NAIROBI, Dec. 25 -- The rosy growth expectations for Africa have been overshadowed by the year-old, worst-ever Ebola outbreak originating and raging in West Africa.

The global death toll from the deadly epidemic has risen to 7,588 out of 19,497 confirmed cases, according to the latest figures released on Wednesday by the World Health Organization (WHO). The hardest-hit countries are Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

Africa was expected to continue its robust growth in 2014 as well as 2015 owing to supportive external demand conditions and strong growth in public and private investment.

However, the Ebola outbreak has clouded the scenario, and experts warn that it is not time for the international community to be complacent although the spread of the epidemic appears to slow down in certain parts of West Africa, as the economies of the three worst-hit countries were crippled and spillover effects began to be felt by other African countries.

"Not only will it deal a heavy blow to Africa, but it has already done so," said Margaret Jowi, a Kenyan expert in communicable diseases, in a recent interview with Xinhua.

She said a closer scenario to Kenya is that the country's national carrier Kenya Airways has incurred massive losses, as much as millions of U.S. dollars, over the past months.

"Also the African region has been shunned by the rest of the world," Jowi said, adding quite a few African countries, including those not affected or less affected, have been hit by disrupted cross-border trades, supply chains and tourism.

Nigerian Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala told the media in September that several investment meetings in the country have been postponed as a result of Ebola-related travel fears, though Africa's biggest economy is not seriously affected by the Ebola outbreak.

Nigeria had seen seven deaths out of 19 Ebola cases before it was declared end of Ebola outbreak by WHO in October.

C. Sophie-Jane Madden, a senior press officer at the Doctors Without Borders (MSF), told Xinhua that the international community is still running behind the Ebola outbreak, and the international response is still taking shape.

"In terms of the response, there are still gaps in many aspects - access to medical care, contact tracing, epidemiological surveillance, effective alert and referral systems, safe burials and community education and mobilization," said Madden.

The outbreak is predicted to inflict losses worth 3 billion to 4 billion dollars on the Sub-Saharan African economy. The virus' severe impact also could reverse the peace building gains made in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, where short-term growth was expected to decline.

According to a World Bank (WB) study released in early December, all the three nations were growing strongly before the Ebola crisis, but Liberia is now likely to grow at an annual rate of just 2.2 percent, and Sierra Leone at 4 percent, about one third of the pre-crisis forecasts for both countries.

Guinea is to suffer the most severe blow, with projection for its economic growth having been cut from 4.5 percent to just 0.5 percent now.

The year of 2015 is looking even worse. The WB is projecting negative growth for Guinea and Sierra Leone, and less than half for Liberia.

Phillip Jeremy Hay, head of Communications of the World Bank for African Region, said that most of this economic impact comes not from the actual deaths, sickness, but from the fear factor.

"People are afraid to keep their businesses open, they are afraid to go to work, they're afraid to fly to the countries; they're afraid to let people from the affected countries leave and sell their goods," Hay said.

He added this results in an "economic quarantine" of sorts for these affected countries, and it has an enormous economic impact.

Meanwhile, Hay said that the economies of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, are not a large part of the West Africa output.

He said that if the governments and their partners can effectively stem the tide of the epidemic, there will be a likely impact on West Africa, but the impact could be truly devastating if outbreak is not brought under control.