Isolation of Ebola carriers and disinfection of anything that they have been in contact with helps curtail the spread of the highly contagious and high-mortality virus, says Kalyani Gomathinayagam, a general physician from Madurai, who is back from a six-week stint in Foya, one of the many Ebola-hit districts in Liberia.
“We used chlorine to disinfect everything that the patients had on them, even money and mobile phones. Since direct contact with bodies is identified as one of the reasons for transmission, protocols for funerals were followed. Safe burials, in which the body bags were sprayed with chlorine and then buried in a separate cemetery, helped curb the spread,” Dr. Gomathinayagam says.
Dr. Gomathinayagam, who was at a treatment facility in Foya set up by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), which has been at the frontline of Ebola control in the district, says deaths can be prevented if the virus is caught in time and the carrier isolated and given supportive treatment by health workers following the mandatory protocol.
“The survival rate is 37 per cent. There is no specific treatment, we mainly rehydrate the patients and offer supportive therapy,” she says.
While the MSF has not been able to assess the preparedness of Indian healthcare systems to tackle an Ebola outbreak, the organisation is keen on sharing with the Indian government and healthcare sector its experience of treating Ebola patients and the know-how to mobilise the community.
“Breaking the chain of contact is the key to Ebola control,” Dr. Gomathinayagam says adding that to contain the virus from spreading, communities need to act fast and in a synchronised manner.
Health workers being at high risk of being exposed to the virus, treatment procedures for them are harder because protective gear that includes gloves and goggles have to be worn at all times. “It is hard to examine patients wearing a protective gear; it is hot and the glasses get foggy within minutes because of the sweat. We cannot examine patients as in the usual course, we have to take quick decisions and ensure at all times that the protocol is followed so that we couldn’t expose ourselves and endanger our colleagues,” she says.
Having served out the mandatory 21-day self-monitoring period in Geneva, Dr. Gomathinayagam says counselling of communities is equally crucial in Ebola control.
“In Foya, the families of those suspected to have Ebola were unwilling to send them to the isolation facilities; they feared they wouldn’t come out alive. So we had to make arrangements for families to meet the patients, we also encouraged people to attend funerals of their kin, but after following the protocol,” she said.
The World Health Organisation has declared Nigeria free of Ebola, but Dr. Gomathinayagam says there is good reason not to drop the guard just yet.
