Ebola ‘international emergency’ threat as virus crosses borders

HEALTH experts will meet tomorrow to decide whether to declare the Ebola epidemic in central Africa “a public health emergency of international concern”.

More than 2000 Ebola cases have been recorded since last August in the Democratic Republic of Congo, two thirds of them fatal.

The outbreak has now spread to Uganda, where a five-year-old boy died on Tuesday and two others are confirmed to have the deadly disease.

The World Health Organisation’s emergency committee has met twice, most recently in April, to consider declaring the outbreak an international emergency but decided not to. For the committee to make the emergency call, it must determine that the epidemic “carries implications for public health beyond the affected State’s national border and may require immediate international action,” said the WHO.

Following the death of the five-yearold in a Ugandan isolation unit late on Tuesday night, the country announced two more cases of Ebola yesterday – a grandmother and a three-year-old boy. The two new victims were the dead boy’s brother and grandmother, the Ugandan Health Ministry said.

His grandfather also recently died of Ebola.

“This epidemic is in a truly frightening phase and shows no sign of stopping,” said Jeremy Farrar, an infectious disease specialist and director of the Wellcome Trust, a global health charity.

“We can expect, and should plan for, more cases in DRC and neighbouring countries.

“There are now more deaths than any other Ebola outbreak in history, bar the West Africa epidemic of 201316, and there can be no doubt that the situation could escalate towards those terrible levels.”