A doctor in Sierra Leone has died of Ebola, the fifth local doctor in the West African nation to die of the disease, The UK Guardian reports.

 

Godfrey George, medical superintendent of Kambia government hospital in northern Sierra Leone, died on Sunday night, according to Sierra Leone’s government.

 

George’s death, which was announced by Dr Brima Kargbo, Sierra Leone’s chief medical officer, is a blow to efforts to keep desperately needed health workers safe in a country ravaged by the deadly virus.

 

Doctors and nurses have been particularly vulnerable to contracting Ebola, as the virus is spread through body fluids.UN chief Ban Ki-moon warned on Monday against “unnecessarily” strict restrictions on health workers returning from treating Ebola patients, in an apparent reference to quarantines and visa bans by some Western nations.

 

“There are some unnecessarily extra restrictions and discriminations against health workers. These people are … risking their own lives,” Ban said. These “unnecessarily strong and strict restrictions” included “quarantine for health workers … not based on science and medical evidence”.

 

“That is my honest and urgent opinion to the international community,” he said, stressing however that people with Ebola symptoms “should be immediately treated and supported”.

 

Experts say quarantining medical professionals who have shown no symptoms of the virus is counter-productive and could deter other workers from helping contain west Africa’s Ebola crisis.

 

A senior health official in China said on Monday that medical staff who work with Ebola patients in west Africa will be quarantined for 21 days after they return from duty.

 

Doctors returning to China will be subjected to a battery of tests before they enter the observation period, said He Qinghua, deputy director of the Ministry of Health’s Bureau for Disease Control and Prevention.