The World Bank said Tuesday that the fallout from the deadly Ebola pandemic will push Guinea and Sierra Leone into recession next year.

With the disease still not under control in West Africa, the cost to the two countries plus less-impacted Liberia of shuttered businesses and curtailed investment will run "well over" $2 billion in 2014-2015, the Bank said in a new report.

Nearly 7,000 people have now died from Ebola in west Africa, with the latest report from the World Health Organization counting over 1,200 more deaths than in a toll given on Wednesday.

Data published by the U.N.'s health body late Friday showed that 16,169 people had been infected with Ebola and that 6,928 of them had died in the three countries at the center of the outbreak -- Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia.

Citizens of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone will need a visa to enter Singapore as part of measures against the spread of Ebola, the city-state's health ministry said Monday.

The three West African countries are the worst-hit by the Ebola epidemic that has killed more than 4,900 people.

Health Minister Wael Abou Faour said Wednesday that flights arriving from countries where there is an Ebola outbreak would land in one terminal as he announced further measures to stop the virus from reaching Lebanon.

Following talks with the management of Rafik Hariri International Airport along with Public Works and Transport Minister Ghazi Zoaiter, Abou Faour said a specialized room has been established at the airport apron to isolate any suspected case.

Health Minister Wael Abou Faour warned on Monday that Lebanon could be exposed to Ebola because Lebanese expatriates are present in countries where the virus is spread but promised measures to prevent infection cases in the country.

Abou Faour denied that the virus was present in Lebanon and said his ministry was cooperating with the foreign ministry to take extraordinary measures at Lebanese embassies in the African states where the virus is spread.

At least nine people died and dozens more were missing Friday after an overcrowded wooden boat went down off the south coast of Guinea, officials said.

The long thin pirogue boat had 69 passengers aboard when it left the port of Farmoriah for a weekly market further along the coast of the west African country, the national navigation agency said. 

Belgian authorities have arrested a female former commander in the rebel movement of Liberia's one-time president Charles Taylor and charged her with war crimes, officials said Thursday.

Martina Johnson is believed to be the first person charged for crimes committed during the country's first civil war, said a legal group acting for victims of the conflict.

International medical agency Medecins Sans Frontieres said Tuesday the world was "losing the battle" to contain Ebola and called for a global biological disaster response to get aid and personnel to west Africa.

"Six months into the worst Ebola epidemic in history, the world is losing the battle to contain it. Leaders are failing to come to grips with this transnational threat," MSF international president Joanne Liu told a U.N. briefing in New York. 

Ebola-hit nations met for crisis talks on Thursday as the death toll topped 1,500 and the World Health Organization warned that the number of cases could exceed 20,000 before the outbreak is stemmed.

Nigeria announced that the virus had reached its oil-producing hub, dashing hopes that the country had successfully contained it to its biggest city, Lagos.

Liberia's leader has sacked ministers and senior government officials who defied an order to return to the west African nation to lead the fight against the deadly Ebola outbreak, her office said on Tuesday.

President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf had told overseas ministers to return within a week as part of a state-of-emergency announcement on August 6, warning that extraordinary measures were needed "for the very survival of our state".