Ebola reaches UK: Briton feared to have caught virus after travelling in West Africa

A BRITON is feared to have caught the deadly Ebola virus after travelling in the West African region where it has claimed more than 800 lives.

It is now feared that Ebola has reached the UK [GETTY]

Health chiefs in Wales said yesterday that the condition of the suspected victim is being "closely monitored".

Officials confirmed that the unnamed patient from Cardiff, South Wales, contacted them after feeling ill on their return to British soil.

They were effectively quarantined in their own home and would speak to doctors on a daily basis until the threat was deemed to have passed.

Public Health Wales said the patient believed they "may have been exposed" to the virus which has killed 826 people in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria and Guinea.

Spokesperson Anna Humphries said: "We have known about this person for the last week - somebody travelled in West Africa and came back a week ago.

"They identified they may have been exposed to Ebola.

"The reason we haven't spoken about this before is the individual is not currently a case of ebola."

She said there was "no risk to the public" posed by the quarantined traveller and stressed that the case is unconfirmed.  Read more

You can visit our Ebola Virus article archive here.

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The Ebola Virus Pandemic: “A Weapon of Mass Destruction”?

The deadly Ebola virus

Joachim Hagopian

The Department of Defense and Centers for Disease Control (CDC) classify the Ebola virus as a biowarfare agent. Reports of up to 90% of humans infected die within a very short time. Therefore, it is a very real, extremely potent potential weapon of mass destruction.

Every single day Ebola keeps cropping up in different places, eight cases spreading into Africa’s most populated nation Nigeria, several more now have surfaced beyond the African continent with suspected new cases in Hong Kong and Saudi Arabia. At least six others fresh off flights from West Africa are currently being quietly tested at locations here in the US in New York, Philadelphia and Ohio. With all the latest news of the spreading outbreak understandably giving rise to public fear and panic that it is just a plane ride away now, millions if not billions on this planet are pondering whether the African pandemic might be rapidly turning into a global epidemic spreading to every corner of the earth. Of course to reduce these concerns, the World Health Organization (WHO) and US government are busily downplaying the risks to citizens here in North America.

Is it coincidence that the first two Americans suffering from the deadly disease are now inside the US border? Is it coincidence that the most deadly outbreak of the disease in history has admittedly now killed nearly 900 West Africans already this year? Over 200 more than just a few days ago? Is it coincidence that President Obama has just signed an executive order to have the power to begin rounding up American citizens with respiratory diseases against their will? Is it coincidence that FEMA roundups are about to begin in Los Angeles, deceiving homeless people with the carrot stick of a meal to corral them into those FEMA concentration camps and Halliburton refurbished, soon to no longer be empty prisons we’ve been hearing about?

DHS Report: 70% Chance Disease Will Escape Proposed Biodefense Laboratory

Martin Matishak
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON -- An expert panel said yesterday the U.S. Homeland Security Department has not adequately gauged the potential risks associated with a proposed multimillion-dollar infectious-disease research laboratory in Kansas (see GSN, May 20 ).

There are "several major shortcomings" in a department risk assessment of its planned National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility near Manhattan, Kansas, according to a report by the National Research Council, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences. The proposed site is roughly 120 miles west of Kansas City.

The facility's construction is expected to cost between $500 million and $700 million. The 520,000-square-foot center, slated to begin construction in 2012, would study highly infectious animal-borne pathogens, some of which could pose a threat to humans. It would replace the Plum Island Disease Center located near Long Island, New York, which was established in 1937.

The new site would also be the world's third Biosafety-Level 4 Pathogen laboratory to work with large animals. The other two such facilities are in Australia and Canada.


The DHS assessment, which wrapped up in June, found that there is a nearly 70 percent chance a disease would escape the laboratory during its planned 50-year operational lifespan. The earlier report estimated the economic losses from a postulated foot-and-mouth disease outbreak at $9 billion to $50 billion.

However, yesterday's 146-page NRC analysis states that the actual amount could be "significantly higher" because the department's assessment did not consider the dangers associated with daily upkeep of large animal holding rooms.

The earlier evaluation was also criticized for inadequately accounting for the planned facility's proximity to Kansas State University College of Veterinary Medicine clinics, where large numbers of sick animals are treated, as well as the university's football stadium, which has a capacity over 55,000. The large animal and human populations at those sites would be potentially susceptible to infections with a zoonotic agent, the report states. About 9.5 percent of the entire U.S. cattle inventory is raised within 200 miles of the Manhattan site.

The DHS assessment also did not account for the lack of adequate medical care in the surrounding area to deal with a potential disease outbreak, the analysis states. There is one medical center nearby and it lacks the resources to handle such an event, according to the report.

"Building a facility that is capable of large animal work on a scale greater than other high-containment laboratories presents new and unknown risks that could not be accounted for in the DHS risk assessment because of a lack of data and experience," Ronald Atlas, who chaired the research council committee, said yesterday during a telephone press conference.

"The risk assessment should be viewed as a starting point, and given more time, it could have progressed further. As more information emerges, an updated analysis could be appropriate," said Atlas, co-director of the Center for Health Preparedness at the University of Louisville in Kentucky.

Despite its critique, the newly minted report does not question the basic requirement for such a research center.

"There is a need for a facility like the NBAF to be constructed and operated in the United States," it states.
In July the Government Accountability Office released a report that said the Homeland Security Department had used "inadequate" site information in its NBAF selection process and labeled the decision to place the new facility in a natural disaster-prone state as "scientifically indefensible."

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