Lassa Fever: Over 60 Under Surveillance In Rivers

[caption id="attachment_3805" align="alignnone" width="600"]FILE PHOTO[/caption]

Following the outbreak of Lassa fever in the state, over 60 people have been placed under surveillance in Rivers State.

This was revealed by the State’s Health Commissioner Dr. Theophilous Adangbe on Thursday, in Port Harcourt, the state capital.

Recall that on December 30, last year, and January 1, a nursing mother and her two-week-old baby were said to have died from the contagious disease.

Advertisement

Dr. Adangbe said that medical officers who attended to the victims at a public health centre, secondary contacts and some family members and friends of the deceased have been placed under observation.

He said: “We have placed the health personnel, who attended to the woman and her baby, who died last week, under surveillance. We have also placed some secondary contacts – those who had contacts with the deceased during the naming ceremony of the baby, who died two days after the death of the mother – under surveillance.

“Over 12 of the workers at the primary health care centre, who managed and attended to the mother and the baby, have been placed under surveillance. The husband of the deceased woman has been asked to draw up a list of those who attended the naming ceremony of the baby and had contact with the mother and child.

“The list from the husband of the deceased woman is also being generated and that will be over 50. We already have some of them under observation. We are searching for all those who have had secondary contacts with the health personnel, including family members and friends who had primary and secondary contacts with the victims.”

Advertisement

Agangbe said the primary health centre, where the victims were admitted, had been decontaminated, adding that the victims have already been buried, in keeping with the principles of managing the bodies of those who died from Lassa fever and other haemorrhage diseases.

“For now, we do not have any symptomatic case. What we are doing is to check the temperatures of those currently under observation. Any of them who develops the symptoms of Lassa fever will be immediately quarantined,” he added.

Leave a comment

Advertisement