The news of the outbreak of Ebola fever in some countries in West Africa, including several parts of Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia has sent shock waves across the region, and reverberated in other parts of the world.
West African countries like Senegal have since closed their land borders to check inter-border spread of the disease.
With death tolls rising in the affected countries, Assistant Director-General of the World Health Organisation, Keiji Fukuda, recently described the outbreak as ‘one of the most challenging Ebola outbreaks’ the organisation has ever faced.