One released from Ebola surveillance, 229 under watch

ZUBEDA HAMID

One passenger who travelled from Ebola-hit Sierra Leone to Tamil Nadu has now been released from health surveillance, after 30 days of monitoring.

As of Thursday, a total of 229 passengers who have travelled from the four countries where the deadly virus has broken out, are being monitored across the State, said director of public health K. Kolandaisamy. Of these, 227 passengers passed through Chennai airport and two at Madurai.

Among the 229 are 11 students from two city colleges, who had travelled to their home countries recently. However, all of them are in good health and show no signs of the virus, Dr. Kolandaisamy said.

“They are just being observed as a precautionary measure,” said an official from one of the colleges.

While there are dozens of students from various parts of Africa in the State, only a few fall into the category for observation, as the others have remained here for a while and could not have been exposed to the virus, Dr. Kolandaisamy explained.

A majority of the passengers — 222 — are from Nigeria, while five are from Guinea, one from Sierra Leone and one from Liberia.

The passengers will all be monitored for 30 days since the date of their leaving these countries, as the virus has an incubation period that could be anything between two and 21 days. A total of 15 passengers travelled to other states from Chennai, and are being tracked by their respective State health departments.

Across the country, 821 passengers are being tracked for Ebola as of Wednesday. Besides Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and Kerala too account for a lot of the passengers

For any information on the virus, residents can contact the health helpline 104.