Ebola: Sierra Leone Vice President Quarantined

Sierra Leone's Vice President has been quarantined after one of his body guards died from Ebola Virus. Samuel Sam-Sumana said he would stay out of contact with others for 21 days as a precaution

Sam-Sumana voluntarily decided to quarantine himself for 21 days following the death from Ebola last Tuesday of one of his security personnel.

"This virus has affected thousands of our people and has nearly brought our country to its knees," said Sam-Sumana in a statement on Sunday. "We all have a collective responsibility to break the chains of transmission by isolating the sick and reporting all known contacts, by not touching the dead ... We cannot be complacent. We must work together as a nation to end Ebola now."

Sierra Leone recorded 18 new cases of Ebola in the week ending Saturday, up from 16 new cases last week. This breaks the trend of declining cases in the country.

Many of the new clusters are related to the capital's fishing industry. In one case a fisherman died at sea in early February and the boat returned his body to shore in Freetown, the capital. Some of the fishermen on the boat then returned to their homes in the shantytown surrounding the fishing wharf, causing new infections

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 The death toll for the current Ebola outbreak has risen to more than 9,600 from more than 23,800 infections mostly in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, according to World Health Organization figures released Friday.