The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC) has identified and isolated 53 primary contacts linked to Nigeria’s first confirmed case of Ebola virus disease in the current outbreak.
Jide Idris, Director-General of the NCDC, disclosed this at a press briefing on Sunday, saying seven additional contacts had been traced and isolated.
According to Idris, 44 of the contacts were identified from the health facility where the patient was treated, while nine others were traced through further contact investigations.
“As of now, we have 53 primary contacts. These comprise 44 people from the health facility where the patient was treated and nine additional contacts,” Idris said.
He said the additional contacts included people who attended to the patient at Julius Berger Clinic in Abuja before she was transferred to Nizamiye Hospital, where she was diagnosed with Ebola.
“Of the nine additional contacts, three are household members of the patient, her driver, chef, and husband. Three others attended to her at Julius Berger Clinic before she got to the other facility, while the remaining three were members of the team who went to collect samples,” he said.
Idris said none of the 53 isolated contacts had tested positive for the virus as of Sunday.
Read Also: Ebola: Expert seeks early diagnosis, comprehensive contact tracing
He also said a suspected Ebola case in Rivers State had tested negative, ruling out the infection in that case.
The confirmed patient, a 42-year-old woman born in Uganda and married to a Swiss diplomat, tested positive for the Bundibugyo strain of Ebola virus disease on October 20.
She arrived in Nigeria from Uganda on October 3.
The Minister of Health, Ali Pate, had said genomic analysis showed that the virus detected in Nigeria was highly similar to a case previously reported in Kenya.
Pate said the findings raised the possibility that the patient may have come into contact with a Kenyan man at an airport in Uganda. The Kenyan national later died after arriving in Nairobi.
However, Uganda’s Ministry of Health denied that the virus was exported from the country to Nigeria, maintaining that Uganda remained Ebola-free following its declaration by the World Health Organisation in August.
The NCDC has continued contact tracing and monitoring of people linked to the confirmed case as part of efforts to contain the outbreak.
