Ebola outbreak: Nowhere is safe until virus is contained in Africa, claims the top doctor who beat it in Nigera
Charlie Cooper
IndependentUK
Tuesday 21 October 2014
No country in the world will be safe from Ebola as long as the outbreak continues in West Africa, the doctor who led Nigeria’s hugely successful containment of the virus has warned.
Africa’s most populous country was declared Ebola-free by the World Health Organisation on Monday, despite warnings of a potentially “apocalyptic urban outbreak” only three months ago.
The country’s response, which involved rapid, coordinated action by the government, health workers and aid agencies, along with meticulous tracing of people who had been in contact with Ebola patients, has been held up as an example to the world.
However Dr Faisal Shuaib, the incident manager for Nigeria’s Ebola response, told The Independent that Nigeria was still under threat, and that no state could afford to be complacent.
“Yes we have contained an outbreak, but there’s always a threat that we could be infected again by individuals travelling from affected states,” he said. “The outbreak in West Africa is two different stories, a success story in Nigeria, and a story of human tragedy [in the worst-affected states].
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