The Ebola epidemic is like a frontline that is constantly advancing, the head of Doctors Without Borders said Friday.
Joanne Liu, international president of Doctors Without Borders, spoke to reporters in Geneva after spending 10 days on the ground in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, the three countries most affected by the outbreak.
"I really had the feeling that it is a wartime, in terms of fear," Liu said. The epidemic is moving and advancing without clues, she added.
On Thursday, the World Health Organization said that official counts, which stand at 1,069 deaths and 1,975 cases, may still "vastly underestimate the magnitude of the outbreak."
Liu called the lack of infrastructure in the West African countries struggling to contain the epidemic an "emergency within the emergency" because people don't have access to basic health care, which creates distrust.
A Liberian woman holds up a pamphlet with guidance on how to prevent the Ebola virus from spreading, in the city of Monrovia, Liberia. Liberia and the other West African countries struggling to contain the epidemic are vastly under-resourced. (Abbas Dulleh/Associated Press)
"My biggest concern is that we are exposing the medical staff over and over again," she said.
The flood of patients into every newly opened treatment centre is evidence that the official counts aren't keeping up, Gregory Hartl, a spokesman for the UN health agency, said from Geneva on Friday.
'My biggest concern is that we are exposing the medical staff over and over again.'- Joanne Liu, Doctors Without Borders
Hartl said that an 80-bed treatment centre opened in Liberia's capital in recent days filled up immediately. The next day, dozens more people showed up to be treated.
"Over the next six months we should get the upper hand on the epidemic, this is my gut feeling," Liu said.
Elsewhere on Friday, the International Olympic Committee and local organizers for the Youth Olympics starting in Nanjing, China on Saturday said three teenage athletes from the West African countries affected by Ebola won't be allowed to compete because of the infection risk.
Ebola can cause a high fever, bleeding and vomiting. Since there is no cure and no licensed treatment, doctors and nurses focus on providing supportive care, such as maintaining patients' blood pressure.
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