KAMPALA Aug 2 (Reuters) - Residents in western Uganda said on Thursday they were too scared to go shopping in local markets, visit churches or mosques or travel freely for fear of catching the Ebola virus which has already killed 16 people. 
 
 Thirty people are in an isolation ward at a hospital in Kibaale district, where the outbreak started, after 12 new cases were admitted. A total of 232 people suspected to have had contact with Ebola victims were also being monitored. 
 
 Health officials are hopeful there will be no repeat of the severity of the Ebola outbreak in Uganda in 2000, when 425 people were infected by the virus, more than half of whom died. 
 
 There was no new deaths on Thursday, health workers said, but residents were finding it hard to cope with the preventive measures. 
 
 President Yoweri Museveni has advised people to avoid shaking hands, casual sex and do-it-yourself burials to reduce the chance of contracting the deadly haemorrhagic fever. 
 
 There is no treatment for Ebola, which is transmitted by close contact and body fluids such as saliva, vomit, faeces, sweat, semen and blood. However, doctors can treat opportunistic diseases and symptoms affecting patients including diarrhoea, vomiting and malaria, and some patients can survive. 
 
 "Fears of catching Ebola have twisted people's lives," Tumusiime Jamilo, a reporter at a local radio station told Reuters. "They can't go to the markets to buy things, (others can't) sell their products and that's hitting their pockets." 
 
 Tumusiime said people couldn't also freely travel wherever they wanted or go to churches and mosques because of worries they might be infected. 
 
 Ugandan authorities said last week they had confirmed the outbreak of Ebola in Kibaale, 170 km (100 miles) west of the capital Kampala, and near the Democratic Republic of Congo where the virus first emerged in 1976, taking its name from the Ebola River. 
 
 But they have not yet identified the source of the outbreak, although Kibaale Forest has a high concentration of monkeys and birds, which act as transmitters of the virus. 
 
 Stephen Mfashingabo, a health official in Kibaale, told Reuters the local Ebola taskforce had been struggling to cope with insufficient facilities since the disease struck, although funds and medicines had been delivered on Thursday. 
 
 "There was no money from the Health Ministry to fund activities since this outbreak was confirmed and there was also no food," he said. 
 
 In neighbouring Kenya, a second suspected case of Ebola was reported in Eldoret, a large town in the Rift Valley, where a man has been placed in isolation. 
 
 Public Health and Sanitation Minister, Beth Mugo, however told parliament that tests carried out on the first suspected Ebola case have not been completed, though she said the victim reported bleeding from gums, urine and stool after eating meat from a goat that had been rescued from a python. 
 
 She said Kenya has never had a confirmed case of Ebola. (Additional reporting by Drazen Jorgic; Writing by James Macharia, editing by Diana Abdallah) ||||| Story highlights The hospital at the center of the outbreak now has 30 suspected cases, a doctor says 
 
 Concerns over infection ripple across Uganda 
 
 "We do expect the number of suspected cases to increase," the doctor says 
 
 The hospital at the center of an Ebola outbreak in Uganda is now dealing with 30 suspected cases, including five from Kibaale prison, Dr. Dan Kyamanywa said Thursday. 
 
 Three patients at Kagadi hospital have been confirmed as having the virus, said Kyamanywa, a district health officer. 
 
 Doctors are now testing the suspected cases urgently so they can separate confirmed cases from those who do not have the disease, Doctors Without Borders said. 
 
 Suspected cases are still trickling into the hospital, Kyamanywa said. 
 
 At least 16 people have died in the current outbreak. 
 
 The five prisoners have been showing Ebola-like symptoms of vomiting, diarrhea and fever, the doctor said. 
 
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 "We do expect the number of suspected cases to increase," he said. "It's important to break transmission and reduce the number of contacts that suspected cases have." 
 
 There is a fear that the outbreak will spread to the capital, but it is unlikely, he said. 
 
