Senegal has reopened air and sea borders with Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, the nations worst hit by the Ebola virus.
The frontiers had been closed since Aug. 21, but the restriction was lifted with immediate effect, Senegalese Minister of the Interior Abdoulaye Daouda Diallo said on Friday.
“Senegal has decided to partially open its borders with the Republic of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone as of this Friday... This measure applies only to air and maritime borders, excluding the land border,” Diallo said in a statement.
Guinea shares a land border with Senegal, which remains closed.
The announcement came after Liberia lifted its state of emergency on Thursday last week, announcing huge gains in the fight against Ebola.
Smaller, more mobile treatment units are being deployed in remote areas of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea to act quickly to prevent the spread of the hemorrhagic fever.
No mention was made of neighboring Mali in the statement, which has recorded deaths from the Ebola virus. The land border between the nations remains open.
The WHO said on Friday that 5,177 people have now died of Ebola across eight nations, out of a total of 14,413 cases of infection, since late December last year.
Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone have suffered the most during the deadliest ever outbreak of the disease.
In its latest toll, WHO said that through Monday last week, 2,812 people had died in Liberia, out of 6,878 cases.
In Sierra Leone, 1,187 people had died as of Tuesday out of 5,586 cases, WHO said.
Guinea, where the outbreak began, counted 1,166 deaths and 1,919 cases, also as of Tuesday.
Senegal was declared Ebola-free by the WHO last month after a single, non-fatal case was earlier detected in the nation.
Meanwhile, A doctor from Sierra Leone who has contracted Ebola was early Saturday flown to the US where he has residency to be treated for the deadly virus, a senior medical official told AFP.
The flight carrying Martin Salia left the airport at Sierra Leone’s capital Freetown at 2:30 am GMT, Brima Kargbo, the country’s chief medical officer, told AFP.
Salia had been treating Ebola patients at Freetown’s Connaught Hospital, he said.
On Thursday the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, one of a handful equipped to handle Ebola cases in the US, said that it would treat the doctor if he were well enough to travel.
“The members of the crew will determine whether the patient is stable enough for transport -- if he is, he would arrive in Omaha sometime Saturday afternoon,” the hospital said in a statement on Thursday.
CNN had reported that Salia is married to a US citizen and has several children.
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