Mozambique installs Ebola screening program at border with Malawi



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Published on
03.08.2019 at 12:54
by
AFP

Mozambique set up disease control points along its border with Malawi on Saturday to prevent any spread of a deadly outbreak of Ebola, said a senior official of the health ministry.

More than 1,800 people have died in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo since the outbreak of the Ebola virus last August.

Mozambique has not yet reported Ebola, but DRC neighbors are on high alert while the World Health Organization (WHO) has turned the crisis into a global health crisis.

Checkpoints have begun to operate in Milage and Morrumbala districts in Zambezi province and controls are expected to extend to other provinces in Mozambique sharing borders with Malawi, a ministry official said. of Health.

"The establishment of Ebola checkpoints is a guideline given by the decision of the Ministry of Health and the World Health Organization to prevent the spread of the disease in other countries", told the press the health director of the Zambezi province, Hidayate Kbadim.

"The checkpoints are meant to follow anyone who comes to Mozambique with the fever or if they have had contact with people who have been in Congo," he said.

"Depending on this control, we will determine if there is a risk or not in our province," Kbadim added.

The authorities have defined screening of people entering Mozambique as a preventive control measure aimed at preparing, preventing, detecting and treating any cases of Ebola that may develop in the country.

The most deadly Ebola outbreak was declared in West Africa in December 2013 and lasted more than two years, making more than 11,300 deaths out of 29,000 infected people recorded.

The current one – year epidemic has killed 1,823 people, according to the DRC 's Ministry of Health, ranking it second after the 2013-2016 crisis.

Rwanda on Thursday closed its border with the DRC after a third case of the deadly virus was detected in the border town of Goma.

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