Ebola: Uganda introduces 21-day quarantine for people entering from DRC

Ugandans returning home from DR Congo -- which has been hit by its worst ever Ebola outbreak -- will be required to spend 21 days in quarantine, the health ministry said Sunday.

The DRC, which shares a border with Uganda, has recorded more than 4,600 deaths since it declared its 17th Ebola outbreak in May. The virus has killed more than 15,000 people in Africa over the last 50 years.

In August, the World Health Organization officially declared Uganda Ebola-free after 20 cases, including two deaths, on its territory, almost exclusively among people coming from visits to DRC.

Ebola is transmitted through contact with bodily fluids and causes severe haemorrhagic fever. The current outbreak is caused by the virus' Bundibugyo strain for which there is still no vaccine or specific treatment.

"Returning Ugandans with a history of travel to the DRC will undergo 21 days of quarantine at their own cost." the Ugandan ministry stated, adding it had "intensified traveller screening at Entebbe International Airport and all land border crossings, supported by screening at designated road checkpoints."

Kenya, where two people have died, and Nigeria, the continent’s most populous country, reported their first cases in October.

Nigeria recorded its first case on Tuesday -- a woman who arrived in the capital Abuja on a flight from Uganda.

A Ugandan government spokesperson rejected meanwhile the idea that a patient identified in Nigeria might have contracted the virus in Uganda.

Alan Kasujja told AFP it was "absurd" to suggest that because someone was on holiday Uganda -— "which, incidentally, has no cases of Ebola" -- could spark a discussion about Ebola in Nigeria.