Geneva - An outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus has killed 11 people in Gabon and spread across the border to Congo, where it has claimed four lives, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Thursday.
In a statement, the United Nations agency said that a total of 27 cases had been reported in the two countries, 25 of which had been confirmed with two suspected cases under investigation.
WHO and other experts deployed on both sides of the border are tracing 227 people believed to have come into contact with the blood or other body fluids of victims, it added.
There is no vaccine or known cure for Ebola, whose victims bleed to death within days after early symptoms similar to flu.
"It is still one outbreak. We are dealing with a remote part of the world, essentially the jungle, where people cross the border all the time," WHO spokesperson Ian Simpson said.
Of the 27 reported cases, 16 were in Gabon, including 11 fatalities, he said. On Tuesday, the WHO said that quarantine and other measures to contain the outbreak in the forested region around Mekambo in northern Gabon - the third in the central African country since 1994 - appeared to be working.
Eleven cases were in the Republic of Congo, including four deaths, according to the WHO in Geneva. - Reuters