Ebola Outbreak: Federal Steps Up Passenger Screening At Airports

Thermal scanners,personnel and sanitisers have been deployed in Nigeria’s two major international airports by the Federal Government as part of measures to forestall another round of Ebola outbreak in Nigeria.

It was learnt that the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, and the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, were the two major focus areas, although plans were in top gear to extend similar surveillance to the Port Harcourt International Airport, Rivers State, as well as the Aminu Kano International Airport, Kano.

Punch gathered on Sunday that the deployment of additional personnel in the airports followed the reported outbreak of Ebola virus in the Democratic Republic of Congo recently.

The World Health Organisation recently confirmed the death of at least one person as a result of Ebola in the North-East of Congo, a development that has prompted increased surveillance in Nigeria.

Officials at the NAIA as well as the MMIA confirmed to one of our correspondents on Sunday that the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria was aware of the development in Congo and had directed Port Health officials and its doctors at the airports to step up their activities.

The Acting General Manager, Public Affairs, FAAN, Mrs. Henrietta Yakubu, told The PUNCH that although the screening of passengers had been on since the last Ebola incident in Nigeria, the authority had stepped up its surveillance on inbound travellers at the arrival halls of the Lagos and Abuja airports following the recent Ebola case in Congo.

Punch