Africa CDC, which is Africa’s top public health body, on Thursday said that the Ebola outbreak in Uganda is finally coming under control, reported The Reuters.
The announcement comes as no new Ebola case has been reported in the last 39 days since the last confirmed case of the virus was reported in the country.
The Ugandan government first confirmed the outbreak in September caused by the Sudan strain of the disease, for which there is no proven vaccine.
Ahmed Ogwell Ouma, the acting director at Africa CDC, told a briefing that the outbreak will be declared as over if no new cases are reported in Uganda by January 10.
According to the World Health Organization, a country needs to pass 42 days, twice the maximum incubation period, after the last confirmed case for it to be declared Ebola-free.
The Africa CDC chief praised the Ugandan government’s excellent coordination and implementation of Ebola-containment measures, saying it had taken around 70 days to bring the outbreak under control with 142 confirmed cases and 55 deaths.
Ouma added that vaccine trials against the Sudan strain of Ebola were ongoing.
The Africa CDC and health officials have made a concerted effort to boost their readiness to respond to Ebola after several outbreaks were periodically reported in various sub-Saharan Africa countries, specially in West, Central and East Africa including in DR Congo, Uganda and South Sudan.
A devastating outbreak of the Zaire strain of the disease in West Africa in 2014-2016 killed over 11,300 people, mostly in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.
Some of the main symptoms of Ebola are vomiting, bleeding and diarrhoea. The virus spreads via contact with bodily fluids of the infected. The virus can sometimes linger in the eyes, central nervous system and bodily fluids of survivors and flare up years later.
