'Drastic action is needed' now to stop Ebola epidemic
The World Health Organization says "drastic action is needed" to stop the deadly Ebola virus outbreak in West Africa, CNN reported.
It has sent teams of experts to help locals deal with the epidemic and WHO plans to meet next week to discuss how to contain it.
Relief workers on the ground said the epidemic has hit unprecedented proportions.
"The epidemic is out of control," said Dr. Bart Janssens, director of operations for Doctors Without Borders.
There have been at least 600 cases and 360 deaths in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, according to a WHO statement released Thursday. That's since the epidemic began in March, according to the latest World Health Organization figures.
Complicating matters, these countries have major medical infrastructure challenges and there is a real sense of mistrust from communities there of the help that has been sent. In Sierra Leone and Guinea, WHO has said that community members have thrown stones at health care workers trying to investigate the outbreak.
In April, CNN Chief Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta traveled to Conakry, Guinea, to report on what was being done to treat patients and contain the outbreak.
"It took only moments to feel the impact of what was happening here," Gupta wrote after landing in Conakry. "There is a lot we know about Ebola, and it scares us almost as much as what we don't know."
Ebola outbreaks usually are confined to remote areas, making the disease easier to contain. But this outbreak is different; patients have been identified in 60 locations in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.