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WHO declares Ebola outbreak 'health emergency' of international concern

Health workers move a patient to a hospital after he was cleared of having Ebola inside an MSF-supported Ebola Treatment Centre in Butembo, DR Congo, on November 4, 2018. The World Health Organization on Wednesday declared the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo a public health emergency of international concern. PHOTO | JOHN WESSELS | AFP

By  Elizabeth Merab

Health & Science Reporter

Nation Media Group

The World Health Organization on Wednesday declared the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo a "public health emergency of international concern," a rare designation only used for the gravest epidemics.

"It is time for the world to take notice," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a statement, as he accepted the advice of his advisory board to invoke the emergency provision (PHEIC), only used by the UN health agency four times previously.

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