United Nations, Dhu-AlHijjah 22, 1435, October 16, 2014, SPA -- A total of 4,493 people have died from the world’s worst Ebola epidemic on record as of October 12, according to statistics released Wednesday by the World Health Organization (WHO). The U.N. health agency said a total of 8,997 confirmed, probable, and suspected cases of the deadly virus had been reported in seven countries, with the vast majority of those in the West African countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea. In Spain and the United States, a few healthcare workers are ill, while Senegal and Nigeria appear to have prevented further spread of the disease, the WHO said. “It is clear … that the situation in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone is deteriorating, with widespread and persistent transmission” of Ebola, the report said. In Liberia, which accounts for more than half the number of dead and likely Ebola cases, the WHO said problems with data gathering made it difficult to draw conclusions about the evolution of the epidemic, with the number of cases in the capital, Monrovia, certainly under-reported. In Sierra Leone, transmission of the disease was rampant, with 425 new cases between October 6 and 12, the U.N. agency said, with the capital, Freetown, and the neighboring western districts of Bombali and Port Loko hardest hit. The increase in the number of new cases in Guinea—where 843 people are now believed to have died from the disease—was driven by a spike in infection in the capital, Conakry, and the nearby district of Coyah, the report said. --SPA 11:28 LOCAL TIME 08:28 GMT www.spa.gov.sa/w