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A military medical team transfers
Manuel Garcia Viejo from Sierra Leone to Spain in September. A Spanish nurse
who treated the priest has been diagnosed with Ebola, it was announced Monday. ©
Spanish Defence Ministry
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MADRID—In
the first known transmission of the current outbreak of
Ebola outside West Africa, a Spanish nurse who treated a missionary for the
disease at a Madrid hospital has tested positive for the virus, Spain’s health
minister said Monday.
The female nurse was part of
the medical team that treated a 69-year-old Spanish priest who died in hospital
last month after being flown back from Sierra Leone, where he was posted,
Health Minister Ana Mato said. The nurse is believed to have contracted the
virus from that priest.
The World Health Organization
confirmed there has not been a previous transmission outside West Africa in the
current outbreak. WHO spokeswoman Fadela Chaib told The Associated Press that
so far there have only been confirmed cases in West Africa and the United
States, and no known transmission outside West Africa. The organization is
awaiting official notification of the case from Spanish authorities.
The woman went to the Alcorcon
hospital in the Madrid suburbs with a fever on Sunday and was placed in
isolation. Mato said the infection was confirmed by two tests.
The woman’s only symptom was a
fever and she was on vacation when she fell ill, Antonio Alemany, Madrid
director of primary health care, told a news conference.
Alemany said authorities are
drawing up a list of people with whom the nurse had contact, though he did not
say how many people that might be, or where she went on holiday. She is married
but does not have children.
The woman’s husband and the
paramedics who admitted her on Sunday are being monitored. Officials did not
say how or where.
The nurse helped treat two
Spanish missionaries who died after being flown back to Madrid with the deadly
virus, officials said.
She cared for Manuel Garcia
Viejo, who died Sept. 25. In August, she also helped treat 75-year-old Spanish priest Miguel Pajares, who was flown back to Spain
from Liberia, but died after being treated with the experimental Ebola medicine
ZMapp.
The woman will be transferred
for treatment to Madrid’s Carlos III hospital.
The virus that causes Ebola
spreads only through direct contact with the bodily fluids of an infected
person who is showing symptoms.
In West Africa, the disease has
spread quickly to family members who cared for the sick or handled their bodies
after death.
WHO estimates the latest Ebola
outbreak has killed more than 3,400 people.
Source: http://www.msn.com
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