 Many patients fled Kagadi hospital when Ebola was confirmed, he said, and the hospital is struggling to respond to all the call-outs to suspected cases. 
 
 Could the Ebola outbreak spread to the U.S.? 
 
 "Right now there is no treatment for Ebola, so the most effective measure we can take is to contain the spread of the disease," said Olimpia de la Rosa, the Doctors Without Borders emergency coordinator for Uganda Ebola intervention. 
 
 "That is why we need to start working immediately. Other cases need to be rapidly identified because containment is what can stop it," said the expert from the aid group, which is also known as Medecins Sans Frontieres. 
 
 The Ugandan government has asked people in western Uganda to travel by public transport only if it is necessary. 
 
 The outbreak began in the Kibaale district in western Uganda. 
 
 The deaths have stoked heightened fear about the spread of the virus, a highly infectious, often fatal agent spread through direct contact with bodily fluids. Symptoms can include fever, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain, headache, a measles-like rash, red eyes and, at times, bleeding from body openings. 
 
 Market day was canceled Wednesday after Uganda's president warned people not to gather in large groups. 
 
 Health officials urged the public to report any suspected cases, to avoid contact with anyone infected and to wear gloves and masks while disinfecting bedding and clothing of infected people. Officials also advised avoiding public gatherings in the affected district. 
 
 Teams in Uganda are taking an aggressive approach, including trying to track down anyone who came into contact with patients infected with the virus and health workers have been gearing up for better protection of health workers and an influx of cases. 
 
 The workers include people from Uganda's ministry of health, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization. 
 
 The outbreak initially went undetected because patients did not show typical symptoms, Ugandan Health Minister Dr. Christine Ondoa told CNN on Sunday. Patients had fevers and were vomiting, but did not show other typical symptoms, such as hemorrhaging. 
 
 Diagnosis in an individual who has only recently been infected can be difficult since early symptoms, such as red eyes and skin rash, are seen more frequently in patients who have more common diseases, the CDC said. 
 
 Uganda's Ministry of Health declared the outbreak in Kibaale district Saturday after the Uganda Virus Research Institute identified the disease as the Sudan strain of Ebola hemorrhagic fever. 
 
 The Ebola virus was first detected in 1976 in the central African nation of Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo). The virus is named after a river in that country. There are five strains of Ebola viruses, all named after the areas where they were found: Zaire, Sudan, Cote d'Ivoire, Bundibugyo and Reston, according to the WHO. 
 
 Ugandan officials, international experts tackle Ebola outbreak ||||| The aid group Doctors Without Borders says the first victim of the latest Ebola outbreak in Uganda was a 3-month-old girl and that of the 65 people who attended her funeral, 15 later contracted the deadly disease. 
 
 At least 11 of those who attended the baby's funeral have since died, the group said in a statement on Wednesday. 
 
 Funerals in Uganda are typically elaborate affairs that draw huge crowds. In a national address this week, Uganda's president urged people to avoid unnecessary contact with each other and discouraged handshakes. Doctors Without Borders says that while that is good advice people without symptoms are not contagious, and avoiding contact with others' bodily fluids is the best way to limit an Ebola outbreak. 
 
 Ebola is highly infectious and kills quickly.
– The Ebola outbreak gripping western Uganda spread widely at the funeral of the first known victim, a 3-month-old girl whose mother also died, according to Doctors Without Borders. Of the 65 people who attended the baby's funeral, 15 contracted the deadly disease and at least 11 of them have died, AP reports. The outbreak has killed at least 16 people so far, and the hospital at the center of the outbreak is now dealing with 30 more suspected cases, including five from a prison, reports CNN. The government has urged Ugandans to avoid handshakes, casual sex, and home funerals, Reuters reports. People in western Uganda have been warned to avoid public gatherings and public transportation unless absolutely necessary. Health officials, hoping to make this outbreak less deadly than one in 2000 which killed more than 200 people, are isolating suspected victims and monitoring people they came into contact with.