The countdown has once again begun in Sierra Leone. In 42 days, i.e. twice the maximum incubation period of the Ebola virus, the end of the epidemic will be declared in Sierra Leone if no new cases appear. The last known patient in the country, a 38-year-old woman, has just returned to her home, “officially cured” according to the health authorities.
The World Health Organization (WHO) had announced that Sierra Leone was free of the haemorrhagic fever virus last November. But in January, the country’s authorities announced the death of a student and a hundred people who may have been in contact with the virus have been placed in quarantine.
The last of the known patients, who was being treated at an Ebola treatment center in Freetown, was discharged from that center after testing negative twice.
The Ebola epidemic in West Africa, the most serious since the identification of the virus 40 years ago in Central Africa, has killed more than 11,300 people for some 28,000 cases, an underestimated assessment by the WHO’s own admission.
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