Congo records one-day record for confirmed Ebola cases

Congo onWednesday confirmed 14 new cases of Ebola virus in its easternborderlands, the largest one-day increase since the currentoutbreak was declared in August.

In all, the hemorrhagic fever is believed to have killed439 people and infected another 274 in the eastern provinces ofNorth Kivu and Ituri.

It is surpassed only by the 2013-2016 outbreak in WestAfrica, which involved over 28,000 cases and 11,000 deaths andled to substantial investments in a vaccine and treatments forthe virus.

Health officials have struggled to bring the currentoutbreak, Congo's tenth since 1976, under control, largely dueto widespread militia violence in eastern Congo which hashampered the response.

One other case was in Butembo.

The ministry also announced six new deaths of confirmedcases as well as the recovery of one patient.

Earlier this week, drugmaker Merck saidit will ship another approximately 120,000 doses of an experimental Ebola vaccine to Congo by the end of nextmonth.

Associate Vice-President Lydia Ogden told the World Economic Forum that the company is committed to having a ready stockpile of300,000 doses and already has shipped 100,000 to the World Health Organization.

Health officials have called the experimental vaccine highly effective against the virus.

Congo's health ministry says more than 63,000 people have received the vaccine in the outbreak that was declared on Aug. 1 in the country's densely populated northeast near Uganda and Rwanda.

Carrying out vaccinations is also complicated by poor infrastructure and in some cases hostility from communities that have never faced an Ebola outbreak before.