GPs and nurses put on high alert for UK Ebola cases

UK doctors and nurses have been told to check they have sufficient stocks of PPE and be prepared to isolate patients as part of an NHS-wide national alert for Ebola, it has emerged.

The UK Health Security Agency has issued an “urgent public health message” to all hospitals, GP surgeries and other NHS clinics advising staff to be on alert for any suspected cases of the deadly virus, amid the ongoing outbreak in central Africa.

While the threat to the UK general public is classed as low and there are no recorded British cases for the current outbreak, the message tells NHS staff to make preparations in the event of a patient displaying symptoms.

It follows the UKHSA, the Government body responsible for public health, putting up posters at major airports and train stations for passengers returning from the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda advising them to seek medical advice if they have symptoms.

The UKHSA routinely issues urgent public health messages in response to emerging infectious disease threats, with the last one broadcast during the deadly meningitis B outbreak in Kent.

Medical staff have been told to be alert to any patients who have in the previous 21 days returned from the DRC or Uganda, where the Bundibugyo variant of Ebola has caused hundreds of cases and 62 confirmed deaths, and are showing symptoms such as a fever, unexplained haemorrhage or multi-organ failure.

If a person is suspected to have symptoms, NHS staff should “move the patient immediately to an empty room. The number of staff in contact with the patient should be restricted and relatives and visitors must not enter the room,” the alert says.

It adds: “Ensure relevant teams within your organisation are aware of the information in this urgent public health message (UPHM).

“This particularly applies to microbiology, virology or infectious disease teams but also infection prevention and control (IPC), urgent care, emergency departments, acute medicine, obstetrics, paediatrics and primary care [GP surgeries].”

Staff should “ensure clinical services have pathways in place for assessment and management of suspected EBOD [Ebola disease] cases within their setting” and infection and prevention teams should ensure they have “adequate stocks of personal protective equipment (PPE) and that relevant staff are trained in its use for the assessment and treatment of suspected EBOD cases”.

Staff should report any suspected cases to their local UKHSA department.

The World Health Organisation designated the current Ebola outbreak as a public health emergency of international concern on 17 May.

In 2014, during the last major Ebola outbreak in west Africa, a nurse returning to Glasgow from Sierra Leone was treated for the disease. A further three healthcare workers also returning from the centre of the outbreak to the UK were treated at London’s Royal Free Hospital.

Unlike Covid, Ebola is not transmitted through airborne particles but by direct contact with blood, secretions or other body fluids of an infected person, or with contaminated environments or materials.

Symptoms include fever, malaise, myalgia [muscle pain], and headaches but some patients may not have a fever when they present, the alert says.

These symptoms may progress to include rash, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, abdominal pain and subsequent multi-organ failure, neurological symptoms and death.

The UKHSA said it continues to monitor and assess the situation closely. It said the probability of an imported case, and the impact of such a case on the UK population, is low and because the virus is not airborne, transmission in a community setting is “extremely unlikely”, the agency said.

However public health experts have warned that the UK’s decision to cut spending on the Pandemic Fund, operated by the World Bank and WHO, is hampering the response to outbreaks such as the current Ebola one.

Doctors from the Healthy World, Secure Britain campaign said the UK has committed less than 5 per cent, or £20 million, of what it had previously spent to tackle outbreaks of Ebola. In November 2015 alone government documents confirmed the UK had committed £427m to tackle Ebola and early recovery.

The World Health Organisation estimates that a vaccine against the Bundibugyo variant of Ebola may take six to nine months to develop.

Professor Kirsty Le Doare, Professor of Vaccinology and Immunology at City St George’s, University of London, and member of the Healthy World, Secure Britain campaign said: “Helicoptering in and out of a country when an outbreak happens won’t work.

“The UK must lead by accompanying surveillance with funding, infrastructure and laboratory capacity. This will provide a pipeline for current vaccine technology that can be upscaled for future pandemics – one that may affect the UK in the way Covid-19 did.”

Dr Derek Sloan, an expert in infectious diseases at St Andrews University and UK-Med, said: “This outbreak, along with the recent Hantavirus cases on a cruise ship and meningococcal meningitis infections in the UK, shows how important it is that we stay vigilant and use effective public health tools to protect our populations.

“Infectious disease outbreaks such as these in our interconnected world cannot be dismissed as someone else’s problem.”