Nairobi County has set aside Ksh300 million to train health workers on procedures to handle potential cases of Ebola.
Speaking at Mbagathi Hospital today, acting county executive for health Mercy Kamau said that the county government had set up an Ebola task force. The team, comprising medical experts, will come up with a contingency plan to deal with any reported cases of the disease which has become a global health crisis.
Until now, no cases of Ebola have been reported in Kenya. The disease has killed an estimated 4,000 people in West Africa.
Dr. Andrew Sulley, the Mbagathi Hospital CEO, confirmed that the institution is prepared to deal with any cases of Ebola referred to it. “We have trained our staff on how to handle the Ebola patients and have the requisite equipment including body suits,” said Sulley adding that Nairobi County had provided fifty body suits to the hospital.
Speaking at the same event, Dr. Susan Mboya-Kidero, said Ebola was a socio-economic disaster.
“The social and economic setbacks we have seen in West Africa is not a fate we would want for Kenya. We should borrow from the Nigerians on how they combated Ebola by identifying the index (first) patient and work from there,” she said.