Kenyan health authorities are searching for a Ugandan national linked to the country’s first Ebola case, who died on October 5, amid concerns over contact tracing across the region’s porous borders. According to Daily Nation, Director-General for Health Dr Patrick Amoth said the man was one of two contacts whose…...
Kenyan health authorities are searching for a Ugandan national linked to the country’s first Ebola case, who died on October 5, amid concerns over contact tracing across the region’s porous borders.
According to Daily Nation, Director-General for Health Dr Patrick Amoth said the man was one of two contacts whose whereabouts were initially unknown. The other person has since been traced and placed in quarantine at Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital in Eldoret.
“We know him (the Ugandan) by name and passport number and from his phone but we are not able to reach him,” Dr Amoth said.
The man reportedly uses a South Sudanese telephone number, making it difficult for officials to establish his location. Authorities have also found no record of him travelling through Jomo Kenyatta International Airport or any other airport in Kenya.
“We suspect either he travelled by road or used a panya route but we have communicated with Uganda,” Dr Amoth said, referring to unofficial border crossings that bypass formal immigration controls.
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The search leaves one contact unaccounted for among the 130 identified by Kenya’s Ministry of Health. On October 17, the ministry reported that 128 contacts had been traced and placed in quarantine. Following the discovery of another contact, 129 have now been accounted for.
The missing man’s movements remain unclear as Kenya continues efforts to contain the outbreak, which has recorded eight cases, including one death, according to figures provided by health officials.
Kenya confirmed its first Ebola case on October 6, involving a Kenyan man who had lived in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). He travelled from the DRC through Uganda and arrived in Nairobi on October 3 before dying on October 5.
One of the subsequent cases involved a 49-year-old patient attendant who had cared for the first patient and later tested positive while in quarantine.
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Contact tracing remains crucial to containing Ebola because symptoms can take up to 21 days to develop. People exposed to an infected person must therefore be monitored throughout the incubation period, as additional cases may emerge among quarantined contacts.
Virologist Professor Omu Anzala, who serves on the National Task Force for Ebola, said each contact must complete 21 days of monitoring from their last relevant exposure. He expects monitoring to end around October 24 for passengers on the flight and October 26 for health workers.
The missing contact poses a challenge to the response because authorities cannot complete the monitoring process without establishing his whereabouts and exposure history.
Meanwhile, Kenya has screened more than 667,000 travellers at 26 points of entry, while mobile laboratories have been deployed at the Lwakhakha and Busia border points.
Screening has also been intensified at Gate 16 of Jomo Kenyatta International Airport for passengers arriving from high-risk countries, including the DRC, Uganda and South Sudan.
The Ministry of Health has maintained that the risk to the general public remains low, adding that there is no evidence of community transmission. It has not imposed restrictions on travel, trade or public gatherings.
People experiencing symptoms such as fever, unusual tiredness, muscle or joint pain, sore throat, vomiting, diarrhoea or unexplained bleeding have been urged to seek medical attention immediately.
Ebola spreads through direct contact with the blood or body fluids of an infected or deceased person and is not transmitted through the air.
The ministry has advised anyone with concerns to call its toll-free health line on 719.