Ebola can infect 20,000 people, warns WHO

The Ebola outbreak in West Africa could infect more than 20,000 people, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said while giving a bleak assessment of the disease.

While issuing a strategic plan to combat the disease in Africa, the WHO called for a massive and co-ordinated international response. It said that the outbreak that began in Guinea in March and spread to Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria may have claimed more lives than the reported 3,069. The actual number may be two to four times higher than the ones that have been registered, it said.

The United Nations agency also called for adapting the response activities in areas of intense transmission and said that special attention must be given to stopping transmission in capital cities and ports.

The WHO said that the virus is still spreading in a large number of localities and has claimed the lives of several health workers.

An elaborate UN-led plan will be launched at the end of September, the report said. The plan will underpin support for the problems linked to food security, protection, water, sanitation and hygiene, primary and secondary health care and education, as well as the longer-term recovery effort that will be required later on.

The Ebola virus has killed 1,552 people so far.