Ebola cases prompt mini-quarantine in Sierra Leone capital

Sierra Leone imposed a quarantine in a fishing district of the capital city, Freetown, after at least five new Ebola cases were confirmed there, an official said Saturday. The measure, imposed Friday, affects the coastal district of Aberdeen, which contains both upscale hotels and informal settlements, said OB Sisay, director of the Situation Room at the National Ebola Response Center. At least some of the new cases included fishermen who had gone out in a boat but returned complaining of stomach pains and were sent to a hospital for tests. A control center has been established in the area, and contact tracing and surveillance officers have been deployed, Sisay said.

We are very, very far from the end of the outbreak.

Iza Ciglenecki from Doctors Without Borders, speaking at a science conference

Sierra Leone has seen nearly 11,000 confirmed, probable and suspected Ebola cases during the worst Ebola outbreak in history, the most of any country, according to the World Health Organization. Despite a drop in cases, transmission in Sierra Leone remains widespread, with 76 new cases confirmed in the previous week, WHO said Wednesday . The need for a quarantine is further evidence that getting to zero cases will be “a bumpy ride,” Sisay said. Unlike other diseases, where doctors are satisfied to get infections down to a low rate, with Ebola the only way to stop it is to get the number of cases down to zero, said Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Ebola Africa