HOW EBOLA GOT TO PORT HARCOURT

The Rivers State Commissioner for Health, Dr. Samson Parker, while giving an update on the EVD in the state, after recording its first death from Ebola last week Friday, disclosed that the surveillance list had increased to 160. He also gave further insight into how the dreaded EVD crept into the state and claimed its first victim.
He said the late Dr Enemuo was aware that Koye, whom he treated, had evaded the surveillance team in Lagos to travel to Port Harcourt.
Parker said: “He (Koye) had received the late Dr. Patrick Sawyer in Lagos. Upon developing the symptom, he confided in a female colleague, called Lillian, who contacted the late Dr. Enemuo. It was after contact was established with Dr. Enemuo that Koye flew to Port Harcourt to see Dr. Enemuo.
"To conceal his movement, Koye sneaked out of the isolation unit where he was being observed and took a flight to Port Harcourt and switched of his phone so that he cannot be reached or traced should he answer a call.
“On arrival in Port Harcourt, Koye checked into a local hotel called Mandate Hotel, around Rumuokoro in Obio/Akpor Local Government Area of the city.”
The hotel, Parker said, was close to Enemuo's private clinic, Sam Steel Clinic.
Parker continued: “From what we have gathered so far, Dr. Enemuo, knowing full well that Koye was positive of the Ebola virus took some measure of precaution to protect himself while treating Koye. Knowing the enormity of what he was doing. Dr. Enemuo upon Koye’s departure for Lagos poured bleach all over the room that Koye slept in order to sanitise the place.
“Upon developing the Ebola symptom, Dr. Enemuo approached one of our colleagues for treatment at Green Heart Hospital, along Evo Road, in G.R.A. Dr. Enemuo did not tell the doctor that was treating him the truth. He merely told him that he had fever. He lied. He did not tell the doctor that was treating him his full story.
"But the doctor, a nice and conscientious professional suspected that Dr. Enemuo was either hiding something or was suffering from a strange ailment because he proved negative to malaria, fever and typhoid fever. To be sure of what he was doing, he spoke to other very experienced doctors about the strange case he was handling in his hospital.
“He even invited some of his colleagues to come over to his hospital to study Dr. Enemuo’s medical history. Of course, the news of the Ebola virus was everywhere, so, they were afraid to go. None of them showed up at the hospital where Dr. Enemuo was being treated. His condition continued to deteriorate and he eventually died and his body was taken to the University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital.”
Parker said Koye had returned to Lagos where the surveillance group saw him and tested him of the EVD and that he had tested negative.
He said Koye neither disclosed to the people that he travelled to Port Harcourt nor that he had treated himself of the disease.
According to the commissioner, “When news got to Koye that the doctor that treated him in Port Harcourt had died, he collapsed. It was then he opened up and confessed that Dr. Enemuo had treated him when he travelled to Port Harcourt. He confessed that he sneaked out of Lagos to Port Harcourt”.
However, the authorities of the isolation centre in Lagos never disclosed to the public that an Ebola positive patient had escaped from the centre when the incident occured. This information is only just coming to light following the death of a doctor in Port Harcourt.