Ebola epidemic out of control
The armed conflict in the East of the Democratic Republic of the Congo make the dangerous Ebola epidemic in the Region is hardly controllable. Because the affected province of Nord-Kivu into civil war region, many areas with Ebola patients for helper is not accessible, said the Wurzburg tropical medicine Christian Little of the aid organisation Doctors without borders (MSF).
“We see, therefore, always a new infection, not chains, that we know of, how they were formed,” says the 42-Year-old. He is currently the clinical Director of an MSF-a transit center for Ebola patients in the town of Beni in use.
A second severe outbreak of the story
According to the world health organization (WHO) is now the second-most severe Ebola outbreak in history. Since August, have infected, according to the authorities Friday around Beni, more than 426 people with Ebola, more than 245 people died as a result of the disease. The easily transmittable Ebola Virus is one of the most dangerous pathogens in the world.
In the case of an epidemic 2014/2015 died in West Africa, more than 11,000 people. Infected the Virus can be transmitted through body fluids such as blood, sweat or vomit. In North Kivu, 37,000 people have received according to the authorities, meanwhile, an experimental Ebola vaccine. According to the WHO, the risk that the epidemic could spread to neighboring countries – such as Uganda or Rwanda.
When the epidemic can be brought under control, to predict because of the security situation difficult to predict, says Small. The transit center is temporarily been on a football field built to relieve the Ebola treatment centres. “We started in mid-November with 16 beds, then 32, and now we currently have 48 beds,” says the doctor. The Doctors work under strict safeguards. “The Wearing of the suit is not unbearable in the blazing heat of the Congo for more than an hour,” says Small.
“Always sad”
One of the hardest moments of the work, if ill patients would have to be separated from their family members. “That’s always something to see sad again. But the Isolation of the patient is simply to avoid a further spread.”
In the raw material in the province of North-Kivu, it always comes to Fight, because there are several militias and rebel groups are active. Read more about it here. The groups tend to be about control over the natural resources. The Ebola outbreak is the tenth epidemic in the Central African Congo.
In the Video: Our fight against Ebola On the Front lines in West Africa (dbate 2014)
