Dr. Akindele Akintayo, the Senior Registrar of the National Orthopedic Hospital Igbobi has disclosed that apart from the Liberian-American, late Patrick Sawyer, who spread the dreaded virus Ebola, there is another Liberian presently receiving treatment in Nigeria for the same reason.
He disclosed this while responding to questions this morning on Channels Television program, Sunrise Daily.
He said “You need to know that there is another liberian patient under observation that is being treated for Ebola in an Infectious Disease Hospital Lagos.
“Am not very sure if he is a new case or had contact with Patrick Sawyer,” he explained.
He called for awareness in communities to make sure that the virus would not spread to other parts of the states.
He also said that infected dead victims should be cremated to avoid the transmission of the virus, saying that even the dead can transmit Ebola.
According to report, a lot of people contacted the virus during burials in Liberia, just like Late Patrick Sawyer who contracted the virus during his late sister’s burial.
HE also warned that people discharged of Ebola should be monitored, and still be giving care as they can still transmit the virus to anyone they go in contact with.
The Liberian Government was aware that Patrick Sawyer, its citizen who brought the Ebola virus into Nigeria, had possibly contracted the virus from his late sister, yet cleared him to travel to Nigeria for a conference organised by the Economic Community of West African States [ECOWAS], PREMIUM TIMES can authoritatively report today.
Patrick Sawyer
Documents obtained by this newspaper showed that Mr. Sawyer’s employers, ArcelorMittal, an iron mining company, suspended him from work and isolated him after it became aware that he had contact with his sister who died of the virus on July 8.
The company also issued an internal memo to staff of the company informing them that Mr. Sawyer had been referred to the Liberian Health ministry for testing and close observation.
“A family member of an ArcelorMittal Liberia employee died on Tuesday, July 8th, in Monrovia due to a confirmed case of the Ebola virus,” the July 11 edition of Satellite, an internal newsletter of ArcelorMittal Liberia, said. “The employee had minimal contact with the victim, at the state where the virus was infectious.
“Doctors say the risk of potential transfer to any member of the ArcelorMittal staff or contractors is very low. The employee has submitted to the Ministry of Health for a medical examination for possible Ebola infection, and has also requested the Ministry of Health to make the result available to ArcelorMittal Liberia and its close affiliates.
“There is no evidence to suggest that the employee has been infected. Under the Ministry of Health guidelines, the employee is being monitored on a daily basis and will continue to do so for a period of 21 days. During this time the employee will be absent from work.”
The July 25 edition of the Satellite which announced Mr. Sawyer’s death reads:
“Patrick was last at the Buchanan site (of AncelorMittal) on 9th July when he informed us about the death of his sister. Having informed us of this news, Patrick was submitted to the Ministry of Health for a medical observation and isolation and requested not to return to work until he had passed through the incubation period. He has not been at the Buchanan site or in any ArcelorMittal office since that time.”
But despite being under isolation and observation for the deadly disease, the Liberian Government, through its Deputy Finance Minister For Fiscal Affairs, Sebastian Muah, cleared Mr. Sawyer to travel to Nigeria for an ECOWAS convention in Calabar.
The deputy minister personally admitted approving the trip in an online discussion forum where some Liberian citizens raised questions about his action and competence.
Mr. Muah could not be reached for comments on Monday. His mobile telephone was switched off the numerous times PREMIUM TIMES called.
But the Liberian Minister of Information, Lewis Brown, admitted to this newspaper that his government knew Mr. Sawyer was possibly infected by the virus before he travelled to Nigeria.
“I can confirm to you that he was advised by the Chief Medical Officer at the Ministry of Health not to leave the country because he was under observation,” Mr. Brown said by telephone from Monrovia, the Liberian capital. “It was regrettable that he left the country while being observed.
“We felt he had a duty to his colleagues to tell them that he was under observation for the disease. We also felt he had a duty to our country and yours (Nigeria) not to leave Liberia so as not to endanger the lives of others.”
Asked why a Liberian government official approved Mr. Sawyer’s trip to Nigeria even when the administration was watching him for Ebola, Mr. Brown said he had no information that the Deputy Minister, Mr. Muah, okayed the journey.
He however explained that such an administrative slip was possible at the time Mr. Sawyer left Liberia for Nigeria because at as that time, inter-agency cooperation among government departments was low.
“It’s possible the health ministry was monitoring him (Mr. Sawyer) but the finance ministry did not know,” Mr. Brown said. “It was a slip and we have learned from it regrettably.”
He said the Patrick Sawyer incidence had now compelled Liberia to rework its procedures.
“Now the practice is to share the names of everyone under observation with with all other agencies, including the airport, so they cannot leave the country,” the minister said.
“Before the Patrick Sawyer incidence, we did not have that kind of cooperation. We were not locking people under observation down. We were only bringing them to the isolation centre after they show signs of the disease.”
