A Success Story: Ebola in Nigeria and Senegal

According to the World Health Organization, as of now, Ebola has infected 6,533 people and has killed 3,083. The most affected countries are Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. Senegal and Nigeria have also been affected by the epidemic although to a much smaller extent compared to the other three countries: As of September twenty-fourth, Nigeria had only registered nineteen laboratory-confirmed cases and Senegal, just one. The virus was not any less threatening in either of these two countries, however, the strategy implemented by the Nigerian and Senegalese authorities was tremendously successful at tackling the virus’ spread and, therefore, making it less of a risk for their respective populations.

When the first case of Ebola was detected in Lagos (Nigeria), Africa’s largest city, authorities and medical personnel’s concern grew since the potential risk of infection was immense due to the high-density populated area. The Nigerian government declared a national Ebola emergency and established a National Ebola Emergency Operations Center, which has since undertaken operations to streamline and coordinate the tracing of people who have been in contact with Ebola patients. 894 contacts with patients were determined, and more than 18,000 face-to-face visits were carried out by the teams of the Center. The Nigerian government monitored these possible Ebola-infected citizens and found a total of nineteen cases, including the first patient. The rigorous action taken by the Nigerian authorities has been widely recognized as the main reason for the near elimination of Ebola in Nigeria at this time.

In Senegal, only a single case was confirmed on August 29th and the patient has recovered. The Senegalese government has collaborated with a WHO-approved center, the Institut Pasteur laboratory, and two senior WHO epidemiologists to avert any further spreading of the virus. Sixty-seven contacts with the patient were determined and monitored for twenty-one days, after which no more infected people were found. Just like the Nigerian case, this Senegalese one is a success story in which the government’s thorough, effective monitoring of the epidemic’s evolution within its borders has paid off. Currently, common agreement is that Ebola has successfully been beaten in Senegal.

The question now is whether or not this strategy can be followed by other Ebola-stricken countries where the virus is still very present and continues to increase the already alarming death toll. There are two main limitations to a bright and hopeful eradication of Ebola in the three main affected countries: the insufficiency of resources and the late reaction to the problem. Nigeria and Senegal both have the available resources and capital to deal with a national emergency such as this within their territory. Beyond this, these two states also have better-established systems of national procedure and agenda for tackling national emergencies, foreseen and unforeseen. Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea simply lack these essential fixtures. Secondly, there is a temporal difference between Nigeria and Senegal and the others; Nigeria and Senegal detected the first cases of Ebola relatively quickly and were therefore able to react quickly to avert the spread of Ebola. Today, the three gravely affected countries have already seen hundreds of cases, which makes tracing the contacts of each patient a backbreaking and near impossible task to carry out successfully. Let’s not forget that each contact would have to be isolated and treated if infected, and that, certainly, if several of the contacts traced happen to be infected, several simultaneous contact-tracing and isolation cycles would begin for each infected contact, their contacts in turn, and so on. Despite the difficult future that the three countries face, Nigeria’s Minister of Health, Professor Onyebuchi Chukwu, has already offered per request of the UN and the WHO, to train health workers of those countries. According to the Minister, this measure is just one of many since the Nigerian government intends to help the African nations to fight the virus.

The threat that is Ebola lingers on in three of the 15 West African countries, and it might well be possible that Nigeria and Senegal have successfully secured their borders regarding this topic. Both governments have assured that the search for cases will continue and that the highly intense vigilance will remain. The intense virus transmission in the neighboring countries creates a high risk that Nigeria and Senegal will experience additional Ebola cases. Nevertheless, they seem fully prepared to fight it.