Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf's
temperature being taken by a Chinese soldier
before the opening of a new Ebola virus
clinic
sponsored by China, in Monrovia, Liberia,
Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014 (pix: ibtimes)
The Ebola outbreak in Sierra
Leone, which has been surging in recent weeks, may have
reached its peak and could be on the verge of slowing down, Sierra Leone's
information minister said Wednesday.
But
in a reminder of how serious the situation is in Sierra Leone, a ninth doctor
became infected Wednesday and the World Health Organization said the country
accounted for more than half of the new cases in the hardest-hit countries in
the past week. By contrast, infections appear to be either stabilizing or
declining in Guinea and Liberia, where
vigorous campaigning for a Senate election this week suggests the disease might
be loosening its grip.
In all, 15,935 people have
been sickened with Ebola in West Africa and
other places it has occasionally popped up. Of those, 5,689 have died. The case
total includes 600 new cases in Guinea,
Liberia and Sierra Leone in
just the past week, according to the WHO.
