THERE ARE FIVE new cases of Ebola reported every hour in Sierre Leone, according to the Save the Children group.

There were an estimated 765 new cases reported last week alone, however, there are only 327 beds in the country.

The group says that the critical shortage of beds is resulting in untold numbers of children dying anonymously at home or in the streets, adding that the scale of the problem is being massively unreported.

They said that unless the international community step up their efforts people will continue to die at their home, resulting in more people being infected in the communities.

Save the Children group said:

Ebola is spreading across Sierra Leone at a terrifying rate, with the number of new cases recorded doubling every few weeks. At the current rate, 10 people every hour will be infected with Ebola in the country before the end of October. Even as health authorities get on top of the outbreak in one area, it breaks out in another. In the Port Loko district, cases have risen five-fold in the last month

Rob MacGillivray, Save the Children’s country director in Sierra Leone said they are facing the frightening prospect of an epidemic “which is spreading like wildfire across Sierra Leone, with the number of new cases doubling every three weeks”.

He said that chidlren, more than anyone, are suffering painful, anonymous and undignified deaths at home. “It’s very difficult at this stage to even give accurate figures on the number of children who are dying from Ebola, as monitoring systems cannot keep pace with the outbreak,” he said.

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