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Ebola Crisis in Liberia Forces President to Extend Home Stay

By Peter R | Update Date: Sep 01, 2014 02:54 PM EDT

In a bid to the spread of Ebola in Liberia, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf extended home stay of civil servants for another month.

US News reported that non-essential government workers were told not to come to work for a month, promising them their wages during the home-stay. The deadly Ebola outbreak in Africa that has spread to five countries and killed more than 1,500 people, has hit Liberia the worst where around 700 people are said to have been killed by the virus. Schools in the West African nation have been closed for a month now, with Sirleaf's government keen on preventing an outbreak by preventing big gatherings.

The Liberian government is also battling severe mistrust among people with many believing the government is only fooling them about an Ebola outbreak. ABC News reported on Monday that two weeks ago an angry mob stormed a treatment center in West Point, a quarantined slum then, and asked patients to leave the center. The mob told patients the government was fooling them about Ebola when they actually were suffering from Malaria.

After local unrest over isolation of an entire slum comprising 50,000 people, the government lifted the quarantine last week.

Elsewhere, a Swedish patient who had traveled to a risk area and returned with fever sparking off Ebola suspicion, showed no signs of the disease Reuters reported.

The man was brought to Karolinska University Hospital in Stockholm with a fever but the Stockholm county council said the man tested negative. However unidentified man would continue to be treated at the facility to determine the reasons for his illness.

Meanwhile, a Spanish man of Nigerian origin was admitted to the Malaga Regional Hospital in Spain following suspicion of Ebola infection. Wall Street Journal on Monday reported the man was placed in isolation in the hospital as he had recently traveled to Nigeria, and had returned with fever. His condition was said to be stable. 

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