Nigeria contains Ebola, shuts schools till Oct 13

• Suspends summer classes

• Two more discharged, last case stable

• Dead health workers are heroes, says Chukwu

• Rep moves motion to immortalise Adedavoh

• Doctor's sister's tests negative

• Co-discoverer of virus decries slow response

WITH the survival of seven out of the 13 confirmed cases of the Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) in the country, including the index case, Mr. Patrick Sawyer, Nigeria has contained the virus with 61.5 per cent survival rate.

The Minister of Health, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu, at a press conference in Abuja Tuesday disclosed that the country had contained the EVD with two more patients discharged and the last one stable.

According to Chukwu, Nigeria has only one confirmed case of EVD, a secondary contact of Mr. Patrick Sawyer's and spouse of one of the physicians who participated in the management of the index case. But he said that she was stable and on treatment at the isolation ward in Lagos.

Taking further precautions against the spread of the disease, the Federal Government yesterday announced a new resumption date for public and private primary and secondary schools across the country.

The Minister of Education, Malam Ibrahim Shekarau, who made the announcement, declared that all the schools must remain closed until October 13, 2014.

The minister directed that all summer classes being conducted by some private schools across the country should be suspended with immediate effect until October 13.

At a press briefing in Abuja after a meeting with all the Commissioners of Education of the 36 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory, he stated that the new date became imperative to allow the Federal Government take adequate preventive measures against the spread of Ebola before the students resume.

He instructed all state Ministries of Education to immediately organise and ensure that at least two officials in each school, both public and private, are trained by appropriate health workers on how to handle any suspected case of Ebola.

All schools, he said, must also embark on immediate sensitisation of all teaching and non-teaching staff on preventive measures, adding that the training must be concluded not later than September 15, 2014.

Shekarau said that each state Ministry of Education should appoint a designated desk officer not later than September 1 who he explained should also receive appropriate training and must report on daily basis to the commissioner of education on situation in the schools.

"The names of such desk officers, their phone numbers and e-mail addresses should be communicated to the headquarters of the Federal Ministry of Education not later than September 1," he said.

In appreciation for Dr Ameyo Stella Adadevoh in containing the spread of the disease, a member of the House of Representatives, Nnaji Uzoamaka Peace, yesterday supported calls to immortalise the late doctor.

The lawmaker who represents Nkanu East/Nkanu West Federal Constituency of Enugu State expressed readiness to sponsor a motion aimed at urging the Federal Government to immortalise the late physician.

She said that but for the courageous role played by the late physician who stopped Sawyer from spreading it to the wider population, the death toll from the deadly Ebola virus in the country would have assumed a frightening dimension by now.

She noted: "My heart goes to all those affected by the deadly Ebola virus that was forced on us by this fellow called Sawyer. I am deeply concerned that we have to grapple with the reality of tackling a disease without a cure threatening our population that is the envy of other nations of the world.

"I have been imagining what would have become of our population by now without the heroic deeds of Ameyo Stella Adadevoh, the physician who brought her expertise to bear to curtail the disaster that could have befallen our dear nation.

"As a Nigerian, I feel pained that we have lost a rare gem alongside two of our promising nurses. She belonged to the rare breed of heroines who paid the supreme price to keep Nigerians alive today. She single-handedly stamped her foot on the ground to stop the devil incarnate from decimating our population.

"She belongs to the class of the late Funmilayo Anikulapo Ransome Kuti, Queen Amina, Margareth Ekpo, Gambo Sawaba and Prof. Dora Akunyili who put aside their self-interests to preserve their respective societies. Dr Adadevoh deserves to be immortalised. This explains my resolve to sponsor a motion to immortalise her. We need to keep her name evergreen in our memory so that future generation of Nigerians would be reminded of the essence of selfless service and a deep sense of patriotism that is fast-eluding our society today."

The Lagos State government yesterday said no fewer than 331 persons had been screened for Ebola. He warned residents against hiding their relatives with suspected symptoms of the deadly disease.

Among the 159 discharged with a clean bill of health is the late Adedavoh's sister, who was rumoured to have been infected.

The government, at a briefing on EVD yesterday, said the earlier suspected cases were reported, the better the chance of survival.

Out of the five deaths recorded in the state so far, three bodies were cremated while two were properly buried in line with global best practice, the state government said.

The state Commissioner for Health, Dr Jide Idris, told reporters that out of the 331 contacts so far screened since the Sawyer episode, 159 contacts had been cleared and discharged on completion of their 21-day surveillance.

In Rivers, the Oduoha community has fined the state Ministry of Health N300,000 for siting an Ebola quarantine centre there without their prior knowledge. Some irate youths and women have vowed to resist their elders' consent to grant the state government permission to locate an Ebola quarantine center in the community.

Following Monday's protest by scores of Oduoha youths against the location of an Ebola quarantine centre in the community, the state Commissioner of Health, Sampson Parker, yesterday led a delegation of officials of his ministry to meet with elders and chiefs of the community, primarily to explain government's decision to site the centre there.


