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WASHINGTON - The U.S. Peace Corps has withdrawn eight volunteers from northern Gabon because of an outbreak of Ebola fever, an official said on Wednesday.

The U.S. State Department said in a statement on Wednesday it had told all U.S. government personnel to leave the affected region in the province of Ogooue-Ivindo.

Other Americans in the area should avoid funerals and contact with infected people, their body fluids or objects that may be contaminated, such as needles, it said. U.S. citizens are advised to avoid the affected area, it added.

The Peace Corps workers moved to the Gabonese city of Franceville as soon as reports of the outbreak came out, said the Peace Corps official, who asked not to be named.

Ebola is thought to have killed 10 people in the remote Mekambo district of the Central African country and one more is seriously ill.

The disease causes up to 90 percent of its victims to bleed to death in a matter of days and has no known cure or vaccine. Nampa-Reuters

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