Nigerians not to celebrate over Ebola containment

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Barely 24 hours after the Federal Government announced that it has been able to contain the spread of the deadly Ebola Virus Disease (EVD), the federal government on Wednesday cautioned Nigerians not to celebrate yet as the country was still at risk of the deadly virus.
According to it, the country is not free of the public health hazard yet until the one patient currently undergoing treatment and a number of others under surveillance are certified free of the disease.
Minister of information Labaran Maku and his Health counterpart, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu, stated this after the weekly Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting presided over by President Goodluck Jonathan.
Addressing State House correspondents, Chukwu, who said he gave FEC an update on the fight against Ebola in the country as instructed by the president that he should do so in his weekly report, noted that 13 cases had been reported till date in the country.
He said: ?Let me just say that I don?t want us in Nigeria to move from panic to euphoria. The media has been working so well with us and we commend them for that but some of the headlines today (Wednesday) suggest that you may push the public to euphoria which again will be a problem.
?Yes, Nigeria is doing well on containment. Containment is like you have got an animal into a cage but it is not yet dead. But at least if you know where to now concentrate than when that animal was roaming. That is what we have achieved.
?We now know where the disease is in Nigeria. All of them so far in Nigeria have been traced to Mr. Patrick Sawyer. But we know there is nothing stopping someone coming with a fresh case from anywhere in the world.
?That?s why we say Nigeria has been successful with containment. But have we eliminated the disease? No. Because as we speak, there is a case we are still managing and that case must also have had her own third degree contacts apart from the number of people that are still under surveillance.
?So, until we give a clean bill of health to every contact, we cannot really say that we have eliminated the disease?.
The minister added that by Wednesday, five persons had died including four Nigerians, seven had been managed successfully and discharged while one person remained under treatment.

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