Chukwu said yesterday that only 128 persons were now under surveillance, while others had been cleared after staying the mandatory 21 days under surveillance.

He insisted that all the reported cases of the EVD in Nigeria had their root in the index case, the late Sawyer. This, he said, was an indication that, thus far, Nigeria had contained the disease outbreak.

He reassured Nigerians and indeed the global community that the government would remain vigilant and would not relent as it continued to work with her partners to ensure that the disease was kept out of the country.

In a statement yesterday by his Special Assistant on Media and Communications, Mr. Dan Nwomeh, Chukwu said: "Today is the 38th day since the Ebola Virus Disease was imported into Nigeria by a Liberian-American.

"As of today, 26th August, 2014, Nigeria has had 13 cases of EVD including the index case.

"Of these 13, five, including the index case unfortunately did not survive the disease and are now late.

"However, seven of the infected persons were successfully managed at the isolation ward in Lagos and have been discharged home.

"Two of treated patients, a male doctor and a female nurse were discharged yesterday evening, 25th August, 2014 having satisfied the criteria for discharge."

The minister described those who died while attending to Sawyer as heroes and heroines, promising that they would not die in vain.

He also dispelled rumours that the sister of the late senior consultant at First Consultants Hospital was positive, stressing there was no truth in it.

He explained that the N1.9 billion announced by the president was not an Ebola fund, stressing that the approval was secured after the Ministry of Health prepared a budget to the Presidency.

Meanwhile, the Publicity Secretary of the People's Democratic Party, Olisa Metuh, yesterday donated N1 million to the efforts to tackle the disease and called on corporate bodies and individuals to support measures to contain the disease.

Also, the Minister of Information, Labaran Maku stressed the need for the country not to relax yet on the Ebola prevention efforts.

He said: "We should not relax because the disease is going down. Let us use this opportunity to promote public health. We should defeat the virus. We must work harder and keep on our eyes on the ball."

According to a draft document laying out the World Health Organisation's (WHO's) battle strategy, more than N73.1 billion ($430) million will be needed to bring the worst Ebola outbreak on record under control.

The WHO, in statement, yesterday, said the plan sets a goal of reversing the trend in new cases within two months, and stopping all transmission in six to nine months.

According to the document obtained by Bloomberg News, it requires funding by governments, development banks and the private sector .

The current outbreak, which has killed 1,427 people in Liberia, Guinea, Sierra Leone and Nigeria, may soon exceed all previous Ebola outbreaks combined. The sum now being sought is six times more than the N12 billion ($71 million) the WHO suggested was needed in a plan published less than a month ago.

There is reason to be concerned "about whether the proposed resources would be adequate," said Barry Bloom, a public health professor at Harvard University who also questioned whether the funds would be made available fast enough, and whether the organisation's latest plan "would ensure the expertise from WHO that is needed."

The WHO plans to publish the plan by the end of this week at the earliest and details may change, said Fadela Chaib, a spokeswoman for the Geneva-based agency. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon this month appointed health crisis expert David Nabarro to coordinate the UN response.

The Belgian scientist who co-discovered the Ebola virus in 1976, Peter Piot, yesterday castigated "the extraordinary slowness" of international organisations in responding to the outbreak.

Piot in an interview with French daily Liberation said: "The WHO only woke up in July, whereas the epidemic began in December last year and health experts sounded the alarm in early March. There is now leadership but it is late."

"We have never seen an (Ebola) epidemic on this scale," Piot was quoted by the French daily as saying. "In the last six months, we have been witnessing what can be described as a 'perfect storm' - everything is there for it to snowball.

"The epidemic is exploding in countries where health services are not functioning, ravaged by decades of civil war. In addition, the public is deeply suspicious of the authorities. Trust must be restored. Nothing can be done in an epidemic like Ebola if there is no trust."

Piot is former chief of the UN agency Joint United Nations Programme on AIDS (UNAIDS) and now director of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, one of the world's foremost centres of expertise on tropical disease.

Also, the European Commission and aid groups including Doctors Without Borders have criticised the WHO for a lack of leadership in coordinating the fight against the outbreak.

"Clearly WHO didn't foresee this outbreak and while the Ebola crisis was clear in March, it didn't act until August to declare an emergency," Bloom said in an e-mail.

J. Stephen Morrison, director of the global health policy centre at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, had a different view. The scale of the disease's devastation goes far beyond what health officials had seen previously, he said in a telephone interview.

It's not "a question of incompetence or complacency," according to Morrison, who said the WHO should be able to raise the money needed. "It's the fact we're catching up with the unknown, and it's way ahead of us."

Meanwhile, the United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) has deployed its largest emergency supply operation ever in a single month delivered to children caught in record number of crises including EVD.

According to a statement released yesterday by UNICEF, Liberia's effort to contain the Ebola outbreak has been strengthened by 248 MT of supplies from UNICEF such as latex gloves, safety goggles, and overalls to protect health workers, concentrated chlorine disinfectant and a range of essential medicines. UNICEF is also helping the government assess the country's supply chain capacity, which is strained by the crisis.