A Liberian national who was picked up at the airport and transported
to the Isolation Unit of the Mainland Hospital, Yaba, Lagos, has been
discharged after he tested negative to the Ebola Virus Disease.
The unnamed Liberian was discharged on Tuesday, August 19 .
This was disclosed at a press conference held on Wednesday, by Jide Idris, the Lagos State Health Commissioner.
According to him, six people are currently in the hospital’s
Isolation Ward, while the contact tracing team are combing every nook
and cranny of the state in search of more suspected cases, adding that
the chances of getting new cases are still high due to Lagos population.
Dr. Idris said: “
Contact tracing activity is now vigorous and
that’s the major area of containment so we are going to harp on it
because that’s the only way you can prevent spread into the major
population.”
“
The contact tracing team are very active. They are proactive
now. We are getting more vehicles now to get more teams, they are
training more people to join the teams. Because, let’s not kid
ourselves,
with our population, we don’t know, we pray not, but again we
want to err on the side of caution.”
He therefore urged the public to report new suspected cases.
Patrick Sawyer, a Liberian-American, imported the deadly Ebola virus into Nigeria, last month, and so far five people have died.
Reports surfaced today from the Lagos State authorities that there are new suspected cases as five people with the symptoms of Ebola were brought to the Yaba Mainland Hospital in Lagos and a Liberian was among the five.
Meanwhile, recent data from the World Health Organization on Ebola
shows that there are now 2,240 cases confirmed and 1,229 recorded
deaths since its outbreak in West Africa.
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