Ebola Cases Double in Democratic Republic of Congo

The number of Ebola cases in the
Democratic Republic of Congo doubled over
the past week to 62, the World Health
Organization reported Thursday, and more
than half the afflicted patients have died.
The outbreak in the country, where the
Ebola virus was first discovered nearly 40
years ago, is a distinct strain from the far
more drastic Ebola crisis ravaging western
Africa, where more than 2,200 people have
died this year, the worst on record. The
Congo outbreak, by contrast, is confined to
four villages in one county, and all are
linked to one initial case, first reported to
the W.H.O. on Aug. 26.
Still, the doubling of Congo cases during the
week ending Tuesday, reported by the
W.H.O. in an update on its website,
reflected Ebola’s contagious risks. The virus,
which causes high fevers, vomiting, diarrhea
and internal bleeding, with a fatality rate as
high as 90 percent, is spread through person-
to-person contact.
Thirty-five of the Congo patients have died,
the W.H.O. said, including seven health care
workers. Isolation facilities have been
established in the four affected villages, the
W.H.O. said, and international experts
assisting local health officials have identified
386 people who may have been exposed.
In other Ebola-related news, the
International Monetary Fund said Thursday
that economic growth in Liberia and Sierra
Leone, two of the three West African
countries hit hardest by the outbreak, could
decline by as much as 3.5 percentage points
because of disruptions to the mining,
agriculture and service industries. Economic
growth in Guinea, the third worst-afflicted
country, where mining businesses have yet
to be affected, could fall by 1.5 percentage
points, the I.M.F. said.
In neighboring Nigeria, Africa’s most
populous country, where health officials
have confirmed 19 Ebola cases linked to a
visitor from Liberia two months ago, Reuters
reported that a South African woman in
transit at Lagos airport on her way home
from Morocco had been sent to a testing
center as a suspected Ebola patient. The
woman, who was not identified, had visited
Sierra Leone and Guinea and had
acknowledged having Ebola symptoms,
Reuters quoted Nigerian health officials as
saying.