KINSHASA - Four new cases of the Ebola hemorrhagic fever epidemic were confirmed Saturday in the Equateur province in northwestern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Minister of Health Oly Ilunga announced in a statement.

The four new cases were confirmed in the health zone of Iboko, one of the three health zones affected by the epidemic, according to the statement.

The numbers of confirmed cases thus increased from 17 to 21 following the latest test by the on-site laboratory in Equateur province since the epidemic was officially declared.

These results are part of the daily tests that the mobile laboratory team of the Ministry of Health delivers in collaboration with a team of the World Health Organization (WHO), which was deployed since the declaration of the epidemic in the area.

According to the WHO, the particularity of this preventive campaign is to vaccinate circles of people who have been in direct contact with a patient and the so-called "contact of contacts," or the second-level contacts of a patient.

A new batch of 3,200 doses of Ebola vaccine, provided by the WHO, is expected in Kinshasa to complete the first doses arrived last Wednesday.