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Thursday, January 31, 2019, 10:08
UN: DRC Ebola outbreak second worst since W Africa epidemic
By Xinhua
Thursday, January 31, 2019, 10:08 By Xinhua

Health workers carry out the body of a patient with unconfirmed Ebola virus on Aug 22, 2018 in Mangina, near Beni, in the North Kivu province, Democratic Republic of Congo. (JOHN WESSELS / AFP)

UNITED NATIONS — The Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) now has the second largest number of such cases in history, after the 2014-2016 West Africa Ebola epidemic, Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for the UN chief, said on Wednesday.

Congo's Ebola epidemic was first reported in the latest outbreak in North Kivu and has been spreading southward into DRC conflict areas

The current epidemic already has claimed 461 lives out of the 689 confirmed and 54 probable cases, the Word Health Organization (WHO) said.

The highly contagious hemorrhagic disease was first reported in the latest outbreak in North Kivu and has been spreading southward into DRC conflict areas, confounding efforts of health workers already facing pockets of mistrust in the region, Dujarric reported.

ALSO READ: UN: Ebola spreading into 'high security risk area' of Congo

In the West Africa epidemic, the first case was reported in December 2013 in Guinea. From there the disease spread initially to neighboring Liberia and Sierra Leone then eventually to Italy, Mali, Nigeria, Senegal, Spain, Britain and the United States. 

The epidemic ended in June 2016 with a total of 28,616 cases, including 11,310 deaths, according to the WHO.

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