The United States Center for Disease Control and Prevention,CDC, has sent personnel to Nigeria to study how the West African nation contained the killer Ebola Virus Disease (EVD).
This comes after the first case of Ebola was diagnosed on American soil, the US officials are expected to arrive Nigeria Thursday which it claimed had the best practices in combating Ebola Virus disease.
The United Stated on Tuesday, September 30, 2014 reported its first confirmed case of Ebola diagnosed within the country. Previous cases in the country were of Americans diagnosed in West Africa and taken home for treatment.
The patient has been placed on “strict isolation” at the Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital of Dallas in Texas.
A statement released by US CDC Director, Tom Frieden, said “it’s clear the nation needs a quick and thorough response to its first Ebola patient”
Frieden said Nigeria’s extensive response to a single case of Ebola shows that control is possible with rapid, focused interventions. He said Senegal will also be visited for study.
He said “the best practices in Nigeria and Senegal suggest the U.S. should monitor all individuals who may have been exposed to Ebola and establish a dedicated management and response system.”
According to US CDC, “Nigeria’s first reported case of Ebola surfaced July 20, when Patrick Sawyer landed in Lagos from Liberia and exposed 72 other passengers to the virus. Nigeria’s Health officials quickly issued notifications and tracked everybody who may have been in contact with Sawyer.
“Nigeria also established an Ebola Incident Management Center to handle the potential outbreak and developed a staffing plan that executed a social mobilization strategy that reached more than 26,000 households of people living around the contacts of Ebola patients.”
The deadly virus has killed more than 3,000 people in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia in the largest outbreak ever recorded.
Senegal is free of Ebola having had no new reported cases of Ebola since September 18.
Nigeria has also been declared Ebola free by the health ministry as no new case has been reported since August 31.
