The World Health Organization (WHO) has deployed hundreds of new beds and more medical staff across the five Ebola-hit provinces in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to help the country combat a fast-growing outbreak of the disease.
As of Wednesday, the DR Congo had recorded 6,342 confirmed cases and 3,072 deaths, according to an official situation report.
A total of 1,475 patients have recovered, while 770 others remain in hospitalized in isolation.
"We've been able to augment the number of functional bed capacities by more than 500 for the past four weeks. And this is something which has been really demanded by the current scale of the outbreak. And these almost 500 new beds have been kind of added in more than 50 health facilities across the entire five provinces, which has been affected by this outbreak," said Dr Thierno Balde, Incident Manager of the WHO.
Balde said there are now over 1,300 beds across 49 treatment facilities in DR Congo, adding that the WHO is planning to expand the number to 3000 beds in the next two months.
"We are also trying to see how we can fill the additional gaps because our objective is to move in the next two months with 3,000 additional bed capacities. But what is also very important, WHO is really working with the different partners for increasing the number of the health professionals, the number of clinicians, doctors, and nurses who are going to work into these different health facilities," he said.
On Friday, the DR Congo and its partners launched an updated 180-day multisectoral response plan to intensify efforts against the outbreak, with funding needs estimated at 1.3 billion U.S. dollars.
With support from the WHO, the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other partners, the plan was intended to serve as the operational roadmap for the response over the next six months.
The current outbreak, officially declared in May, has become the fastest-growing Ebola outbreak recorded in the DRC to date.
WHO scales up support to DR Congo amid Ebola outbreak
WHO scales up support to DR Congo amid Ebola outbreak
WHO scales up support to DR Congo amid Ebola outbreak
Global buyers are converging on the ongoing 140th China Import and Export Fair in Guangzhou, south China's Guangdong Province, where competing suppliers gathered under one roof allow them to compare products, quality and prices side by side, with many extending their trips beyond the exhibition halls to the factory floors that ring the city.
Also known as the Canton Fair, the biannual event is China's largest and longest-running comprehensive trade fair and a widely watched barometer of the country's foreign trade.
For the buyers streaming through the bustling halls, the fair's value lies in that concentration, the ability to move between countless suppliers in a single space and weigh offers directly against one another.
"The beauty about Canton Fair is all these different suppliers are all together. So you can go from one supplier to another, to another. Compare their products, quality as well as price, and you put them all together and then you make a decision. Makes it absolutely fantastic. We would like to come again and again and again. Once you come to China once, you will come many times. Next year, we will be here again," said Humphrey Muturi, a buyer from Kenya.
The sourcing journey often continues well beyond the exhibition venue, as Guangzhou sits in the Pearl River Delta, one of China's manufacturing heartlands, where many factories lie just an hour's drive from the fairgrounds.
Buyers frequently take the opportunity to visit production sites in person, where they can observe assembly lines in operation and see the manufacturing process up close.
"Once you go to one company, you get to learn all the manufactured items, you go to the next, you can compare how they operate. You can come to [understand and learn critical information], you can ask them questions and interact, and give them the specification that you are looking for. And they help very fast," said Titus Muthomi, another buyer from Kenya.
That direct access is backed by China's complete industrial chain and stable manufacturing capability, which enable suppliers to offer full-package solutions and customized services to overseas buyers, rather than one-off sales.
Canton Fair puts China's entire supply chain within global buyers' reach
