West Africa Ebola Outbreak Continues To Spread, 'Situation Serious': WHO

First new Ebola cases have been recorded in Guinea's capital Conakry since more than a month, while other previously unaffected areas have also reported infections in the past week, according to the World Health Organization.

In a region already struggling with weak healthcare systems and porous borders, the spread of the two-month-old outbreak risks further complicating the fight against the virus, Reuters reported.

Guinean authorities had previously claimed to have contained the disease.

"The situation is serious, you can't say it is under control as cases are continuing and it is spreading geographically," Dr. Pierre Formenty, a WHO expert who recently returned from Guinea, told a news briefing in Geneva on Wednesday.

"There was no decline. In fact it is because we are not able to capture all the outbreak that we were under the impression there was a decline," he said.

Between May 25 and 27, two new cases, including one death, in Conakry were reported by the WHO, the first to be detected since April 26.

As the city is Guinea's international travel hub, an outbreak in the capital could pose the biggest threat of an epidemic.

"Telimele and Boffa - two districts north of Conakry that were previously untouched by the disease - both confirmed outbreaks through laboratory testing, the WHO said," according to Reuters. "Twelve cases, including four deaths, were reported there between May 23 and 26, while suspected Ebola infections were documented in the adjacent districts of Boke and Dubreka."

"Aboubacar Sidiki Diakité, who heads the Guinean government's efforts to halt the virus's spread, said the origins of all the new outbreaks had been traced back to cases in Conakry."

"The problem is that there are families that refuse to give information to health workers. They hid their sick to try to treat them through traditional methods," he told Reuters.

A total of 281 clinical cases of Ebola, including 185 deaths in Guinea since the virus was first identified as Ebola in March have been documented by the WHO.

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