Update: Lassa Fever kills two Doctors, Nurse in Ebonyi

Ebonyi State government on Monday confirmed the death of three Medical Personnel in the state from suspected Lassa Fever infection.

Commissioner for Health in Ebonyi State, Daniel Umezuruike confirmed this at a briefing in Abakaliki, the state capital.

According to him, two of the dead patients were Medical Doctors while the third person is a Nurse.

He revealed that the index patient who was treated by one of the Doctors and Nurse survived and has been discharged.

“Early last week there was suspected cases of Lassa and yesterday my attention was drawn to it that a doctor died of suspected Lassa Fever. We sent twelve samples and four came out positive”.

 

Read here: Lassa Fever kills three in Ebonyi

Mr Umwzuruike said the cause of the death of one of the Doctors has not been confirmed to be Lassa Fever as he had Mobidity of Diabetes.

The Commissioner further said the victims presented late because they were self medicating when the symptoms started showing.

“One was self medicating, he went to Mater Hospital in Afikpo. Two doctors he saw later advised him to go back to FETHA he refused until it was advanced before he came to the hospital’.

For the second Doctor, Mr Umezuruike said because he has Mobidity of Diabetes his death has not yet been confirmed to be caused by Lassa Fever.

Mr Umezuruike debunked reports that the victims were taken to Irrua Specialist Hospital in Edo state for treatment instead of the Virology Centre built by the state government in Abakaliki, Ebonyi State.

“He was treated at FETHA. We built and donated the Virology Centre to FETHA. The second case treated a woman who was bleeding after undergoing local ovuloctomy and he was treated by the doctor to arrest the bleeding on 29th December. They didn’t present to the hospital on time”, he added

He said the Ministry has commenced contact tracing in other to monitor anyone who came in contact with the patients to ensure that no further deaths are recorded.

He said this will help in tracing the source of the disease.

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