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| Stop Ebola campaign |
A UK military health worker in
Sierra Leone has tested positive for the Ebola virus, Public Health England
(PHE) has confirmed. The health service said medics in
Sierra Leone were ensuring the worker was receiving appropriate care. A
decision about whether to evacuate the medic to the UK has not yet been made.
According to Sky News, a second
military health worker is being tested for the disease, but initial tests have
come back negative.
Public Health England said an
investigation into how the worker contracted the virus is currently under way.
They are believed to have fallen ill at the Kerry Town Crisis Centre, built
last year by the British Army and funded by the UK government.
“Any
individuals identified as having had close contact will be assessed and a
clinical decision made regarding bringing them to the UK,” the organization said.
“The
UK has robust, well-developed and well-tested systems for managing Ebola and
the overall risk to the public in the UK continues to be very low.”
The individual, who has yet to be
named, is the second British citizen to be infected with the disease in 2015
after nurse Pauline Cafferkey was diagnosed with Ebola upon her return from
Sierra Leone in January.
Another British man, Will Pooley,
contracted the virus in 2014 and was successfully treated in the UK.
The military health worker is the
third foreign medic to be infected in Sierra Leone. In November last year, a
Cuban doctor was flown to Geneva for treatment and survived.
Since the beginning of the
outbreak, more than 600 health workers have become infected in the three worst
affected countries. Some 300 have died as a result, the majority being West
African.
More than 9,500 people have died
as a result of the outbreak.
The news comes as another patient
was tested for the disease in a Welsh hospital on Tuesday after falling ill.
The individual, believed to be
from Barry, Cardiff, was later found to have tested negative.
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