Congo tracing contacts of city’s first Ebola case

BENI, CONGO >> After feeling sick for several days the pastor boarded a bus to eastern Congo’s largest city. Only upon arrival at his destination did anyone suspect he had the highly deadly and infectious Ebola virus.

During his trip to Goma, the 46-year-old preacher managed to pass through three health checkpoints aimed at stopping those who are sick with Ebola and contagious.

Now health authorities along his route are trying to hunt down all those he may have been in contact with after the man became Goma’s first confirmed Ebola case on Sunday.

It’s a crucial task to contain the spread of Ebola in Goma, home to more than 2 million people and the largest city to confirm a case of the disease since the epidemic here began nearly a year ago.

“It’s the door of this region to the rest of the world,” said Dr. Harouna Djingarey, infectious disease program manager for the World Health Organization’s regional office in eastern Congo. “From here you can fly to everywhere in the world. If we don’t have the control over the contacts, some high-risk contacts may fly, take a plane and go somewhere.”

Health experts have long feared that the disease responsible for killing nearly 1,700 people since August would eventually make its way to Goma. The city is an important transit point for the region and beyond and a bustling trade hub drawing travelers from throughout Congo’s east.

Speaking at a U.N. meeting in Geneva on the outbreak, Congo’s minister of health, Dr. Oly Ilunga, called the spread of Ebola to Goma “a warning.”

The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said the development was so worrying that he was reconvening the agency’s emergency committee as soon as possible “to assess the threat of this development.”