Liberian newspaper, The New Dawn, which saw the CCTV footage recorded at the James Spriggs Payne’s Airport, Monrovia, moments before Mr. Sawyer boarded an Asky Airline plane to Lagos on July 20 reported that he looked “terribly ill” and wore a “sad countenance“ like someone in severe pain.
Apparently overtaken by “excruciating pain,” he, at a point, laid flat on his stomach on the floor in the corridor of the airport.
The paper also reported the footage as capturing Mr. Sawyer sitting alone and avoiding bodily contacts with other passengers who came close to him at the boarding gate of the airport as he awaited his flight to Lagos.
Mr. Sawyer became severely ill on the plane and was taken to First Consultant Hospital, Obalende, from the Murtala Mohammed Airport in Lagos.
Reports of events before he travelled to Nigeria and soon after his death have now shown that top Liberian government officials were aware of his trip to Nigeria and did nothing to stop him.
The reports have also shown that Mr Sawyer did not escape from where he was quarantined as reported by some newspapers.
In fact, the actions of some Liberian officials suggested that they were more concerned with getting Mr. Sawyer to the convention venue in Calabar and cared very little about the health risk he posed.
After he died, First Consultant Hospital issued a statement saying it resisted immense pressure from Liberian officials to discharge Mr. Sawyer from the hospital to enable him to attend the convention in Calabar, with diplomats saying he had a key role to play at the convention.
Nigeria was free of Ebola until July 20 when Mr. Sawyer arrived.
He became terribly ill on his flight and was rushed to the First Consultant Hospital Obalende, Lagos, where he died on July 24.
Nigeria’s Health Minister, Onyebuchi Chukwu, said on Monday that although the Liberian government has apologized for the incidence, it was pertinent to note that Nigeria was free of Ebola Virus until its importation by the Liberian-American.
Mr. Sawyer’s action, he said, has placed unnecessary stress on Nigeria’s health system.
A top official at the Nigerian Institute of Medical Research, Yaba, Lagos, has said that one of the people who helped the 40-year-old Liberian, Patrick Sawyer, on the Monrovia-Lome and Lome-Lagos flight may have been infected with the virus.
Ebola
The reliable source, who is also on the team of experts monitoring the testing and surveillance of persons who have had contact with the late Liberian victim in Lagos, told our correspondent on Wednesday, that although they had yet to confirm, the person was showing feverish symptoms similar to that of Ebola virus.
He said, “We are still investigating and monitoring those who had first contact with Sawyer. One of the people who helped him off the plane is showing signs of fever, a symptom of Ebola. We have isolated them and we are carrying out various tests to establish if it is Ebola or not.”
However, when contacted the Special Adviser to the Governor on Public Health, Dr. Yewande Adeshina, denied that none of the people that had been isolated at the Infectious Disease Hospital, Yaba, was sick.
Adeshina said, “No one is sick. We are doing a routine surveillance at the centre now and I can tell you that no one is sick or showing symptoms. We are just monitoring them because we are going by the World Health Organisation’s guidelines of prevention, treatment and management.”
The Lagos State Government had on Monday said 59 people in the state came in contact with the 40-year-old Liberian who died of Ebola virus in the state on July 25.
The Commissioner for Health, Dr. Jide Idris, said this figure consisted of 44 healthcare workers and 15 others at the Murtala Muhammed Airport, Lagos.
They include 44 hospital contacts (38 healthcare workers and six laboratory staff) and 15 airport contacts.
The 15 airport contacts comprise three ECOWAS staff-driver, Liaison, and Protocol Officer, Nigerian Ambassador to Monrovia, two nursing staff and five airport passenger handlers.
Sawyer, arrived in Lagos via Lome on Asky Airline Flight KP50.
He was said to be on his way to Calabar, the Cross River State capital for the 8th ECOWAS Retreat of Heads of Offices as a senior ECOWAS official in Liberia.
The deceased was also reported to have been very ill on arrival at the airport in Lagos and was assisted by some airport and ECOWAS protocol staff to a private hospital in Obalende .
It was said that when he showed the symptom of Ebola virus, the hospital notified the state Ministry of Health which also notified the Federal Ministry of Health.
The patient was said to have died at about 6.50am on July 25.
The state Ministry of Health in collaboration with the National Centre for Disease Control of the Federal Ministry of Health, and WHO have established an isolation centre for persons believed to have had contact with Sawyer while entering the country.
The private health facility where Sawyer was admitted had been decontaminated to eliminate any possible infections, according to health officials.
Meanwhile, veterinary virologist, Prof. Oyewale Tomori, has warned Nigerians against unsupervised burial of persons who died of Ebola.
He said 40 per cent of cases in high risk countries were transmitted from victims` bodies, stressing that an Ebola corpse was deadlier than the patient.
The Lagos State Government said on Monday that it had identified no fewer than 59 people who had contacts with the Liberian who died of Ebola Virus in the state, Mr Patrick Sawyer.
