Ebola Scare cause Panic at LUTH over death of patient
A reliable source, who confirmed this development to our correspondent in Lagos on Tuesday, said the patient was brought in by members of the health authorities at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ikeja, to the hospital on Monday.
According to the doctor who was on duty when the patient was admitted into the Accident and Emergency Unit, the patient was vomiting blood and stooling, symptoms which are similar to that of an Ebola patient, before he died in the early hours of Tuesday at the Spill-Over ward of the hospital.
He said, “They rushed him to the Accident and Emergency Unit, and since he was vomiting and purging and he also had high fever, we quickly took his temperature, it was very high. We were all scared to take his blood samples because we were not wearing any Protective Protective Equipment.
“We had to take him out of the emergency ward to the other spill-over ward to avoid any form of contamination. We also reported to the Lagos State Government so that they can take him to the Infectious Diseases Hospital in Yaba for proper treatment. But he had started vomiting blood by this morning , and few hours after he died.”
The doctor said that the body has being transferred to the Mainland Hospital, Yaba, for testing and confirmation of the cause of death.
The source said, “Like I said, we could not take any blood sample when he was alive because we were not wearing PPE, and we could not manage him effectively because of the severity of the symptoms we saw and considering the fact that he was coming from the airport. He could have been coming from an Ebola-affected country.
“They will need to establish the cause of death, so as to be able to know whether to quarantine those that he had contact with from the airport to the hospital. LUTH does not have the facilities to handle any suspected case of Ebola, government should know that, so they don’t keep bringing suspected cases here. All suspected cases should be taken to IDH.”
Several calls to the LUTH’s Chief Medical Director, Prof. Akin Oshibogun, to confirm if the patient had died of Ebola were unanswered as at press time.
