Liberia's Ebola Problem Worse Than Imagination - WHO

The World Health Organization (WHO) has released report that is related to the Ebola virus outbreak in Liberia which is on the increasing side.

The full statement read thus:

Situation in Liberia: non-conventional interventions needed

During the past weeks, the WHO team of emergency experts worked together with President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and members of her government to assess the Ebola situation in the country.

Transmission of the Ebola virus in Liberia is already intense and the number of new cases is numerous.

The investigative team worked alongside staff from the Ministry of Health, local health officials, and other key partners working in the country.

All agreed that the demands of the Ebola outbreak have completely outstripped the government’s and partners’ capacity to respond.

Fourteen of Liberia’s 15 counties have now reported confirmed cases. Some 152 health care workers have been infected and 79 have died.

When the outbreak began, Liberia had only one doctor to treat nearly 100,000 people in a total population of 4.4 million people. Every infection or death of a doctor or nurse depletes response capacity significantly.

Liberia, together with the other hard-hit countries, namely Guinea and Sierra Leone, is experiencing a phenomenon never before seen in any previous Ebola outbreak.

As soon as a new Ebola treatment facility is opened, it immediately fills to overflowing with patients, pointing to a large but previously invisible caseload.

Of all Ebola-affected countries, Liberia has the highest cumulative number of reported cases and deaths, amounting, on 8 September, to nearly two thousand cases and more than one thousand deaths. The case-fatality rate, at 58%, is also among the highest.

Situation in Montserrado county

The WHO investigation concentrated on Montserrado county, which includes Liberia’s capital, Monrovia. The county is home to more than one million people.

The teeming West Point slum, which has no sanitation, little running water, and virtually no electrical supplies, is also located in Monrovia, and is adjacent to the city’s major market district.

In Montserrado county, the team estimated that 1000 beds are urgently needed for the treatment of currently infected Ebola patients.

At present only 240 beds are available, with an additional 260 beds either planned or in the process of being put in place.

These estimates mean that only half of the urgent and immediate capacity needs could be met within the next few weeks and months.

The number of new cases is moving far faster than the capacity to manage them in Ebola-specific treatment centres.

For example, an Ebola treatment facility, hastily improvised by WHO for the Ministry of Health, was recently set up to manage 30 patients but had more than 70 patients as soon as it opened.

WHO estimates that 200 to 250 medical staff are needed to safely manage an Ebola treatment facility with 70 beds.

The investigation team viewed conditions in general-purpose health facilities as well as Ebola-specific transit and treatment facilities.

The John F Kennedy Medical Center in Monrovia, which was largely destroyed during Liberia’s civil war, remains the country’s only academic referral hospital.

The hospital is plagued by electrical fires and floods, and several medical staff were infected there and died, depleting the hospital’s limited workforce further.

The fact that early symptoms of Ebola virus disease mimic those of many other common infectious diseases increases the likelihood that Ebola patients will be treated in the same ward as patients suffering from other infections, putting cases and medical staff alike at very high risk of exposure.

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