--- title: Ebola Hits Southern Nigeria With 3 Cases Confirmed in Port Harcourt description: Three cases of Ebola have been identified in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, with another 60 people considered at high risk of having the disease. canonical: https://time.com/3266348/ebola-spreads-to-southern-nigeria-with-3-cases-confirmed-and-60-at-high-risk/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-09-04T07:28:12.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T08:00:45.856Z article:section: Health og:title: WHO: We've Never Seen Anything Like This Epidemic og:description: Ebola is spreading rapidly, with 3 cases confirmed in southern Nigeria and 60 at 'high risk' og:url: https://time.com/3266348/ebola-spreads-to-southern-nigeria-with-3-cases-confirmed-and-60-at-high-risk/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt36eb621719f49d7f/6986a1f1f983e71d0504f7ba/rtr3262q.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2592 og:image:height: 1458 og:image:alt: An aerial view of the oil hub city Port Harcourt in Nigeria's Delta region og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: WHO: We've Never Seen Anything Like This Epidemic twitter:description: Ebola is spreading rapidly, with 3 cases confirmed in southern Nigeria and 60 at 'high risk' twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt36eb621719f49d7f/6986a1f1f983e71d0504f7ba/rtr3262q.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Ebola Spreads to Southern Nigeria With 3 Cases Confirmed and 60 at 'High Risk' > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: August 2026. ## TIME Health Matters: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition Health Matters is one of seven email newsletters published by TIME, the news organization founded in 1923. The latest health news and expert advice on living well. Health Matters makes the fast-moving world of health more useful, surprising and human, from the latest science and medical breakthroughs to practical ideas for living better. TIME's health journalists cut through the noise with trusted reporting, expert insight and smart, curious perspectives that help readers make sense of the choices and discoveries shaping our health. 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Health Matters is TIME's daily health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free daily newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. ## Video: Inside a Liberian Ebola Town Under Quarantine [Watch (HLS stream): Inside a Liberian Ebola Town Under Quarantine](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/5BZgJwhR.m3u8) (0:37)  _Published 2014-09-04. Life in Dolo Town in Liberia's Margibi County, which has been quarantined to containe the spread of Ebola._ by [Elizabeth Barber](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## Elizabeth Barber Sep 4, 2014 7:28 AM UTC  An aerial view of the oil hub city Port Harcourt in Nigeria's Delta region May 16, 2012. An aerial view of the oil hub city Port Harcourt in Nigeria's Delta region May 16, 2012.Akintunde Akinleye / Reuters—REUTERS by [Elizabeth Barber](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## Elizabeth Barber Sep 4, 2014 7:28 AM UTC **Correction appended**, Sept. 4. Three cases of Ebola have been identified in the southern Nigerian city of Port Harcourt, the World Health Organization (WHO) says, confirming that the disease has spread outside Lagos, where five people have died. Officials in Port Harcourt — a teeming city of 1.4 million in the Niger delta — are now monitoring over 200 people, 60 of whom are considered at high risk of having contracted the disease. It is a worrying expansion of an epidemic that has now killed 1,900 in West Africa and defied the attempts of under-staffed and under-funded aid teams to halt it. WHO officials warn that the virus is not just expanding geographically but also accelerating. Ebola has now sickened upwards of 3,500 people and in the past week alone almost 400 people have died of the virus, said Dr. Margaret Chan, director-general of the WHO at a press conference in Washington D.C. on Wednesday. “This [Ebola epidemic](https://unfoundation.app.box.com/s/8yqirr2uqxekdbue0th4) is the longest, the most severe and the most complex we’ve ever seen,” said Chan. Experts, she added, “have never seen anything like it.” Some $600 million in supplies will now be needed to duel with the epidemic, the worst on record, WHO officials said—up [$110 million](http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/03/us-health-ebola-idUSKBN0GY1V320140903) from the estimate given last week, according to Reuters. The increased sum will further test the willingness of the global community to tackle the disease at source. Health organizations such as Doctors Without Borders have already been [highly critical](http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/news-stories/speechopen-letter/united-nations-special-briefing-ebola) of what they say is a lackluster international response. As the epidemic expands, resources on the ground have not, WHO officials said. There is no room in what few hospitals there are in the worst-hit areas; terrified medical staff have stopped showing up to work; and in Liberia the bodies of Ebola victims are being left unattended in the streets. Some who contract the disease are also choosing to hide their illness—in the meantime, unwittingly infecting those around them—rather than be turned upon by neighbors. Meanwhile, some 150 scientists and experts convened Thursday at the WHO’s headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, for a two-day meeting to review available experimental Ebola drugs and vaccines and draft testing plans for the most promising. None of the drugs have been tested in humans, but one of them, ZMapp, was given to two Ebola patients who survived their illness. On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services awarded a contract worth up to $42.3 million to ZMapp’s manufacturer, jump-starting clinical trials and fresh production of the drug, supplies of which are currently tapped out. The W.H.O estimates that Ebola will take 20,000 more lives before its transmission is stopped. **Correction**: The original version of this story incorrectly identified the capital of Nigeria. It is Abuja. _Footage of life in Dolo Town, some 40 miles (60 k.m.) east of Monrovia, Liberia, which has been quarantined to contain the spread of Ebola._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3266348/ebola-spreads-to-southern-nigeria-with-3-cases-confirmed-and-60-at-high-risk/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3266348/ebola-spreads-to-southern-nigeria-with-3-cases-confirmed-and-60-at-high-risk/"},"headline":"Ebola Spreads to Southern Nigeria With 3 Cases Confirmed and 60 at 'High Risk'","datePublished":"2014-09-04T07:28:12.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T08:00:45.856Z","description":"WHO officials warn that the epidemic is accelerating rapidly","url":"https://time.com/3266348/ebola-spreads-to-southern-nigeria-with-3-cases-confirmed-and-60-at-high-risk/","keywords":["Infectious Disease","Disease","U.N.","Sierra Leone","WHO","Nigeria","World Health Organization","ebola","Guinea","Liberia"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt36eb621719f49d7f/6986a1f1f983e71d0504f7ba/rtr3262q.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Elizabeth Barber"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt36eb621719f49d7f/6986a1f1f983e71d0504f7ba/rtr3262q.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"An aerial view of the oil hub city Port Harcourt in Nigeria's Delta region","caption":"An aerial view of the oil hub city Port Harcourt in Nigeria's Delta region","creditText":"Akintunde Akinleye / Reuters—REUTERS","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/infectious-disease/","name":"Infectious Disease"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3266348/ebola-spreads-to-southern-nigeria-with-3-cases-confirmed-and-60-at-high-risk/","name":"Ebola Spreads to Southern Nigeria With 3 Cases Confirmed and 60 at 'High Risk'"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Inside a Liberian Ebola Town Under Quarantine","description":"Life in Dolo Town in Liberia's Margibi County, which has been quarantined to containe the spread of Ebola.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/5BZgJwhR/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2014-09-04T06:27:08.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/5BZgJwhR.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/3266348/ebola-spreads-to-southern-nigeria-with-3-cases-confirmed-and-60-at-high-risk/","duration":"PT37S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/3266348/ebola-spreads-to-southern-nigeria-with-3-cases-confirmed-and-60-at-high-risk/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```