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Ebola spreads to Nigeria, prompts international response
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The Ebola virus outbreak in West Africa has spread to Nigeria, where nine suspected cases and one death have been reported, according to WHO.
As of Aug. 4, there have been 1,711 cases of Ebola and 932 deaths throughout Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea and Nigeria.
At press time, WHO is slated to convene an International Health Regulations (IHR) emergency committee meeting to determine whether the outbreak constitutes a Public Health Emergency of International Concern.
As a result of the outbreak, the Peace Corps and other organizations are pulling its volunteers from the region. In addition, the CDC has issued a Level 3 travel advisory that recommends against non-essential travel to West Africa. It also has issued interim guidance about Ebola for airline flight crews, cleaning personnel and cargo personnel.
The two American patients with Ebola, Kent Brantly, MD, and Nancy Writebol, arrived in the United States earlier in the month. Brantly and Writebol both contracted Ebola in Liberia, where they were doing missionary work through the Samaritan’s Purse organization. They will receive care at a special isolation unit at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta.
“This special isolation unit was previously developed to treat patients who are exposed to certain serious infectious diseases,” according to a statement from Emory. “It is physically separate from other patient areas and has unique equipment and infrastructure that provide an extraordinarily high level of clinical isolation.”
The unit was created in collaboration with the CDC to house CDC scientists and others who are exposed to infectious diseases while traveling abroad.
Ebola virus poses very little risk to the general United States population, and the likelihood of the outbreak in West Africa spreading outside of that region is very low, according to the CDC.
“This is the largest Ebola outbreak in history and the first in West Africa,” Stephan Monroe, PhD, deputy director of CDC’s National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, said during a media briefing. “It’s a rapidly changing situation and we expect that there will be more cases in these countries in the coming weeks. The response to this outbreak will be more of a marathon rather than a sprint.”
Monroe said Ebola transmission is through direct contact with bodily fluid of an infected person or exposure to contaminated objects such as needles. Individuals who are not symptomatic are not contagious. Although it is possible someone could become infected and travel from West Africa to the United States, it is unlikely that the disease will spread to other passengers because it is spread only through direct contact.
Nevertheless, the CDC sent a Health Alert Network notice to remind health care providers of the importance of taking steps to prevent the spread of illness, including: taking travel history to identify travel to West Africa within the past 3 weeks; knowing the symptoms of Ebola, which include fever, headache, joint and muscle aches, weakness, diarrhea, vomiting, stomach pain and lack of appetite; and knowing what to do when patients have Ebola symptoms, including isolation of the patient and implementation of infection control precautions.