AlQa'dah 24, 1435, Sep 19, 2014, SPA -- The killing in Guinea of eight people trying to educate locals about the Ebola virus showed how much West African rural populations mistrust authorities after years of instability and conflict, the World Health Organization (WHO) said Friday. A spokesman for the Guinea government said Thursday that eight bodies were found after an attack on a team visiting remote southeastern Guinea, showing the dangers faced by health workers fighting the virus that is surrounded by suspicion and stigma. "This population in the forested area has really suffered a lot in the last 20 years," WHO expert Pierre Formenty told reporters in Geneva after returning from Liberia. "They are in a post-conflict behavior, there is lack of trust obviously between these populations, and the different governments for the three countries." "We need to continue the combat against Ebola, we need to investigate these murders, but it should not stop us. We should continue the dialogue with the community, we should continue to explain our work, continue to show our empathy with the victims, with the families, with the communities. Without that we will not be able to make our messages understood by the population. And we will not be able to control it (the outbreak)," Formenty said.
