Uganda: Death toll from Ebola hits 30

(SomaliNet)The death toll from the current outbreak Eboal in Uganda has increased to 30 after a patient died in western Uganda on Tuesday the health ministry said.

So far 116 people are known to be infected with the lethal virus.

But health authorities in Uganda were still registering new infections in Bundibugyo district, home to 250,000 people and the outbreak\'s epicentre.

The US Centers for Disease Control pathogen experts continued to test for the virus that was identified as a new strain of Ebola, which epidemiologists say erupted in September but was identified only in late November.

Hundreds of villagers and medics who had physical contacts with the patients have been put under observation, authorities said.

Spread by body fluids, the blood-born disease was named after a small river in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where it was discovered in 1976. It re-emerged in Sudan later the same year.

Other outbreaks have been recorded in Ivory Coast, Gabon and Uganda.-AFP