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The Ebola outbreak in Democratic Republic of Congo could end up as disastrous in the West Africa epidemic of 2014, an expert has warned.
If they were killed in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea five years ago, he said.
Although the death toll in DRC has not yet hit 1,000 – it was 984 on Wednesday – the ongoing violence in the region.
Last Sunday, April 28, was the most devastating of the outbreak so far, with a record 27 cases diagnosed in a single day.
Dr. Osman Dar, a global health expert at Chatham House and member of the Royal College of Physicians Edinburgh and Public Health England, warned the situation must change.
He told MailOnline a lack of security where the outbreak is the 'key issue' facing the organizations trying to stop it.
A total of 931 people died during the Ebola outbreak in Democratic Republic of Congo since it began in August. It has killed 65 per cent of the 1,439 who have been infected
Health workers in the city of Butembo, in the epicenter of the Ebola outbreak, last week after attackers shot dead a World Health Organization doctor working in the region. The workers have been attacked indefinitely if their safety is not improved
"I do not think it's going to turn into what we saw in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone but we could end up seeing the same number of deaths," said Dr. Dar told MailOnline.
We need to mbadively ramp up efforts to improve the safety of health workers.
'At the moment they're quite confident they have [the outbreak] It is better, but it goes on, the greater chance there is of it spreading to a major urban setting or across a border.
The 2014 outbreak in West Africa began when an 18-month-old boy in Guinea got infected by a bat in December 2013, and the disease quickly spread to neighboring countries.
By the time the World Health Organization released its first situation in August 2014, more than 3,000 people had been infected and 1.546 killed.
A year later the number of cases had rocketed to 28,073 and 11,290 people had died.
Dr Osman Dar, a global health expert at the Chatham House think tank, said it could not be better in the region
Dr. Dar said the UN, African Union and the British and US militaries should be thinking about ways to make the DRC safer for medical staff.
A World Health Organization (WHO) doctor in the North Kivu province was shot dead this month and 11 people have since been arrested in connection with the killing.
Dr. Richard Mouzoko Kiboung's death is the latest and worst victims of Ebola patients.
Distrust of politicians and outsiders and rumors Ebola is a fake disease invented by a corrupt government in the poverty-hit nation.
In November, 16 WHO workers were evacuated from a hotel in Beni after it was hit by a bomb which did not explode in a militia attack.
And political protestors – a controversial presidential election over Christmas – have attacked camps and set up infected patients loose.
There are already a peacekeepers working alongside Congolese police and military in the area, but Dr. Dar suggests more forces may be needed.
The DRC's new president, Felix Tshisekedi (pictured in stripes), said he wants the Ebola outbreak, which began in August, to end in the next three months
WHO WARNS IT MAY RUN OUTSIDE MONEY TO FIGHT EBOLA OUTBREAK
The World Health Organization's director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, has been warned of a $ 104million (£ 80m) it needs to keep fighting Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The funding gap must be filled with health workers can continue battling the virus to the end of July and beyond, Science reported.
'We can not intensify our efforts if we do not have enough funds,' said Dr. Tedros.
'The current funding gap has meant that we have had to slow down preparedness activities in neighboring countries.'
The UK's International Development Secretary, Penny Mordaunt, echoeed Tedros's sentiment and said other countries need to step up and contribute more.
She said this month: 'The UK has been a major donor since the start. But this outbreak requires a global response if we're to stop this threat.
'It's time for other countries to step up. Diseases like this one does not respect borders and it's all in your interests to help contain the spread of Ebola. '
The UK Government has failed to disclose how much it is contributing to the effort.
The country's new president, Felix Tshisekedi, said in April he wants to see the Ebola outbreak in the next three months.
'It's theoretically possible to end the outbreak in three months,' Dr. Dar said. It could not have been unstable.
'But in the absence of security, it is difficult and this is an ongoing problem.
'The international community needs to make an effort to stabilize the security situation for response teams to work safely.'
There are currently WHO and Medecins sans Frontieres officials working alongside Congolese health workers in the north-east of DRC, close to its borders with Uganda, South Sudan and Rwanda.
