Liberia searches for missing Ebola patients

Liberian authorities are continuing to search for 17 people who left an Ebola medical centre over the weekend when it was attacked by looters.

Officials say the weekend chaos in Monrovia highlights the growing unease in Liberia amid the mounting Ebola death toll.

Liberia's assistant health minister Tolbert Nyenswah,

"When the community saw that we were carrying supplies, food and beddings for those people, some young people got agitated and then jumped in that area and scared away those patients, Let it be known that the patients that were in these were suspects because of presentation of signs or symptoms of the disease."

Liberia has reported over 400 Ebola-related deaths so far, the highest number of Ebola deaths among the affected West African countries.

The overall death toll stands at some 1,100.

Meantime, Guinea is stepping up sanitary measures along its borders with Liberia and Sierra Leone, to prevent people infected with the Ebola virus from entering or leaving the country.

Government Spokesman Albert Camara,

"We have decided to take a sanitary belt around the area where Ebola is, that is to say, the borders with Liberia and Sierra Leone, in the area of Gueckedou. So that all people that are going in those countries and coming from those countries can be controlled to see whether they have Ebola or not, or they are in risk of Ebola."

Also, another group of Chinese medical staff is now in Guinea to provide services and training to locals.

The new Chinese contingent also includes 10 members of a resident medical mission that will work at a local hospital in Conakry for two years.

China has sent several batches of medical equipment and some experts to Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone to help the African countries fight against Ebola epidemic.