Lagos State Commissioner for Health, Dr. Jide Idris | credits: File copy
Commissioner for Health, Dr Jide Idris, said at a news conference in Ikeja that the contact tracing became imperative to ascertain any possible transmission of the virus by the victim.
Idris said the identified contacts comprised 44 hospital and 15 airport contacts, including the Nigerian Ambassador to Liberia.
He said 20 of the contacts had been screened and that none of them had so far been found to be infected with the virus.
He, however, said the contacts did not include those he might have been with on his flight to Nigeria on July 20, as the airline had yet to release the passenger manifest for investigation.
He said, “The airline manifest has not been provided by the airline as at the time of this report and therefore, the precise number of passenger contacts is yet to be ascertained, especially as two flights were involved (Monrovia-Lome and Lome-Lagos).”
He urged Nigerians not to entertain fears about Sawyer’s case as the state and Federal Governments were doing everything possible to prevent any outbreak in the country.
Idris said the deceased’s body had been decontaminated, using 10 per cent sodium hypochlorite and cremated with the permission of the Government of Liberia.
He said, “A cremation urn has been prepared for dispatch to the family. The vehicle containing the remains have also been decontaminated while the hospital in which he died on July 25 has been demobilised .”
Idris said the state Ministry of Health had designated an isolation ward at the Infectious Disease Hospital, Yaba, for case management, adding three other centres were under way.
The commissioner urged residents to report people with abnormal cases of bleeding and fever to the appropriate authorities for intervention, as high fever with bleeding from all body openings were symptoms of the disease.
Idris also urged residents to always keep their environments clean and maintain good personal hygiene as Ebola virus spreads easily in dirty environments.
Also speaking, the Director, National Centre for Disease Control, Prof. Abdul-Salami Nasidi, warned against the consumption of bats and monkeys as these animals had been established to be the original sources of Ebola.
He said, “This is time for those bat-eating and monkey-eating communities to be careful now. Ebola started from the eating of chimpanzees. How the virus got to the monkey, nobody knows yet.
“But this is the time to be careful about the eating of monkeys and bats. The Ebola threat is high in West Africa and people should start taking precautions.”
President of the Nigerian Academy of Science, Prof. Oyewale Tomori, also warned Nigerians against the unsupervised burial of people who died from suspected Ebola case.
He said 40 per cent of cases in high risk countries were transmitted from victims bodies, stressing that an Ebola corpse was deadlier than the patient.
Special Adviser to the Governor on Public Health, Mrs Yewande Adeshina, urged traditional healers to collaborate with the government in checking Ebola threats by reporting suspicious cases for the right intervention.
The following numbers, the Minister said can be used to contact ministry officials in case of any emergency. They include 08023210923, 08097979595 and 07067352220.
BY VICTORIA OJEME
ABUJA – The federal government has confirmed the death of a victim of Ebola virus in a Lagos hospital.
The Minister of Health, Professor Onyebuchi Chukwu, at a briefing in Abuja Friday said: “on July 22, the Federal Ministry of Health was alerted on a suspected case of Ebola virus disease in Lagos involving a 40-year old male, travelling from Monrovia, Liberia to Nigeria on Asky Airline via Lome to Lagos.
“The passenger presented with fever, vomiting and diarrhoea on arrival at the airport. He was then handed over by the airline to the Port Health Services of the Federal Ministry of Health who quickly isolated him and transported him to the hospital, avoiding contact with the general public.
“The patient was subjected to thorough medical evaluation where laboratory investigations where carried out. His blood sample was taken to the advanced laboratory at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital which confirmed the diagnosis of Ebola Virus Disease. The result was corroborated by other laboratories outside Nigeria.
“Despite the urgent specialised barrier nursing care provided for the patient in Lagos, the patient unfortunately passed away in the early hours of July 25, 2914.”
The minister however reassured the general public that his ministry was currently working with other ministries, agencies and international organisations, as well as, the Lagos State Government to prevent the spread of the virus.
According to the minister, “all the passengers the patient came in contact with have been traced and are being investigated; in line with the WHO international health regulations and in keeping with international best practices, all ports of entry into Nigeria including airports, seaports and land borders are placed on Red Alert.
“Ministry of Health specialists have been positioned in all entry points. Active surveillance has also been stepped up.
“All government tertiary health institutions in Nigeria have been equipped to handle any emergency that may arise from the disease.”
The Minister also noted that “an emergency operation centre has been established, coordinated by the Centre for Disease Control of the Federal Ministry of Health with an inter-ministerial committee set up by Mr President, headed by the Minister of Information in order to sensitize the public.”
The following numbers, the Minister said can be used to contact ministry officials in case of any emergency. They include 08023210923, 08097979595 and 07067352220.
“The general public is hereby assured that the federal government is not leaving any stone unturned to keep Nigerians safe,” the minister said.
He disclosed this while responding to questions this morning on Channels Television program, Sunrise Daily.
