Sierra Leone is enforcing a three-day lockdown in an emergency measure to fight the Ebola epidemic.
People stocked up on food ahead of the nationwide shutdown.
Six million residents will be forced to stay in their homes while volunteers search door-to-door for Ebola victims.
"We believe this is the best way for now to identify those who are sick and remove them from those who are well," CNN quoted Sierra Leone Minister of Information Alhaji Alpha Kanu.
Health officials have prepared treatment centers in anticipation of the extra patients arriving during and after the shutdown.
"You know we have this three days shutdown, and you know most of these people - especially the suckling mothers, pregnant women and the aged," Moses S. Wilberforce, food coordinator for the Community Integrated and Development Organization and the UN's World Food Programme, said.
"Most of them are not employed so that is one way of helping them to get them set all right throughout the holidays," he explained.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organization said Ebola is spreading faster than before, with more than 700 cases emerging in West Africa in just one week.
The outbreak has killed more than 2,600 people so far, including more than 100 health care workers.
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