According to Time.com, two new cases of the deadly Ebola virus have been recorded in Sierra Leone’s capital city of Freetown, just about three weeks after the most recent new cases were found.
This new development seems to have crushed virtually all hope of ridding the region of the disease. It is on record that the worst known Ebola epidemic in history killed more than 11,000 people in West Africa, about a third of them being Sierra Leoneans.
While Nigeria and Liberia have become Ebola-free, Liberia’s neighbours Sierra Leone and Guinea are still struggling to get to zero cases despite hundreds of millions of dollars in aid.
The two new cases in Freetown in the past few days, has disproved the assumptions that the capital city had already won the fight against the deadly virus, officials said on Monday, June 22.
Sidi Yahya Tunis, a spokesman for the National Ebola Response Centre (NERC) said:“This is worrisome because we had already closed all Ebola quarantine structures in Freetown since we had gone for weeks without a case.”
Tunis added that there were concerns about further infections, since the two cases reported were in Magazine, a densely populated slum lacking adequate hygiene facilities. The first case in Freetown since May 29, health officials say was a fisherman who caught the hemorrhagic fever from his girlfriend in the northern district of Port Loko.
Reports have it that shortly afterwards, a family member who lived in the same household also caught the virus. Health ministry data shows that the other six cases recorded in Sierra Leone over the past week were in the northern provinces of Port Loko and Kambia Sierra Leone is one of the three West African nations hit hardest during the outbreak, with mores than 13,000 cases experienced, and 3,900 deaths witnessed.
The struggle is still on in Guinea to hit zero cases. Liberia, at some point last year was leading all three in the highest number of cases, but in May was declared Ebola-free.
The three countries together have reported more than 27, 350 cases and 11, 170 deaths.
However, overall infections are on the decline, with fewer than 25 cases in Ebola treatment units last week.For three weeks, Sierra Leone did not see a single case of Ebola, these new cases seem to be stirring the still waters of not just Sierra Leone but indeed the entire West African state. Other countries that share border with Sierra Leone are beginning to beef up security and increase the alert level as to the emergence of the disease.
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