UN: Deadline to curb Ebola will not be met

The UN Ebola Emergency Response Mission which set a December 1, deadline to contain the virus says the target will not be fully met due to escalating numbers of cases in Sierra Leone and elsewhere.

The mission set the goal in September, seeking to have 70 percent of Ebola patients under treatment and 70 percent of Ebola victims safely buried.

The Head of UNMEER, Anthony Banbury, however says that target will be achieved in some areas, citing progress in Liberia.

Mr Banbury said the areas of greatest concern are in rural parts of Sierra Leone, the city of Makeni in the centre of the country and Port Loko in the northwest.

He said, surveillance to prevent further cross-border spread of the disease must be improved, given the transmission of the disease overland from Guinea into Mali, where at least six people have now died.

The WHO says the death toll in the worst Ebola epidemic on record has risen to 5,459 out of 15,351 cases identified in eight countries by November 18. 

ALJAZEERA