West African healthcare systems reel as Ebola toll hits 932
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A man washes his hands in a attempt to stop the spread of the deadly Ebola virus in the city of Monrovia, Liberia, Aug 6, 2014. [Photo/IC] |
TROOPS DEPLOYED IN OPERATION "WHITE SHIELD"
Spain's health ministry denied that one of the nuns - born in Equatorial Guinea but holding Spanish nationality - had tested positive for Ebola. The other nun is Congolese.
"We hope they can evacuate us. It would be marvellous, because we know that, if they take us to Spain, at least we will be in good hands," Pajares told CNN in Spanish this week.
More than 60 healthcare workers have died fighting the virus - a heavy blow in a region where doctors are already in chronically short supply. Two US health workers from Christian medical charity Samaritan's Purse caught the virus in Monrovia and are receiving treatment in an Atlanta hospital.
The two saw their conditions improve by varying degrees in Liberia after they received an experimental drug, a representative for the charity said. Three of the world's leading Ebola specialists urged the WHO to offer people in West Africa the chance to take experimental drugs.
A spokesman for the Liberian government said it would be willing to allow in-country clinical trials.
Highly contagious, Ebola kills more than half of the people who contract it. Victims suffer from fever, vomiting, diarrhoea and internal and external bleeding.
Many hospitals and clinics have been forced to close across Liberia, often because health workers are afraid of contracting the virus or because of abuse by locals who think the disease is a government conspiracy.
In an effort to control the disease's spread, Liberia has deployed the army to implement controls and isolate severely affected communities, an operation codenamed "White Shield".
The information ministry said on Wednesday that soldiers were being deployed to the rural counties of Lofa, Bong, Cape Mount and Bomi to set up checkpoints and implement tracing measures on residents suspected of contact with victims.
Neighbouring Sierra Leone said it has implemented new restrictions at the airport and that it was asking passengers to take a temperature test. In the east, soldiers set up roadblocks to limit access to affected areas, MSF's Lorenzi said.
Some major airlines, such as British Airways and Emirates, have halted flights to affected countries, while many expatriates are leaving, officials said. "We've seen international workers leaving the country in numbers," Liberia's Finance Minister Amara Konneh told Reuters.
Randgold Resources - which mines gold in neighbouring Mali and Ivory Coast - advised its workers not to travel to the affected countries.
India and Greece advised their citizens on Wednesday against non-essential travel to Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria and said they would take extra measures at entry ports.
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