Ebola: South-West govs meet as Lagos state matron dies

South-West governors on Wednesday rose from a meeting in Lagos and called on the Federal Government to   stop   the spread of the deadly Ebola virus.

Before that,   the Minsiter of Health, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu and the Lagos State Commissioner for Health, Dr. Jide Idris, announced at separate news conferences that the matron of the Lagos hospital where a Liberian-born American, Patrick Sawyer, was admitted, died on Tuesday afternoon.

The matron whose name was not given by   Chukwu,and   Idris,   was reported by the media on Wednesday to have shown the symptoms of the virus.

She was among the health workers that attended to Sawyer who died in the Lagos hospital on July 25 and officially, the first Nigerian casualty.

The matron had been quarantined alongside seven others at the Infectious Diseases Hospital, Yaba, Lagos for close monitoring.

One of them, a female medical doctor, who also attended to Sawyer, had also contracted the disease.

About 59 people were reported to have had direct or primary contacts with the Liberian-American. Twenty seven others who had secondary contacts with the primary contacts had been traced.

Chukwu, while announcing the death of the Lagos matron   confirmed seven other Ebola cases, Idris called on religious groups in the state to stop all gatherings until a solution   to Ebola outbreak was found.

The South-West governors first met behind closed-doors   at the Lagos House, Ikeja, and later   with commissioners for Health in the zone.

In attendance were the host Governor,     Babatunde Fashola;   Olusegun Mimiko(Ondo);   Ibikunle Amosun(Ogun); Kayode Fayemi(Ekiti); and the Deputy Governor of Oyo State, Moses Adeyemo.

They said the Federal Government must assist the states by ensuring that all the nation’s borders in the zone were effectively policed to ensure that Ebola virus did not get into their states.

Fashola, at a news conference said the meeting afforded them the opportunity to share experiences and seek collaborative efforts   to prevent the spread of the virus in the zone.

He said, “The meeting addressed issues of containment and the challenges of illegal borders.

“We also discussed possible support by the Federal Government and coordination among states. We feel that it is imperative that our collaboration suggests to us that Nigerians should not panic and that we would overcome this with the very best practices and collaboration.

“It is important therefore that advocacy must continue about what the risks are and the sources are.”

Amosun said Ogun State was overwhelmed and was short of manpower and material to effectively man its over 100 illegal borders   where foreigners enter the state with ease.

He said, “We are more prone and more at risk to Ebola virus and we have put all our security agencies and the respective medics at these illegal borders.

“But when you have in excess of 100, you and I know that the state doesn’t have the capacity to   man these borders.

Mimiko   said the onus lay on every Nigerian to ensure that foreigners did not have unfettered access into the country.

“Every Nigerian should know that those who aid and abet illegal entry into Nigeria now could be up to something that could be dangerous to the health of the country.”

Fayemi spoke on the possibility of Nigeria seeking the assistance of the United States   for ZMapp, an experimental drug for the treatment of the EVD.

He said, “The drug has not been certified as a cure for the disease; however, the Federal Government can try out its efficacy in a controlled centre.”

FG confirms seven Ebola cases

The Health minister, at a news conference in Abuja on Wednesday,   said, “Nigeria has now recorded seven confirmed cases of EVD.

“The first one was the index case, which is the imported case from Liberia of which the victim(Sawyer) is now late.

“On August 5, 2014, the first known Nigerian to die of the EVD was recorded and this was one of the nurses that attended to the Liberian.

“The other five cases are currently being treated at an isolation ward in Lagos.”

He   added that all the Nigerians diagnosed were primary contacts of the index case.

Chukwu also announced the appointment of Prof. O. Onajole of the Lagos University Teaching Hospital as the director, Communication and Community Mobilisation. for the EVD.

He   pledged to visit Lagos within the week, in company with his colleagues in the Ministry of Information, to assess the situation on the ground.

He added that the 24/7 Emergency Operations Centre   planned by the government would be fully functional by tomorrow (Thursday) . Dr. Faisal Shuaibu will be the Incident Manager of the centre.

Shuaibu was expected to   lead a six-member inter-agency team, drawn from the National Primary Health Care Development Agency, the US CDC, the WHO, UNICEF and the Bill and Medinda Gates Foundation to Lagos to complete the setting up of the centre.

Chukwu said the team would be joined by other personnel from the Lagos State Government,     federal hospitals in the state and the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control.

He added, “We are embarking on recruiting additional health personnel to strengthen the team who are currently managing the situation in Lagos.

“We are making arrangements to procure isolation tents to quicken the pace of providing isolation wards in all the states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory.

“We are also setting up a special team to provide counselling and psychosocial support to patients, identified contacts and their families.”

The minister reassured Nigerians that the government was working hard to ensure the containment of the outbreak.

Chukwu   later told State House correspondents after the Federal Executive Council meeting in Abuja, that he had requested the experimental drug being used to treat two   American missionary doctors infected with the virus in Liberia from the US Centre for Disease Control.

The minister, who also shed light on the isolation tents, said as of the time he was briefing journalists, he had yet to receive a response from the USCDC.

