Ebola virus: Liberia health system 'overtaxed'
Many in Liberia say the government's response to the crisis has been inadequate
Liberia's information minister has admitted that the country's health care system has been overwhelmed by the spread of the deadly Ebola virus.
Lewis Brown told the BBC the system had been "overtaxed" by the outbreak, but that authorities were doing their best in the face of an unprecedented crisis.
The medical charity MSF said officials underestimated the outbreak and that the health system was "falling apart".
Nearly 1,000 people have died and 1,800 have become infected in West Africa.
The Ebola outbreak - the worst-ever - is centred on Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, but has spread to other countries in recent months.
Mr Lewis told the BBC that the outbreak was affecting Liberia's most populated areas, and that people there were "in denial".
"There are religious practices and beliefs, long-held traditional values that are being challenged by the procedures... to cure or at least prevent the spread of disease," he said.
He said Liberia's health care system was "not the best in the wold", but rejected accusations that it had not responded quickly enough. The crisis, Mr Lewis added, would have "overstretched and overtaxed" any health system.
"The bottom line is we are at the frontline of a deadly outbreak," Mr Lewis said.
The outbreak has killed almost 1,000 people
Earlier, the co-ordinator for Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF) in Liberia, Lindis Hurum, told the BBC: "Our capacity is stretched beyond anything that we ever done before in regards to Ebola response."
She said five of the biggest hospitals in the capital Monrovia had closed for more than a week.
"Some of them have now started to re-open but there are other hospitals in other counties that are just abandoned by the staff."