The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC) has ruled out Ebola in two suspected cases identified in Yola, Adamawa State, after both samples tested negative.
In a statement on Saturday evening signed by its Director-General, Jide Idris, the agency said the two individuals presented with symptoms suggestive of the disease on 30 October. It had earlier announced that two suspected cases were found in the North-East without naming the state.
“Fortunately, the samples turned out negative for EVD after two rounds of testing,” Idris said.
He stated that there is currently no laboratory-confirmed Ebola case in Adamawa. The index case earlier confirmed in the Federal Capital Territory, he added, remains the only confirmed case in Nigeria to date.
Premium Times, which obtained exclusive details, reported that the two suspected cases were a 34-year-old pilot and his wife, a medical doctor.
Background
The development comes 11 days after Nigeria confirmed its first case of Ebola disease caused by the Bundibugyo virus. The patient, a woman who travelled from Uganda to Abuja, tested positive on 20 October and was subsequently evacuated to Switzerland for treatment.
The NCDC’s latest situation report shows that 62 contacts linked to the case have been identified and are under monitoring.
Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Muhammad Pate, had said genomic analysis showed the virus found in the Nigerian patient is closely related to the strain identified in Kenya’s first imported case. He, however, noted that this does not establish that the patient was infected in Kenya.
Nigeria is among five countries to have detected Bundibugyo virus disease in the current outbreak, which began in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in May. According to the World Health Organization’s latest update, the DRC had recorded 10,274 confirmed cases and 4,992 deaths as of 28 October, while Kenya has nine confirmed cases and two deaths.
