Dozens of residents have fled their homes after visibly ill Ebola patients were refused entry to an overcrowded isolation centre in Liberia’s capital Monrovia, local newspaper Front Page Africa reports.
Six Ebola patients had been dropped off by government ambulances and taxis in front of a quarantine centre in Monrovia’s Paynesville neighbourhood.
But when the centre did not have capacity to admit them, they were left lying on the street, residents said.
Some patients were vomiting and urinating, according to witnesses.
“I spotted them through the window. I came outside (and) when they tried come near me, I ran away,” resident Betty Zamay was quoted as saying.
Community leader Anthony Kpahn said Paynesville residents were living in fear and called on the Liberian government to address the issue.
Health workers eventually arrived to disinfect the area.
Liberia is the country most affected by the Ebola outbreak, reporting more than 200 cases a week for the past three weeks, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
The country has a severe lack of health workers, equipment and facilities to treat patients.
The number of deaths from the Ebola epidemic has now surpassed 2100 in West Africa, the organisation said.
In addition to 2097 deaths in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, eight people died in Nigeria, where the outbreak is limited.
The WHO has counted 3944 suspected and confirmed cases in the hardest-hit countries, 23 in Nigeria and one in Senegal.
Effect of civil war