A woman, wearing a protective face mask and gloves, speaks to a worker
upon arrival at the Murtala Muhammed Airport in Lagos on August 11,
2014. WHO says it does not recommend any ban on international travel or
trade due to the Ebola outbreak, which has infected more than 2,100
people so far and killed 1,145. AFP PHOTO | PIUS UTOMI EKPEI
By AFP
In Summary
The World Health Organisation
said Monday that it had set up a task force with the global airline and
tourism industry in an effort to contain the spread of Ebola.
The UN agency said it was
working hand in hand with the International Civil Aviation Organisation,
the World Tourism Organisation, Airports Council International (ACI),
the International Air Transport Association and the World Travel and
Tourism Council.
The goal, it said in a
statement, was to "support the global efforts to contain the spread of
the disease and provide a coordinated international response for the
travel and tourism sector".
It added that the task force
would "monitor the situation and provide timely information to the
travel and tourism sector as well as to travellers".
The first closed-door session of the task force took place on August 13, WHO told AFP.
On August 8, WHO declared a
global public health emergency over the outbreak of Ebola, a deadly and
highly contagious virus which has spread since the beginning of the year
from Guinea to Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria.
Concerns over air travel were
heightened because the outbreak in Nigeria was traced back to an ill
traveller who flew from Liberia and infected contacts in Lagos.
In Monday's statement, WHO
reiterated that it does not recommend any ban on international travel or
trade due to the Ebola outbreak, which has infected more than 2,100
people so far and killed 1,145.
The haemorrhagic disease is
spread by direct contact with blood and other body fluids of infected
living or dead persons or animals.
"The risk of transmission of
Ebola virus disease during air travel is low," it said, underlining than
unlike influenza or tuberculosis, Ebola is not spread by breathing
airborne particles from an infected person".
"Travellers are, in any event,
advised to avoid all such contacts and routinely practice careful
hygiene, like hand washing," it said.
"The risk of getting infected on
an aircraft is also small as sick persons usually feel so unwell that
they cannot travel and infection requires direct contact with the body
fluids of the infected person," it added.
To head off potential risks, WHO
reaffirmed that affected countries should "conduct exit screening of
all persons at international airports, seaports and major land
crossings, for unexplained febrile illness consistent with potential
Ebola infection".
Anyone with an illness
consistent with Ebola should not be allowed to travel, unless the
journey was part of a medical evacuation, nor should people who have had
contact with an Ebola case, it said.
WHO underlined that most infections occurred in communities battling the disease or in health centres.
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