The World Health Organization (WHO) yesterday insisted that the man who died at the University of Calabar Teaching Hospital (UCTH) this week had no Ebola.
Ten people were quarantined as a precaution.
Cory Couillard, from the WHO African Region, told AFP in an email that the “laboratory investigation for EVD (Ebola Virus Disease) and Lassa fever turned out negative”.
The Federal Government also confirmed yesterday that the results of the laboratory tests on the deceased were negative.
The Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Health, Mr. Linus Awute, told reporters in Abuja that the result which came in yesterday morning was negative for Ebola Virus and Lassa Fever virus.
He, however, said that further tests were ongoing to confirm the actual cause of the patient’s death.
The result is expected to be made public on Monday.
The Permanent Secretary reassured Nigerians that the country is totally free of the virus and urged the general public to continue to maintain good hygienic behaviour.
Awute said that precautionary measures,including decontamination of the hospitals,have been put in place by government, while members of the medical team that attended to the deceased have been placed under observation.
He said the Ebola scare “has once again demonstrated that the fight against Ebola must be a perfect team work based on effective collaboration between federal, state governments, partners and the private sector.”
The patient died on Wednesday at the University of Calabar Teaching Hospital.
He was reported locally as being a suspected Ebola case, although his symptoms were not specified and his travel history was unknown, it added.
Nigeria registered its first case of Ebola in July 2014, when a Liberian, Patrick Sawyer, died in Lagos last year sparking fears of its spread outside Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.
Nineteen people were infected in total, of whom seven died. Nigeria was praised for its response in containing the outbreak of the haemorrhagic fever.
On Wednesday, the WHO said there had been no new confirmed cases of Ebola in the week to October 4 — the first full week without fresh cases of the disease since March 2014.
A total 11,312 of the 28,457 people infected with the virus since December 2013 have died, mainly in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
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