WHO: 700 Ebola cases emerge in one week

In a sign that West Africa’s Ebola crisis is worsening, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday that more than 700 new cases of the deadly virus were confirmed in the last week for which data is available.

The news was announced as citizens of Sierra Leone prepared for a three-day nationwide shutdown, during which the country's 6 million people will be confined to their homes while volunteers search house-to-house for Ebola victims in hiding and hand out soap in a desperate bid to slow the accelerating outbreak.

The number of people killed by the Ebola virus is now more than 2,600, an increase of roughly 200 from the last estimate, WHO said. Most of the deaths have been in Liberia, the hardest-hit of West African nations plagued by the virus.

The disease has also touched Guinea, Nigeria and Senegal and is believed to have sickened more than 5,300 people, WHO reported. Just under half of those cases were recorded in the last three weeks.

Of those afflicted by the virus, some 318 have been health care workers — about half of whom have died.

Authorities aim to take advantage of Sierra Leone’s shutdown, which runs from midnight Thursday through Sunday, to identify sick people reluctant or unable to seek treatment. Volunteers will also hand out 1.5 million bars of soap and deliver information on how to prevent Ebola’s spread.

More than six months into the world's largest Ebola outbreak, there are still affected areas without access to clean water or soap, WHO said.

Authorities expect to discover hundreds of new cases during the shutdown. Many of those infected have not sought treatment out of fear that hospitals are merely places people go to die. Others have been turned away by centers overwhelmed with patients.

Sierra Leone's government said it has prepared screening and treatment centers to accept the expected influx of patients after the shutdown.

Several countries have promised aid. France announced on Thursday that it will establish a military hospital in Guinea in the coming days, while Britain said it will provide 500 more badly needed beds in Sierra Leone. The U.S. plans to send 3,000 military personnel to the region and build more than a dozen treatment centers in Liberia. An American general has already arrived in the Liberian capital of Monrovia to set up a command center.

With no proven treatment for Ebola, public health experts have kept the focus on isolating the sick, tracking down those they have come into contact with, stopping the chain of transmission through travel restrictions and by cordoning off entire communities.

The Associated Press