Kenya Sends Home First 20 Ebola Contacts as Cases Hold at Nine, Two Deaths
The Health Ministry says 98 more people remain in quarantine and Kenya needs 42 days with no new case before the outbreak can be declared over. Churches were asked early on to help spread prevention advice.
See where this is ›NAIROBI, Kenya —
Kenya's Ministry of Health on Monday, Oct. 26, released the first 20 people who had been held in quarantine after contact with Ebola patients. Health Director-General Dr. Patrick Amoth said all 20 finished the required 21 days of monitoring with no symptoms. The country's count stayed at nine confirmed cases, two of them fatal.
Amoth said each person was checked against strict discharge rules and found in good health, and he asked communities to welcome them home. “They do not pose any risk to their families, colleagues or neighbors,” he said in a statement reported by Xinhua. The other 98 contacts are to be released in four groups beginning Nov. 3, depending on each person's health checks, The Standard reported.
See where this is ›Kenya's first case, confirmed Oct. 6, was a Kenyan man who traveled from the Democratic Republic of the Congo through Uganda and flew into Nairobi on Oct. 3, the World Health Organization said. He died Oct. 5. WHO said the eight later cases are all linked to him, four family members and four health and care workers, and all were already in quarantine when they fell ill. The second death, announced Oct. 23, was a 65-year-old woman who was a close relative of the first patient, Al Jazeera reported. The other seven patients are stable and in treatment.
The outbreak is Bundibugyo virus disease, a form of Ebola. The ministry said genetic testing of three of the nine samples tied them directly to the first case and to the Bundibugyo strain circulating in Congo; six samples are still being tested.
See where this is ›Health Cabinet Secretary Aden Duale told Citizen TV's Sunday Live program that about 551 people had been tested in the previous 48 hours, all negative, and that the last positive case was recorded Oct. 19, Capital FM reported. “Once we have 42 days and we have nobody, Kenya will be declared Ebola-free,” Duale said. Amoth said that 42-day count starts only after the last patient tests negative twice, at least 48 hours apart, and is discharged or safely buried.
Early in the outbreak, the Health Ministry asked churches to help raise awareness, promote prevention and encourage people to report suspected cases quickly, Africanews reported Oct. 10. The ministry says travel, trade and public gatherings remain unrestricted. It urges anyone with fever, unusual tiredness, muscle or joint pain, sore throat, vomiting, diarrhea or unexplained bleeding, especially after possible exposure or travel to Congo, to seek care and tell health workers where they have been.
The wider outbreak began in Congo, which declared its 17th Ebola outbreak in May and has reported more than 9,000 cases and more than 4,600 deaths, according to Al Jazeera. Nigeria has reported a case that health officials there said is closely related to the virus found in Kenya's first patient, and Uganda has barred travelers coming from Congo from passing through the country.
