Ebola Fight Takes Toll on Ugandans

Residents too afraid to travel freely.

Residents in western Uganda said on Thursday they were too scared to go shopping in local markets, visit churches or mosques or travel freely for fear of catching the Ebola virus which has already killed 16 people.

Thirty people are in an isolation ward at a hospital in Kibaale district, where the outbreak started, after 12 new cases were admitted. A total of 232 people suspected to have had contact with Ebola victims were also being monitored.

Health officials are hopeful there will be no repeat of the severity of the Ebola outbreak in Uganda in 2000, when 425 people were infected by the virus, more than half of whom died.