Sierra Leone declares a public emergency over Ebola - Doctors say the virus is 'absolutely out of control'

• Doctors Without Borders says West Africa not ready to handle Ebola
• Airports and airlines placed on high alert to prevent disease reaching UKAnyone who slips through will be held in highly secure hospital units
• Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond declares outbreak 'a very serious threat'
• Some experts predict 30,000 people could become infected in west Africa

By Lizzie Parry and Emma Glanfield and Mario Ledwith

Sierra Leone today declared a public health emergency to tackle the worst-ever outbreak of Ebola and will call in security forces to quarantine areas of the deadly virus.

President Ernest Bai Koroma said the measures resembled a tough anti-Ebola package announced by neighbouring Liberia last night.

Koroma also announced he was cancelling a visit to Washington for a U.S.-Africa summit next week because of the crisis.

The move came as world's premier health charity issued a grave warning about the likely spread of the deadly Ebola virus - an epidemic it fears 'can only get worse'.

Doctors Without Borders (aka Médecins Sans Frontières [MSF]) says the threat of the disease spreading beyond western Africa, where it was first detected in Guinea in February, is frighteningly real and said it was 'absolutely out of control'.

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Crisis: A Médecins Sans Frontières medic treats a suspected Ebola patient in Kailahun, Sierra Leone, where a public health emergency has been declared in an effort to stop the spread of the disease

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On high alert: The president of Sierra Leone said the police and military would restrict movements to and from epicentres and provide support to health workers to do their work unhindered

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The latest outbreak of Ebola is the most severe since the disease was discovered in 1976. So far the disease has spread from a village in Guinea to Sierra Leone, Liberia and Nigeria

 

The UN World Health Organization (WHO) said that 1,201 Ebola cases had been reported in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

Of the 672 deaths, the highest number was in Guinea with 319, followed by Sierra Leone with 224 and Liberia with 129, it added.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2711325/Weve-never-known-epidemic-Its-absolutely-control-Grave-fears-spread-Ebola-virus-Doctors-Without-Borders-admits-things-worse.html#ixzz3970OfChc