60 People Who Made Contact With Doctor Infected With Ebola Yet To Be Found

The Rivers State government has said about 60 people, out of close to 200 that had primary and secondary contacts with the late Dr Ikechukwu Sam Enemuo, who died of Ebola virus disease (EVD) in Port Harcourt, the state capital, are yet to be found.

Also, the state government has placed a ban on the movement of corpses within and outside the state without death certificates and explanations on the cause of such deaths, and has directed the police to demand such documents from ambulances conveying such corpses in the state.

This is as the state governor, Rt. Hon. Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, will today meet with leaders of churches in the state, while a meeting with the traditional rulers will hold tomorrow, Tuesday, over the spread of the Ebola virus in the state.

The state commissioner for health, Dr Sampson Parker, who addressed journalists in Port Harcourt yesterday, said about 50 high-risk contacts had been indentified among those that had primary contacts with the late doctor.

Parker stated that three of the people who had contacts with late Enemuo, including two staff of his hospital, Sam-Steel Clinic, and a staff of the Good Heart Hospital, where he died, had been moved to the treatment centre at Edoha community in Emohua local government area of the state.

He said, “Also, movement of corpses within and outside the state must be supervised; there must be death certificates and we must know the cause of the death. So, you cannot just move corpses here and there without clearance from the Ministry of Health. In fact, the police will stop you and ask for clearance. Before corpses are released from the mortuary, even the attendants will ask for the documents; before they come in and before they are released.

“The governor will meet with church leaders tomorrow — all church leaders in Rivers. He will meet them by 10am. He will in the same vein meet with all traditional rulers on Tuesday by 10am. I have been telling you before now that almost 200 persons have been traced. I keep on telling you that; that is because, out of this number, we are still to be in touch with about 60 of them. I will explain the reason later.

“But 50 high-risk contacts have been identified. Quickly, the reason why I said so is because a lot of the news, stigma, and all the rest, these persons are not coming up; we are still on them. In fact, we are concentrating on these names that we have found, and still going for new ones. Every day, it improves; it is getting better by the day.

“We now have three persons at the treatment centre at Edoha; a pharmacist at Sam-Steel Hospital and doctor that worked with Dr Enemuo at that Sam-Steel Hospital, and also a lady that was at the Good Heart Hospital while Dr Enemuo was there. However, they have not been confirmed; we are waiting for the result of the investigation. Today, we should have them. Also, let me quickly tell you that Mrs Enemuo is in a stable condition in Lagos. I am telling you these so that people will know that this is not a death sentence and come out.”

The commissioner advised worship centres against maintaining admission wards in the premises, as well as laying hands on people who may have had contact with Enemuo, and appealed to all those who had contacts with the late doctor or visited Sam-Steel Clinic, Good Heart Hospital and Mandate Garden Hotels to report to the Ministry of Health for checks.

Parker said, “At this point, I must tell you that most of them that came up early survived; only the ones that hid, going from one church to the other until they deteoriated so much that passed on. We must let the public know that anyone who had primary or secondary contact with Dr Enemuo or the clinics and hotel should voluntarily come out and contact us. It doesn’t mean that you are infested; all we need to do is just to observe you, and if there is anything you let us know.

“The chances of survival are very high. None of those that came up in Lagos had issues; most of them were cleared. It is important the churches don’t keep admission wards in their churches; some of them are running to churches and groups of them are laying hands on them without knowing.”

 ‘Hold Jonathan responsible if Ebola cases worsen in Nigeria’
The All Progressives Congress (APC) has said Nigerians must hold President Goodluck Jonathan personally responsible if the Ebola virus disease spreads more than it has done in the country, after he failed to stop a rally in his support in Port Harcourt on Saturday despite warnings from individuals and groups.
In a statement issued on Sunday in Lagos by its national publicity secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said never before has a president of a country sabotaged his own administration’s policy and endangered the lives of his compatriots as President Jonathan has done over the issue of Ebola.

It said the same president who declared a national emergency on Ebola and advised against large gatherings to prevent the spread of the virus was the first to flout his own advice by his failure to stop the rally by the so-called Transformation Ambassadors of Nigeria (TAN) in Port Harcourt, a few days after the virus was detected in the city and at a time that contact tracing was going on to find all those who may have had contact with the medical doctor victim of the disease.

‘’On the altar of political desperation, President Jonathan put the lives of Nigerians in danger. In order to realize his ambition for re-election, President Jonathan has shown he is ready to sacrifice as many lives of Nigerians as possible. There goes the president’s statement that his political ambition is not worth the blood of any Nigerian. This president simply says what he doesn’t mean.

‘’As we said in our statement of Aug. 28th, 2014, calling on President Jonathan to halt the TAN rallies, especially the one in Port Harcourt, could anyone guarantee that none of those who have had contact with the medical doctor who died of the disease will attend the rally? That is why we are calling on Nigerians to hold the president responsible if Ebola spreads more than it has in the country,’’ APC said.
The party said shortly after it made the call for a halt to the TAN rallies, others, including the NBA and Prof. Itse Sagay, in a clearly patriotic duty, issued similar calls.’’In fact, the APC in Rivers described such a rally most appropriately as a ‘firing squad against the people’. But because he will rather be re-elected than give a damn over the safety of the same people who voted him into office, because he will rather transmogrify than transform, President Jonathan ignored all the calls and allowed the rally to hold. This is an unprecedented act of political desperation,’’ it said.

APC said for those who might try to spin the issue by saying the president has no control over the organizers of the rally, they should be asked who the rallies will benefit, whose top officials, including secretary to the government Anyim Pius Anyim, have been attending the rallies and what is the source of the funding of the gatherings.

