UN Ebola czar says epidemic has ´passed the tipping point´

UNITED NATIONS: The Ebola crisis has "passed the tipping point" and there is now a reasonable chance the deadly outbreak could end quickly, the UN special envoy said Thursday.

UN Ebola coordinator David Nabarro welcomed fresh data from the World Health Organization showing that all three hardest-hit countries in West Africa had registered the lowest weekly tally of new cases in months.

"I´m absolutely delighted to see that the incidence of confirmed Ebola cases week-on-week is reducing," Nabarro told AFP in an interview.

"This suggests that we have passed the tipping point and we are beginning to be on the downward slope of the outbreak," he said.

Liberia reported its lowest weekly number of new cases since early June, while Guinea and Sierra Leone both saw the fewest new cases since August.

More than 8,400 people have died since the Ebola outbreak began in Guinea in December 2013, nearly all of them in the three hardest-hit countries: Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.