Dr Dar said is already starting to happen. But there is a real risk.
Dozens of medical staff marched in the city of Butembo last week to appeal for better security – and have it attacked indefinitely.
Dr. Kalima Nzanzu, a medic on the frontline, said: 'If our security is not guaranteed, we will go on strike on the first week of May.'
The outbreak, which quickly became the second largest in the world, had 1,495 people, killing 65 percent of them.
Efforts to control the illness
In a world-first scientific study, four therapeutic drugs are being trialled in patients in the hope of curing them.
Armed police take cover behind a hospital sign Butembo after militia members attacked an Ebola treatment center and killed a World Health Organization doctor the night before
Dr. Richard Mouzoko Kiboung, a doctor from Cameroon working for the World Health Organization in DR Congo, was killed by armed militia last week
And approximately 100,000 people have been shown to be around 97.5 per cent effective.
This may have reduced the potential field of victims by up to 70 percent, researchers revealed.
But Dr. Dar said the United Nations, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and the African Union must work to make the area safe.
But he admitted to the presence of foreigners is already distressing local people, and moving soldiers to the area could this effect.
He added: 'This needs to be sensitively approached with political awareness. It needs to be done carefully but it does not need to be done.
'[The organisations involved] need to come back and say the answer is not adequate and it is not working.
'Otherwise this outbreak will keep rolling on and it's going to end in disaster.'
WHAT IS EBOLA AND HOW DEADLY IS IT?
Ebola, a haemorrhagic fever, killed at least 11,000 across the world after it decimated West Africa and spread rapidly over the space of two years.
That epidemic was officially declared in January 2016, when Liberia was announced to be Ebola-free by the WHO.
The country, rocked by back-to-back civil wars that ended in 2003, was hit the hardest by the fever, with 40 percent of the deaths having occurred there.
Sierra Leone reported the highest number of Ebola cases, with nearly all of them infected with residents of the nation.
WHERE DID IT BEGIN?
An badysis, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, founding the outbreak in Guinea – which neighbors Liberia and Sierra Leone.
A team of international researchers were able to trace the epidemic back to a two-year-old boy in Meliandou – about 400 miles (650km) from the capital, Conakry.
Emile Ouamouno, known as Patient Zero, may have contracted the deadly virus by playing with a hollow tree, a study suggested.
HOW MANY PEOPLE WERE STRUCK DOWN?
| COUNTRY | CASES | DEATHS | DEATH RATE (%) |
|---|---|---|---|
| GUINEA | 3,814 | 2,544 | 66.7% |
| SIERRA LEONE | 14.124 | 3,956 | 28.0% |
| LIBERIA | 10,678 | 4,810 | 45.0% |
| NIGERIA | 20 | 8 | 40.0% |
| SENEGAL | 1 | 0 | N / A |
| SPAIN | 1 | 0 | N / A |
| US | 4 | 1 | 25.0% |
| MALI | 8 | 6 | 75.0% |
| UK | 1 | 0 | N / A |
| ITALY | 1 | 0 | N / A |
Figures show nearly 29,000 people were infected with Ebola – meaning the virus killed around 40 percent of those it struck.
Cases and deaths were also reported in Nigeria, Mali and the US – but on a much smaller scale, with 15 fatalities between the three nations.
Health officials in Guinea reported a mysterious bug in the south-eastern regions of the world before the WHO confirmed it was Ebola.
Ebola was first identified by scientists in 1976, but the most recent outbreak was recorded.
HOW DID HUMANS CONTRACT THE VIRUS?
Scientists believe Ebola is most often pbaded to humans by fruit bats, but antelope, porcupines, gorillas and chimpanzees could also be blame.
It has been transmitted between humans through blood, secretions and other bodily fluids of people – and surfaces – that have been infected.
IS THERE AT TREATMENT?
There is no evidence for the treatment of Ebola – but dozens of drugs and drugs are being tested in a similarly devastating outbreak.
Hope exists though, after an experimental vaccine, called rVSV-ZEBOV, protected nearly 6,000 people. The results were published in The Lancet Journal.
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