BUNIA, Congo (AP) — Anxious healthcare workers in eastern Congo said Wednesday they are underprotected and undertrained in the face of a rapidly spreading outbreak of arare type of the Ebola virusin one of the world’s most remote and vulnerable places.
“It’s truly sad and painful because we’ve already been through a security crisis, and now Ebola is here too,” said Justin Ndasi, a resident of Bunia, site of the first known death that was announced last week after what experts call a worrying delay in detecting the virus.
The Ebola response unfolds in a region long threatened by armed groups that have kept a large part of the population on the run and control a major city where Ebola cases have been confirmed, further complicating health workers’ catch-up efforts to trace the outbreak. The World Health Organization, which said the outbreak posed a low risk globally, has said “patient zero” still has not been found.
In Bunia, where tons of health supplies have been airlifted, residents said masks have become harder to find and some disinfectants that previously sold for 2,500 Congolese francs (about $1) now cost up to 10,000 francs (over $4).
At a treatment center in Rwampara, healthcare workers in protective gear handled the bodies of suspected Ebola victims, in silence.
Families who tend to wash loved ones’ bodies themselves instead watched helplessly as workers disinfected them and placed them into coffins for secure burial sites. By the ambulances, some relatives burst into tears.
The disease struck suddenly, they said, and described a rapid deterioration after symptoms were mistaken for other illnesses such as malaria.
“He told me his heart was hurting, and I thought it was his stomach,” said Botwine Swanze, who lost her son. “Then he started crying because of the pain in his stomach. After that, he started vomiting. Then he started bleeding and vomiting a lot.”
The Ebola virus is highly contagious and spreads in the human population through contact with bodily fluids such as vomit, blood or semen. Symptoms include fever, vomiting, diarrhea, muscle pain and at times internal and external bleeding.
WHO has declared the Ebola outbreak apublic health emergencyof international concern, and expressed worry over its “scale and speed.” The agency’s head in Congo says the outbreak would last at least two months.
Source: Drudge Report
