EbolaNews Brussels: A mother and newborn child have been isolated at a specialist hospital in Belgium after showing symptoms of Ebola soon after arriving from Sierra Leone. The woman, who was not identified, was rushed by ambulance with a police escort to the Antwerp University Hospital on Tuesday after showing signs of Ebola while giving birth at another hospital nearby. She got a fever and so emergency procedures were put in motion. The patient is isolated and transferred to the University Hospital of Antwerp, Sven Heyndricks, a spokesman for Belgiums Federal Public Service, told the Antwerp Gazette. There were no concrete signs the woman has Ebola but that emergency procedures were being followed as a precaution, said Chris DEspallier of the university clinic. Tests were being carried out on samples taken from the mother and the results are expected within two days. The World Health Organisation on Tuesday raised its death toll from the Ebola outbreak to 4,477 and the number of infections to more than 8,900. The West African nations of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone are the hardest hit, and governments around the world are on high alert to try to contain the spread of the deadly virus. The woman had just traveled to Belgium from from Sierra Leone. Belgium is reportedly the only European country still accepting flights from the epicentre of the Ebola crisis. Flights arrive twice weekly from the Liberian capital of Monrovia in Brussels, the home of the European Parliament and a major gateway to Europe and the rest of the world. Passengers arriving on recent flights from Monrovia reported being screened before leaving Liberia but little or no extra health checks for Ebola when they landed in Brussels. Many passengers were joining connecting flights to the United States, NBC reported. Airport officials in Brussels have defended the decision not to screen people arriving from West Africa, saying there there are emergency procedures in place in the event signs of Ebola show up on a flight. But they say they have not yet needed to activate those procedures. Thomas Eric Duncan, the Liberian man who died from Ebola last week in a hospital in Texas, traveled through Brussels on his way from Africa to the United States. Major airports in the United States as well as Londons Heathrow and other international gateways have started ramping up health checks for signs of Ebola in passengers who may be arriving from Ebola hotspots. Trade unions in Brussels have urged Brussels Airlines - the only European airline still flying to West Africa - to upgrade security procedures to better protect airline staff and passengers from the threat of Ebola.
Posted on: Wed, 15 Oct 2014 14:16:42 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015