Thiruvananthapuram: With the WHO issuing world wide alert on Ebola virus and Union Health Ministry issuing advisory, the state health department has taken all steps to meet any situation.
Health authorities here said that district medical officers and health officials were already prepared to handle the situation. Threat perception is low for the country at the moment. “We already have a surveillance system to track people with H1N1 and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), in place at the airport. But if the union civil aviation ministry or the international civil aviation agencies issue advisory we will make the system functional ,’’ said Dr Amar Fettle sate nodal officer for H1N1 Dr Amar Fettle.
People with possible symptoms who come from such countries would be tracked. There should be symptoms and epidemiological link only then one becomes a suspect. Such persons would be tracked for at least four weeks and there are isolation facilities in the hospitals for H1N1 and MERS management. The past experience has helped the department in meeting internationally evolving threats and if the situation changed, it was prepared to respond appropriately.
“We were able to handle H1N1 and MERS, the two international threats. This is not a respiratory virus. In Ebola you need close contact with body fluid or blood through which it spreads. It cant spread through food, water, mosquitoes,” said Dr Fettle. Experts say at this moment India is not a high risk place for Ebola.
“We have people in four or five African countries of which the highest population of Indians is in Nigeria. But the number of infected people in that county is extremely low, in single digit,’’ said a doctor. But in spite of the low threat perception health department would be in close touch with Emergency Medical Relief (EMR) division of Union Health Ministry which issued advisories from time to time.
