HEALTH-EBOLA/WORLD BANK UN, World Bank, WHO urge 'vigilance' despite gains in fight to stop Ebola

Record ID: 565679

  • Title: HEALTH-EBOLA/WORLD BANK UN, World Bank, WHO urge 'vigilance' despite gains in fight to stop Ebola
  • Date: 21st November 2014
  • Summary: WASHINGTON, D.C., UNITED STATES (NOVEMBER 21, 2014) (REUTERS) UNITED NATIONS SECRETARY-GENERAL BAN KI-MOON AT WORLD BANK PODIUM SURROUNDED BY OFFICIALS INCLUDING WORLD BANK PRESIDENT JIM YONG KIM (SOUNDBITE) (English) UNITED NATIONS SECRETARY-GENERAL BAN KI-MOON, SAYING: "Results to date are uneven. The rate of transmission continues to increase in many places. We need more international responders, trained medical teams and volunteer health workers, especially in remote districts. And we need to avoid travel bans, discrimination against health workers and other steps that would isolate countries when they need help most." REPORTERS LISTENING TO NEWS CONFERENCE (SOUNDBITE) (English) WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION DIRECTOR-GENERAL MARGARET CHAN, SAYING: "Yes we are seeing some early signals of hope, cases are stabilizing, but as Mr. Secretary-General was saying, we are also seeing some new areas where they are reporting new cases. So the answer is we must maintain our vigilance, complacency would be our enemy and in order to get it to zero, we have been successful in bending the curve a bit, but we need to continue, to do more, to get to zero." OFFICIALS LEAVING NEWS CONFERENCE
  • Embargoed: 6th December 2014 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA50XH79J41BMMIUX2TKK1E9WQN
  • Story Text: Top global officials, including United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim and World Health Organization Director-General Margaret Chan gathered in Washington on Friday (November 21) to discuss the fight against the spread of Ebola.
    As of Friday, the death toll in the Ebola epidemic had risen to 5,459 out of 15,351 cases identified in eight countries, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
    Some of the hardest hit countries have begun to show signs of progress. Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, for one, said she would not seek to extend a state of emergency imposed in August over Ebola, which has hit her country harder than any other.
    But the fight is far from over, the officials said during a news conference at the World Bank.
    "Results to date are uneven. The rate of transmission continues to increase in many places. We need more international responders, trained medicals teams and volunteer health workers, especially in remote districts. And we need to avoid travel bans, discrimination against health workers and other steps that would isolate countries when they need help most," Ban said.
    The WHO said on Friday that transmission "remains intense" in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, which have been the three hardest-hit West African countries that account for all but 15 of the deaths.
    "Yes we are seeing some early signals of hope, cases are stabilizing, but as Mr. Secretary-General was saying, we are also seeing some new areas where they are reporting new cases. So the answer is we must maintain our vigilance, complacency would be our enemy and in order to get it to zero, we have been successful in bending the curve a bit, but we need to continue, to do more, to get to zero," WHO Director-General Margaret Chan said.
    Earlier on Friday, the WHO said a separate outbreak of Ebola in Democratic Republic of Congo was over after no people showed symptoms for two incubation periods since the last case. In all, there were 49 deaths out of 66 people infected in the remote northwestern Equateur province.

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