Nigeria case shows Ebola can spread by air travel

Associated Press

ABUJA, Nigeria

Nigerian health authorities raced to stop the spread of Ebola on Saturday after a man sick with one of the world’s deadliest diseases brought it by plane to Lagos, Africa’s largest city with 21 million people.

The fact that the traveler from Liberia could board an international flight also raised new fears that other passengers could take the disease beyond Africa due to weak inspection of passengers and the fact that Ebola’s symptoms are similar to other diseases.

Officials in the country of Togo, where the sick man’s flight had a stopover, also went on high alert after learning that Ebola possibly could have spread to a fifth country.

Screening people as they enter the country may help slow the spread of the disease, but it is no guarantee Ebola won’t travel by airplane, according to Dr. Lance Plyler, who heads Ebola medical efforts in Liberia for aid organization Samaritan’s Purse.

“Unfortunately, the initial signs of Ebola imitate other diseases, like malaria or typhoid,” he said.

Samaritan’s Purse, based in North Carolina, issued a news release Saturday saying that an American doctor working with Ebola patients in Liberia has tested positive for the deadly virus.

Dr. Kent Brantly tested positive for the disease and is being treated at a hospital in Monrovia, Liberia. Brantly had been serving as medical director for the aid organization’s case-management center in the city.

Ebola already had caused some 672 deaths across a wide swath of West Africa before the Nigeria case was announced. It is the deadliest outbreak on record for Ebola, and now it threatens Nigeria, Africa’s most-populous nation. An outbreak in Lagos, Africa’s megacity where many live in cramped conditions, could be a major disaster.