The International Emergency Management Society has asked President Goodluck Jonathan to as a matter of urgency order the closure of Nigeria’s land and sea boarders, especially from the West Coast of Africa, to prevent further an influx of the deadly Ebola disease victims and corpses into the country.
The Chairman of TIEMS Nigeria/West Africa Chapter, Air Vice Marshal Muhammad Audu-Bida (retired), made the appeal in a press statement issued in Abuja on Friday.
According to Audu-Bida: “It is high time we reconsider our stance as declared by the Minister of Interior, Comrade Abba Moro, last week that an isolated case is not enough to shut the nation’s borders against its neighbours. Now that the Federal Government has declared an emergency over ebola disease, we must as a matter of utmost urgency close the borders from countries that are worst affected so as to manage the cases that we have at hand.”
He noted that many other countries are already taking extraordinary precautions to protect their citizens from the spread of the disease and lamented the wickedness of the late Liberian Government official, Patrick Sawyer, who, despite being aware that he was infected with the virus, still insisted on coming to Nigeria and even deliberately passing the virus to health workers at the Lagos hospital by urinating on their bodies.
The TIEMS Chairman cited Saudi Arabia which announced that it will not allow pilgrims from West Africa into its territory during the 2014 holy pilgrimage.
The United States, Britain and other countries are also watching tourists from West Africa very closely so as to prevent carriers of the disease from entering their country.
In addition, Audu-Bida called on the federal and state governments to make efforts to ensure that designated hospitals for the treatment of the disease are well equipped so that health workers and volunteers will be well protected from catching the disease.
He called on Nigerians to heed the warnings being given by government functionaries to protect themselves from contacting the virus by washing their hands regularly and observing basic rules of hygiene as the Ebola virus can be killed simply with soap and warm water.
However, the former Director general of the National Emergency Management Agency advised against panic as he said that there were no evidence yet that the virus could be spread by air except by being directly coming in contact with body fluids of an affected patient.
Continuing further, he said Ebola is not spread in the air as it is spread through direct contact with an infected person’s bodily fluids such as blood, sweat, vomit or faeces.
Symptoms of Ebola are much like the flu:
o Fever;
o Headache;
o Joint and muscle aches;
o Sore throat;
o Weakness;
o Diarrhea, vomiting and stomach pain.
In some cases, the disease causes rashes, red eyes and hiccups.
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