According to it's Minister of Health, Awa Marie Coll Seck[1,2], a case of Ebola virus disease (EVD) has been imported from Guinea and it is confirmed by testing at the World Health Organization's collaboration Centre, the Pasteur Institute in Dakar.
Interesting that this occurred one week after Senegal closed its borders (again) with Guinea.[3,4] The infected 21-year old Guinean student travelled on 21-August to Dakar. On the 23rd he presented to a hospital but did not admit to being in contact with known EVD cases; Guinea issued an alert that a person with EVD contact has escaped surveillance 27-Aug; Senegal closed its borders around 22-August.[5,6,7,8].
[WHO Disease Outbreak News places his movements ahead of the closure of the border, arriving in Senegal 20-Aug [8]]
These borders are leaky and so the effect of "closure" essentially hinders aid, trade and economy (all very important to the region, especially right now) but
Humans are the variable in outbreaks.
They behave differently each time.
They respond differently each time.
This is why no two outbreaks are identical.
It's why you're a mug to assume this outbreak will be like the last outbreak.
While it looks like this is now a case study in why closing a border is ineffective, I maintain a position that border closures can't contain infectious disease. And please, do not point me to "temperature measurement" as a way to ensure capture of infected individuals. You could easily be harbouring an infection that does not yet express the symptom of fever.
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| Click on image to enlarge. Graphic lifted from a great CNN video narrated by Dr Sanjay Gupta. The video describes an example of contact tracing and its importance to the fight to contain EVD.[2] |
The contact tracing starts in Senegal now. A 42-day clock starts for the country and a signs and symptoms watch continues on all this case's contacts for 21-days.
References...
- http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/08/29/us-health-ebola-senegal-idINKBN0GT1CD20140829?feedType=RSS&feedName=health&utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter&dlvrit=309303
- http://edition.cnn.com/2014/08/29/health/ebola-outbreak-senegal/
- http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/world/wp/2014/08/29/the-ebola-virus-has-spread-to-senegal-as-the-deadliest-outbreak-in-history-gets-worse/
- http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/africa/alarm-grows-as-ebola-outbreak-spurs-more-flight-cancellations-border-closures/2014/08/25/87e6d020-2c66-11e4-994d-202962a9150c_story.html
- http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-28893835
- http://fox59.com/2014/08/22/senegal-closes-its-borders-with-guinea-over-ebola-fears/
- https://www.internationalsos.com/ebola/index.cfm?content_id=434&language_id=ENG
