The Ebola risk in Sierra Leone is being heightened further as thousands of patients are said to have broken quarantine in an attempt to find food.
Aid workers in the country have raised the alarm that infected people are exposing others to the disease due to hunger.
The aid agencies say that the patients are forced to violate the quarantine because supplies are not reaching them, AP reports.
Large areas of Sierra Leone have been sealed off and travel has been restricted in some areas essentially cutting off the inhabitants.
The task of getting food and other services to the patients has been assigned to the country’s government, with help from the U.N.'s World Food Program, but Jeanne Kamara, the director of charity group, Christian Aid says that many "nooks and crannies" in the country that are being missed.
Kamara added:
“This is a huge concern. People infected with Ebola are desperately searching for food and are in turn exposing others to the disease.”
“They are jostling with people in the market and infecting others through bodily contact. We urgently have to provide food to those who need it to prevent the risk of further spread,” she said.
Ebola has claimed almost 5000 lives in West Africa with Sierra Leone and Liberia contributing the most to the casualty figure.
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