virus cases continue to spread in Congo*
24 Sep 2007 14:19:12 GMT
Source: IRIN
KINSHASA, 24 September 2007 (IRIN) - Two cases of suspected Ebola
haemorrhagic fever have been reported in Kasai Oriental, the
neighbouring province to Kasai Occidental, where at least nine cases
have been confirmed, according to health officials.
"We received samples from two suspected cases in the village of Mwene
Ditu that have been sent to the laboratory in the United States," Benoit
Kebela, the secretary-general in the ministry of health, said. Mwene
Ditu is 100km south of Mbuji Mayi, the main town in the province.
"We are awaiting the diagnosis of the samples sent to the laboratory,"
Kebela said.
Kebela said the suspect cases were not directly related to the epidemic
that had affected hundreds of people in the village of Kampungu, in
Kasai Occidental. Kampungu and its environs have been quarantined by the
government to contain the outbreak.
Although figures released by various sources mention 375 cases and 167
deaths in western Kasai Province, the causes cannot be confirmed yet.
Only one case of Shigella, which causes dysentery, and fewer than 10 of
Ebola, have been confirmed, according to the UN World Health
Organisation (WHO).
"This is not the first time that we have had cases of fever associated
with bleeding which are not Ebola," Kebela said.
Typhoid fever is endemic in the Congo and manifests with bleeding just
like meningitis, which occurs in many parts in the country, Kebela said.
Five cases of typhoid fever were confirmed in Kampungu where
investigations for Ebola are ongoing.
The high number of suspect cases was attributable to panic not only in
Kasai Occidental but throughout the country, Kebela said.
So far, health teams from the WHO, the health ministry and other
organisations are working in the affected areas where they have set up
laboratories and isolation wards.
A team of Canadian health experts from Winnipeg also arrived in Kampungu
on 20 September to set up a mobile laboratory, according to a
spokesperson with the WHO, Christiana Salvi.
"The mobile laboratory will allow us to conduct diagnoses in two to six
hours to avoid confusion with other diseases such as Shigella or typhoid
which are also circulating at the same time [as Ebola] in the region,"
Salvi said.
Approximately 1,850 cases, with more than 1,200 deaths, have been
documented since the Ebola virus was first identified in the western
equatorial province of Sudan and in a nearby region of DRC in 1976,
after significant epidemics in Yambuku, northern DRC, and Nzara in
Southern Sudan.
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