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The
deadly Ebola virus has killed 14 people in western Uganda this month, Ugandan
health officials said on Saturday, ending weeks of speculation about the cause
of a strange disease that had many people fleeing their homes.
The
officials and a World Health Organization representative told a news conference
in Kampala Saturday that there is “an outbreak of Ebola” in Uganda.
“Laboratory
investigations done at the Uganda Virus Research Institute...have confirmed
that the strange disease reported in Kibaale is indeed Ebola haemorrhagic
fever,” the Ugandan government and WHO said in joint statement.
Kibaale
is a district in mid-western Uganda, where people in recent weeks have been
troubled by a mysterious illness that seemed to have come from nowhere. Ugandan
health officials had been stumped as well, and spent weeks conducting
laboratory tests that were at first inconclusive.
On
Friday, Joaquim Saweka, the WHO representative in Uganda, told The Associated
Press that investigators were “not so sure” it was Ebola, and a Ugandan health
official dismissed the possibility of Ebola as merely a rumour. It appears firm
evidence of Ebola was clinched overnight.
Health
officials told reporters in Kampala that the 14 dead were among 20 reported
with the disease. Two of the infected have been isolated for examination by
researchers and health officials. A clinical officer and, days later, her
4-month-old baby died from the disease caused by the Ebola virus, officials
said.
The
officials urged Ugandans to be calm, saying a national emergency taskforce had
been set up to stop the disease from spreading far and wide.
There
is no cure or vaccine for Ebola, and in Uganda, where in 2000 the disease
killed 224 people and left hundreds more traumatized, it resurrects terrible
memories.
Ebola,
which manifests itself as a haemorrhagic fever, is highly infectious and kills
quickly. It was first reported in 1976 in Congo and is named for the river
where it was recognized, according to the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention.
Scientists
don’t know the natural reservoir of the virus, but they suspect the first
victim in an Ebola outbreak gets infected through contact with an infected
animal, such as a monkey.
The
virus can be transmitted in several ways, including through direct contact with
the blood of an infected person. During communal funerals, for example, when
the bereaved come into contact with an Ebola victim, the virus can be
contracted, officials said, warning against unnecessary contact with suspected
cases of Ebola.
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