An Italian doctor has contracted Ebola in Sierra
Leone and is being flown back to Rome for
specialist treatment, the health ministry said
Monday.
The ministry said the doctor, the Italian to
contract the disease, would arrive in Rome late
Monday or early Tuesday and be hospitalised at
the Lazzaro Spallanzani national institute for
infectious disease.
The doctor was working for NGO Emergency at a
clinic for Ebola victims when he contracted the
disease, which has killed more than 5,000 people
in its latest outbreak in West Africa.
“We can reassure his family that the doctor is
feeling well,” health minister Beatrice Lorenzin
said in a statement.
“He did not have a fever or other symptoms
during the night and this morning he had his
breakfast.”
The NGO said the doctor had developed some
unspecified Ebola symptoms but was in a “good
general condition.”
The more serious symptoms of Ebola can take
weeks to develop.
Emergency said all its staff in Sierra Leone had
been trained to avoid contamination.
“However no healthcare in such a serious
epidemic can be considered completely risk-free,”
the NGO said in a statement.
“The situation in Sierra Leone is alarming: the
epidemic is still widening with 100 new cases a
day. According to the World Health Organisation
there are more than 5,000 people with Ebola in
the country but the real figures could be much
higher.”
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