DAKAR, Senegal (AP) — The Ebola
outbreak ravaging West Africa is "totally out of control," according to a
senior official for Doctors Without Borders, who says the medical group
is stretched to the limit in responding.
The outbreak
has caused more deaths than any other of the disease, said another
official with the medical charity. Ebola has been linked to more than
330 deaths in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, according to the World
Health Organization.
International
organizations and the governments involved need to send in more health
experts and increase public education messages about how to stop the
spread of the disease, Bart Janssens, the director of operations for the
medical group in Brussels, told The Associated Press on Friday.
"The reality is clear that the epidemic is now in a second wave," Janssens said. "And, for me, it is totally out of control."
The
Ebola virus, which causes internal bleeding and organ failure, spreads
through direct contact with infected people. There is no cure or
vaccine, so containing an outbreak focuses on supportive care for the
ill and isolating them to limit the spread of the virus.
The
current outbreak, which began in Guinea either late last year or early
this year, had appeared to slow before picking up pace again in recent
weeks, including spreading to the Liberian capital for the first time.
"This is the highest
outbreak on record and has the highest number of deaths, so this is
unprecedented so far," said Armand Sprecher, a public health specialist
with Doctors Without Borders.
According to the WHO, the highest
previous death toll was in the first recorded Ebola outbreak in Congo in
1976, when 280 deaths were reported. Because Ebola often touches remote
areas and the first cases sometimes go unrecognized, it is likely that
there are deaths that go uncounted during outbreaks.
The
multiple locations of the current outbreak and its movement across
borders make it one of the "most challenging Ebola outbreaks ever,"
Fadela Chaib, a spokeswoman for the World Health Organization, said
earlier in the week.
But
Janssens' description of the Ebola outbreak was even more alarming, and
he warned that the countries involved had not recognized the gravity of
the situation. He criticized WHO for not doing enough to prod local
leaders; the U.N. health agency did not immediately respond to requests
for comment.
"There needs to
be a real political commitment that this is a very big emergency," he
said. "Otherwise, it will continue to spread, and for sure it will
spread to more countries."
But
Tolbert Nyenswah, Liberia's deputy minister of health, said the highest
levels of government are working to contain the outbreak, noting that
Liberia had a long period with no new cases before this second wave.
Governments
and international agencies are definitely struggling to keep up with
the outbreak, said Unni Krishnan of Plan International, which is
providing equipment to the three countries. But he noted that the
disease is striking in one of the world's poorest regions, where public
health systems are already fragile.
With
more than 40 international staff currently on the ground and four
treatment centers, Doctors Without Borders has reached its limit to
respond, Janssens said. It is unclear, for instance, if the group will
be able to set up a treatment center in Liberia, like the ones it is
running in in Guinea and Sierra Leone, he said.
Janssens
said the only way to stop the disease's spread is to persuade people to
come forward when symptoms occur and to avoid touching the sick and
dead.
He said this outbreak
is particularly challenging because it began in an area where people are
very mobile and has spread to even more densely populated areas, like
the capitals of Guinea and Liberia. The disease typically strikes
sparsely populated areas in central or eastern Africa, where it spreads
less easily, he said.
By contrast, the epicenter of this outbreak is near a major regional transport hub, the Guinean city of Gueckedou. http://news.yahoo.com/doctors-without-borders-ebola-control-133729407.html
