Deadly Ebola Virus Kills More Than 50 In Guinea

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This picture taken on March 9, 2003 shows International Red Cross workers spraying disinfectant around the Intensive Care room at Kelle hospital, northwestern Congo, where an Ebola fever infected patient lies. An Ebola epidemic which has already killed dozens of people in Guinea's southern forests has spread to the capital Conakry.

An outbreak of the Ebola virus – which has already killed 59 people in Guinea – has reached the capital Conakry, the UN’s children agency has warned.Unicef said the haemorrhagic fever had spread quickly from southern Guinea, hundreds of kilometres away. Scores of cases have been recorded since the outbreak began last month. There is no known cure or vaccine. It is spread by close personal contact with people who are infected and kills between 25% and 90% of victims.

Symptoms include internal and external bleeding, diarrhoea and vomiting.

A Health Ministry statement on Saturday said 80 cases including 59 deaths had been reported, most of them in three southern prefectures near Sierra Leone and Liberia. Three cases, including two deaths, were reported in Conakry, the capital, according to the statement. A team including the health minister had been dispatched to the region, Mr Camara said, and Doctors Without Borders had set up an isolation unit in Gueckedou to try to stop the disease from spreading.