Liberia: Ebola Patient Flees Hospital to Buy Food at Market

A man affected with the highly contagious Ebola virus has fled a hospital in Liberia to buy food.

The patient, who wore a wristband showing he had tested positive to the Ebola test, was chased by a crowd of people while he headed to a market.

Clinic workers dressed in contamination suits eventually reached the man and, as he refused to follow them, grabbed him and took him back to Monrovia's Elwa hospital.

In a Sky News video which caught the incident, a woman commented on the episode by saying that patients are not given food and water.

"The patients are hungry, they are starving," she said. "The government needs to do more. Let Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf [Liberia's president] do more."

One man said, "We told them from the beginning: We do have an option, we don't want an Ebola camp here."

Ebola, which is spread via infected body fluids, has killed at least 1,500 people, of which nearly 700 in Liberia.

The outbreak, the worst in history, has also ravaged Sierra Leone, Guinea, Nigeria and Senegal.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation warned on Tuesday (2 September) that the virus could lead to a food crisis in West Africa, as travelling restrictions and quarantine zones have caused food shortages and price spikes.