Kampala — Suspected cases of the lethal Ebola haemorrhagic fever have been reported in seven more districts, the Ugandan government announced on Friday.

State minister for primary health care, Dr Emmanuel Otaala said eight cases had been registered in the districts of Adjumani in West Nile, Mbale in the east, Masaka and Mubende in Buganda region and Kasese, Fort Portal (Kabarole) and Kanungu in western Uganda.

The case in Ajumani involves an unidentified UPDF soldier. But Otaala said: "Alert cases do not necessarily mean they are (confirmed) cases of Ebola but they ring a bell in our minds that there is something to investigate," the minister said.

Dr Otaala said reported Ebola infections countrywide since August had surged to 101 while deaths from the virulent disease stagnated at 22.

The Cabinet in an emergency sitting chaired by the Prime Minister Apollo Nsibambi on Friday approved USh6 billion to handle the spate of Ebola, plague, meningococcal meningitis, suspected cholera and yellow fever/Hepatitis A epidemics currently ravaging different parts of the country.

But as Ebola threatens to engulf the whole country, acting government Spokesman Dr James Nsaba Buturo said the Cabinet threw out pleas by lawmakers on Thursday that a state of emergency be declared to draw international attention to the health crisis.

"The work (declaration of) state of emergency is not in our vocabulary because we (government) is on top of things (containing the epidemic)," Buturo said.

But it emerged on Saturday that Mr Moses Natukunda, a guard with Delta Security suspected to be ill with Ebola, was on Thursday night rushed and admitted to Mulago Isolation Ward; the same unit where celebrated Kikyo Health centre IV Medical Superintendent Dr Jonah Kule died of the haemorrhagic fever four days ago.

"He (Natukunda) was brought in by his employers, Delta Security, after vomiting and passing out blood," Dr Ayati Omoruto, a community health officer at Mulago hospital, said.

A group of Kyambogo University students who had moved to attend the funeral of a relative in the Ebola hit western Uganda have caused a scare at the campus, forcing health officials to put them under medical observation.