Ebola kills top Liberian doctor, American infected
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| In this 2014 photo provided by the Samaritan's Purse aid organization, Dr. Kent Brantly, left, treats an Ebola patient at the Samaritan's Purse Ebola Case Management Center in Monrovia, Liberia. On Saturday, July 26, 2014, the North Carolina-based aid organization said Brantly tested positive for the disease and was being treated at a hospital in Monrovia. |
MONROVIA, Liberia
(AP) -- One of Liberia's most high-profile doctors has died of
Ebola, officials said Sunday, and an American physician was being
treated for the deadly virus, highlighting the risks facing health
workers trying to combat an outbreak that has killed more than 670
people in West Africa - the largest ever recorded.
Dr.
Samuel Brisbane was treating Ebola patients at the country's largest
hospital, the John F. Kennedy Memorial Medical Center in Monrovia, when
he fell ill. He died Saturday, said Tolbert Nyenswah, an assistant
health minister. A Ugandan doctor died earlier this month.
The
American, 33-year-old Dr. Kent Brantly, was in Liberia helping to
respond to the outbreak that has killed 129 people nationwide when he
fell ill, according to the North Carolina-based medical charity,
Samaritan's Purse.
He was receiving intensive
medical care in a Monrovia hospital and was in stable condition,
according to a spokeswoman for the aid group, Melissa Strickland.
"We are hopeful, but he is certainly not out of the woods yet," she said.
Early
treatment improves a patient's chances of survival, and Strickland said
Brantly recognized his own symptoms and began receiving care
immediately.
There is no known cure for the
highly contagious virus, which is one of the world's deadliest. At least
1,201 people have been infected in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea,
according to the World Health Organization, and 672 have died. Besides
the Liberian fatalities, 319 people have died in Guinea and 224 in
Sierra Leone.
Ominously, Nigerian authorities
said Friday that a Liberian man died of Ebola after flying from Monrovia
to Lagos via Lome, Togo. The case underscored the difficulty of
preventing Ebola victims from traveling given weak screening systems and
the fact that the initial symptoms of the disease - including fever and
sore throat - resemble many other illnesses.
Health workers are among those at greatest risk of contracting the disease, which spreads through contact with bodily fluids.
Photos
of Brantly working in Liberia show him swathed head-to-toe in white
protective coveralls, gloves and a head-and-face mask that he wore for
hours a day while treating Ebola patients.
Earlier
this year, the American was quoted in a posting about the dangers
facing health workers trying to contain the disease. "In past Ebola
outbreaks, many of the casualties have been health care workers who
contracted the disease through their work caring for infected
individuals," he said.
There is no known cure
for Ebola, which begins with symptoms including fever and sore throat
and escalates to vomiting, diarrhea and internal and external bleeding.
The
WHO says the disease is not contagious until a person begins to show
symptoms. Brantly's wife and children had been living with him in
Liberia but flew home to the U.S. about a week ago, before the doctor
started showing any signs of illness, Strickland said.
"They have absolutely shown no symptoms," she said.
A
woman who identified herself as Brantly's mother said the family was
declining immediate comment when reached by phone in Indiana.
Besides
Brantly and the two doctors in Liberia, Sierra Leone's top Ebola doctor
and a doctor in Liberia's central Bong County have also fallen ill.
The situation "is getting more and more scary," said Nyenswah, the country's assistant health minister.
Meanwhile,
the fact that a sick Liberian could board a flight to Nigeria raised
new fears that other passengers could take the disease beyond Africa.
Nigeria's
international airports were screening passengers arriving from foreign
countries, and health officials were also working with ports and land
borders to raise awareness of the disease. Togo's government also said
it was on high alert.
Security analysts were skeptical about the usefulness of these measures.
"In
Nigeria's case, the security set-up is currently bad, so I doubt it
will help or have the minimum effectiveness they are hoping for," said
Yan St. Pierre, CEO of the Berlin-based security consulting firm
MOSECON.
An outbreak in Lagos, a megacity where many lived in cramped conditions, could be a major public health disaster.
The
West Africa outbreak is believed to have begun as far back as January
in southeast Guinea, though the first cases weren't confirmed until
March.
Since then, officials have tried to
contain the disease by isolating victims and educating populations on
how to avoid transmission, though porous borders and widespread distrust
of health workers have made the outbreak difficult to bring under
control.
News of Brisbane's death first began circulating on Saturday, a national holiday marking Liberia's independence in 1847.
President
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf used her Independence Day address to discuss a
new taskforce to combat Ebola. Information Minister Lewis Brown said the
taskforce would go "from community to community, from village to
village, from town to town" to try to increase awareness.
In
Sierra Leone, which has recorded the highest number of new cases in
recent days, the first case originating in Freetown, the capital, came
when a hairdresser, Saudata Koroma, fell ill. She was forcibly removed
from a government hospital by her family, sparking a frantic search that
ended Friday. Kargbo, the chief medical officer, said Sunday that
Koroma died while being transported to a treatment center in the east of
the country.
