Liberia was declared Ebola free on May 9 after not reporting any additional cases for the WHO mandated 42 day period. The toll on Liberia from Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) included 10,666 cases and 4,806 deaths (45% case fatality).
The World Health Organization said: Although transmission of the virus had ceased, Liberia remained at high risk of a recurrence of Ebola due to ongoing transmission in neighboring Guinea and Sierra Leone. For this reason Liberia then entered a 90-day period of vigilance involving testing anyone with features of Ebola virus disease and testing post-mortem swabs for Ebola virus.
After seven weeks without an EVD case, a male who died on June 28 was later to be proven Ebola positive.
Since that time, the number of confirmed EVD cases in Liberia has risen to six, with an addition probable case. In addition, one additional Ebola fatality occurred bring that count to two since the return of the lethal virus.
Five of the cases and one death was reported from Margibi County, while the other case/death was reported from Montserrado County.
Last week, genetic sequencing performed by the Liberian National Reference Laboratory revealed the virus from the new case from late June is genetically similar to viruses that infected many people in Margibi County more than 6 months ago, in late 2014.
The virus appears to be related to the one previously circulating in Liberia, it is unlikely that this recurrence has been caused by virus imported from infected areas of Guinea or Sierra Leone.