EBOLA DEATH TOLL EXCEEDS 5,000, FATALITY RATE AT 48.6 PERCENT

PRETORIA, OCTOBER 31 /SRNA/ - The number of confirmed Ebola deaths in the Democratic Republic of the Congo /DR Congo/ has exceeded 5,000, with more than 10,350 confirmed cases in total, the Ministry of Public Health, Hygiene and Social Welfare announced.

The statement said that since the start of the outbreak in DR Congo, a total of 10,351 confirmed cases and 5,026 deaths had been recorded, representing a fatality rate of 48.6 percent.

The current Ebola outbreak began on May 15 in DR Congo and Uganda. Ugandan authorities announced on July 28 that the outbreak in the country had ended.

The World Health Organization confirmed this on August 25. In neighboring Kenya, the first case of Ebola was confirmed on October 6, TASS reports.

The patient was a Kenyan national who had previously lived in DR Congo. He arrived in Nairobi via Uganda on October 3 and died on October 5. As of October 19, a total of eight cases had been detected in Kenya.