‘’The TAN rallies are government-sanctioned.

“The TAN rallies are the Jonathan administration’s cunning way of beating the INEC ban on campaigns for next year’s general elections.

“The TAN rallies highlight the impunity of the Jonathan Administration. President Jonathan is the sole beneficiary. He can stop the rallies today, if only he wants to put the nation’s interest above his own personal interest,’’ the party said.

Ebola: No Passenger Checks At PH Airport –TUC
The Trade Union Congress (TUC) has chided the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) and the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) for their inability to put something in place to check passengers entering and leaving the Port Harcourt International Airport, Omagwa.

Chairman of TUC in Rivers State Comrade Hyginus Chika Onuegbu, in a statement issued in Port Harcourt yesterday, expressed shock that despite the confirmation of outbreak of Ebola virus disease (EVD) in parts of Nigeria, the airport does not have even a temperature check device.

Onuegbu said if the authorities of FAAN were up and doing, the diplomat and staff of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), Olu Ibikunle Koye, who imported Ebola from Lagos to Port Harcourt, would have been detected.

He therefore appealed to the minister of health, Professor Onyebuchi Chukwu, and his counterpart in the Ministry of Aviation, Chief Osita Chidoka, to ensure that the complete facilities and processes employed at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, were fully deployed to the two airports in Port Harcourt.

The statement reads in part: “The Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC), Rivers State, is shocked that despite the confirmation of Ebola virus disease(EVD) in Rivers State the authorities of Port Harcourt International Airport have not put anything in place to check passengers entering and leaving the airport. Not even the temperature check device is in the airport.

“We view this as callous and irresponsible and immediately call on the authorities of FAAN, NCAA and all agencies in the Port Harcourt International Airport to immediately ensure that they check all passengers entering and leaving the airport. We are tempted to think that if the authorities of FAAN in Port Harcourt were up and doing, perhaps the diplomat that imported Ebola from Lagos to Port Harcourt may have been detected.

“We appeal to the hon. ministers for health and aviation to immediately ensure that the complete facilities and processes employed at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, are fully deployed to the two airports in Port Harcourt.”

FG Summons Emergency Health Council Meeting
The federal government has summoned an emergency health council meeting, which comprises all state commissioners for health and the FCT in Abuja tomorrow.

Sources said this became necessary following the almost gradual “importation” of the Ebola virus disease in some states in the country, as the recent recorded cases in Port Harcourt have shown.
Meanwhile, this is the second emergency Health Council meeting to be summoned by the minister of health, Prof Onyebuchi Chukwu, within a month, following the earlier scheduled one-day meeting which held late into the night on August 11.

The minister of health had, on Wednesday last week, announced during a press briefing on Ebola update that the nation had successfully contained the virus.

However, the next day, Thursday, news broke that one of the primary contacts of the index case, Liberian-American Patrick Sawyer, had sneaked into Port Harcourt, despite being under surveillance, to get medical treatment.

But arising from its one-day emergency meeting on August 11, the National Health Council came out with a communiqué, which among others directed further engagement between the Federal Ministry of Health and states with peculiar security challenges, including Adamawa, Bauchi, Borno, Kano, Taraba and Yobe, to discuss challenges and proffer solutions to address Ebola.

The Port Health Services division of the Federal Ministry of Health was also directed to provide and ensure the implementation of guidelines for cross-border monitoring of EVD, particularly in riverine areas and states with international borders, and states that have riverine areas are to ensure the provision of boat ambulances suitable for EVD control.

State governments were asked to institutionalise communication strategy to ensure mass awareness creation and sensitisation for individuals and communities on EVD.

It also directed that particular attention should be paid to vulnerable groups such as market women and other women groups, patent medicine vendors, road transport workers, fishermen in the riverine areas, hunters and bush-meat sellers, school children, morticians and mortuary attendants, traditional healers and faith-based groups.

Though Council observed that emergency operations centres remained the responsibility of the federal government, it urged states to establish communication channels as necessary that will address general and peculiar needs in each state/FCT.

It also directed that the federal government should assist states to establish isolation tents that would cater for at least 20 people.

According to the communiqué, though ideally all corpses should be accompanied with death certificates, all states are to be encouraged to have legislation to support this resolution, while the corpses of all persons confirmed to have died of EVD must be buried according to standard WHO protocol.

It further directed that the transportation of corpses into Nigeria as well as inter-state transportation be banned until further notice except with approved waivers that may be issued by the Federal Ministry of Health.

No reported case of re-infection in Nigeria – Minister
Nigerian minister of state for health Dr Haliru Alhassan yesterday in sokoto debunked fears that there could be a re-infection of the deadly Ebola disease after treatment.

The minister, who stated that only 13 cases of the ailment have so far been laboratorily confirmed in Nigeria, also urged Nigerians not to completely give up. Nigeria is prepared for any eventuality, he said. The minister however appealed to Nigerians to remain careful as the government is on top of the situation.

According to Dr Alhasan, only six out of the 13 cases laboratorily identified in Nigeria died of the Ebola virus; the remaining seven were discharged after receiving and responding to medical attention.
The minister further cautioned Nigerians on healthy living, even as he warned that the nation was not yet done with the virus completely.

“We have been able to curtail the Ebola in Lagos; sadly, it went to Port Harcourt but we are on top of the situation. But Nigerians should note that we are still not yet out of the woods. They should still be cautious. There are possibilities of other new cases that may come but we are prepared,” Dr Haliru assured Nigerians.

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