Chukwu   explained that the isolation tents would be used to cater for those who might be quarantined because of the virus.

This, he said, had become necessary because residents were raising objection to housing the patients close to them.

He put the cost of one isolation tent at about N20m.

“We have a national emergency. Indeed, everyone in the world is at risk. Nobody is immune. The Nigerian experience had alerted the world because every country is connected by flights,” the minister said.

The minister also said the government had decided to embark on mass recruitment of health personnel to strenghten the team managing the outbreak in Lagos.

He expressed the hope that the Nigeria Medical Association would soon call off its strike to join in the emergency service since government had met almost all their demands.

Chukwu warned members of the public to stop wearing gloves as a way of stopping the spread of the virus, saying such practice could further compound the situation.

He however advised them to avoid handshake as much as possible if they could afford it, describing the virus as both contagious and infectious.

He said the virus could also be contracted through the sharing of bedspreads, pillow cases and towels among other personal effects with infected persons.

Chukwu also said a website, www.ebolaalert.org, had been designed to offer information on the virus.

While disclosing the existence of a Twitter handle, @ebolaalert, the minister added that help could also be reached through a designated toll-free telephone line .

Ebola outbreak, national emergency –FG

The Federal Government also said on Wednesday     that the   Ebola outbreak   had become a matter of national emergency.

The Minister of Information, Mr. Labaran Maku;   made government’s position known while also briefing journalists on the outcome of the FEC meeting

Maku said the meeting was devoted to the measures being taken by government to deal with the outbreak of the virus.

He recalled that the council had set up a committee about two weeks ago to sensitise Nigerians to avoid unhealthy practices.

Lagos to offer life insurance cover to doctors, others

In Lagos,   Idris told journalists that the matron, who also contracted the EVD while participating in managing Sawyer died at about 2.06pm on Tuesday.

The commissioner added, ‘In all, eight people came in contact with Sawyer, comprising the dead matron, the doctor on admission at the IDH, the four new victims and two other people, whose medical test results are being awaited. Two of the four new victims are critically ill.”

Idris said that 27 people who came into   contact with those on admission at the IDH had as of Tuesday been traced.

When asked what government intended to do concerning the traced secondary contacts, he replied, “ We cannot isolate these 27 secondary contacts because they are not showing symptoms yet, they are just contacts.

“What we can do for now is to monitor them; take their blood samples for testing and check their temperature daily. If any one of them starts showing symptoms, then we will take him or her   to the hospital.”

He called on volunteers to help the state in tracing more secondary contacts and in managing the established cases since the situation was “a dire emergency.”

The   commissioner said the state was presently facing a shortage of   health workers needed to attend to those that had been infected and   more of those that might   be isolated for monitoring.

He disclosed that the government would   offer life insurance cover to those     who volunteered to work with experts monitoring and testing suspected Ebola cases.

Idris said, “We will provide   life insurance cover for any doctor, nurse and other experts that want to work with isolated patients.

“We need more hands, because we have moved from the stage of primary contacts to secondary contacts.We are tracing all the people that had contacts not just with Sawyer, but those that had contacts with the health workers and others that have died. We have identified 27 secondary contacts already and we are tracing the addresses of others.

“ it is a tedious task, because we will also be taking their blood samples for testing and we will be monitoring them.

“We are appealing to the doctors on strike to resume work and set aside their grievances. This situation is a dire emergency and our health professionals must recognise that.

“It will be morally unjustifiable for us to call for help from the international community if our own experts and doctors are not working.”

Idris added that the government would   evacuate tuberculosis patients at the IDH to another hospital to accommodate more suspected and isolated Ebola cases.

He said, “ The TB patients at Mainland hospital were protesting this(Wednesday) morning but we made them to understand that if they stayed there, they might be exposed to Ebola virus .

“If we need to evacuate any hospital to ensure that we contain this(Ebola) disease, we will do it. If we have to take suspected cases to LASUTH, we will do it. If we need to take decisions that will inconvenience     some people but beneficial to the larger population, we will do it because Ebola is a highly infectious disease.”

Religious groups advised to stop gatherings

The commissioner also advised religious groups in the state to stop all planned gatherings until a solution   to the Ebola outbreak was found.

Idris, who noted that such gatherings usually involved people from outside the country, said the advice was in public interest.

He said, “We are worried that a gathering of a large group of people would not be the best at this period. Those churches and Islamic associations that are planning large gatherings should stop for now.

“When we heard that there was a convention going on at the Redemption Camp of the Redeemed Christian Church of God in Ogun State, we went there to check.

“We were impressed with what was on the ground because of the outbreak. There were sanitisers everywhere, doctors and other health workers were on standby. The General Overseer(Pastor Enoch Adeboye) also took time to educate people on the virus and what could be done to prevent it.

“We also went to Synagogue church when we heard that they were planning a conference on Ebola. But the truth is that there was nothing like that. The founder(TB Joshua) told us that he was planning to travel out. He also promised to cooperate with the government.

“But the best thing is that any form of large gathering must stop for now.”