Ebola has ‘upper hand’ says US health official

Published 10:00 am Wednesday, August 27, 2014

MONROVIA, Liberia — Ebola still has the “upper hand” in the outbreak that has killed more than 1,400 people in West Africa, but experts have the means to stop it, a top American health official said during a visit to the hardest-hit countries.

Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was in Liberia on Tuesday and later planned to stop in Sierra Leone and Guinea. Nigeria also has cases, but officials there have expressed optimism the virus can be controlled.

“Lots of hard work is happening. Lots of good things are happening,” Frieden said at a meeting attended by Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf on Monday. “But the virus still has the upper hand.”

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Even as Liberia has resorted to stringent measures to try to halt Ebola’s spread, frustration mounted over the slow collection of bodies from neighborhoods of Monrovia.