Ebola Returns to Liberia After Month-Long Pause

A patient in the Liberian capital Monrovia has tested positive for Ebola, in a development that came more than a month after the last new case of the deadly disease was reported.

A patient in the Liberian capital Monrovia has tested positive for Ebola, dashing hopes that the West African country could be declared Ebola-free by mid-April after weeks with no new cases, sources said.

"A woman has been confirmed as an Ebola patient… This is a new case after we have gone more than 27 days without a single case. It is a setback,” government spokesman Lewis Brown told the news agency AFP.

It was not immediately clear where the woman became infected.

Liberia was hit the hardest by the Ebola outbreak in West Africa; the country's death toll currently totals more than 4,000.

Liberia's last known Ebola patient, Beatrice Yardolo, was discharged from a treatment center in Monrovia on March 5; it added to hopes that Liberia could be on its way to being officially announced Ebola-free.

Relatives weep as they bury a loved one suspected of dying from the Ebola virus at a new graveyard on the outskirts of Monrovia, Liberia, March 11, 2015

© AP Photo / Abbas Dulleh

Earlier this month, the World Health Organization said that no new Ebola case had been registered in Liberia since February 19.

According to the WHO, at least 42 days should pass from the last known case of Ebola before a country can be declared virus-free.

More than 10,000 people have already been killed by the Ebola virus since the outbreak was registered in Guinea in December 2013; the virus then spread to neighboring Liberia and Sierra Leone, where it has yet to be eradicated despite a huge international response.

Currently, there is no proven vaccine to prevent the Ebola infection; researchers are speeding up efforts to resolve the problem.