Seven American aid workers involved in the fight against Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are currently in quarantine in an American center in Kenya, the American State Department and the NGO employing them told AFP on Friday, something the Kenyan government claims to be unaware of.
This is the first time that the United States has confirmed that Americans are in quarantine in this center with a planned capacity of 50 beds – a project however suspended by the Kenyan justice system.
Contacted by AFP, the Kenyan Minister of Health, Aden Duale, said he was “not aware”, although a US State Department official told AFP that “the Kenyan authorities had authorized” their placement “in the center under the supervision of doctors from the US Public Health Service”.
Mr. Duale committed in mid-June to suspend the opening of this quarantine center, built by Washington for its nationals potentially exposed to the Ebola virus which caused an epidemic of hemorrhagic fever declared in mid-May in the DRC.
The center is located at the Laïkipia air base, approximately 200 km north of the capital Nairobi. The announcement of his reception in Kenya had aroused the anger of many Kenyans, whose country does not have a common border with the DRC and has never been contaminated by the virus.
Three people were killed in protests against this structure.
American authorities are prohibiting their nationals from returning directly from the DRC to the United States due to the Ebola epidemic.
Americans who participated “in the response against Ebola in the DRC voluntarily settled in the establishment in Kenya, for preventive isolation and surveillance,” a State Department official explained in an email to AFP.
“All are asymptomatic and at present have not tested positive for Ebola,” he added.
The American NGO Samaritan’s Purse, in a written response to AFP, reported “seven American members” of this evangelical Christian structure currently in “isolation in Kenya”.
“None of them show symptoms, but they are placed in quarantine by the Kenyan government for 21 days,” says Samaritan’s Purse, which says it “has extensive experience in the fight against Ebola” after intervening during the epidemic of this disease in Liberia in 2014 as well as during the 2019 epidemic in the DRC.
“They are housed in large military tents set up in a fenced and gravelled area, they sleep on military camp beds, and their food is provided by the American army,” continues the NGO.
A humanitarian source who requested anonymity in Kinshasa told AFP that the seven members of Samaritan’s Purse currently in Kenya are the contact cases of another employee who tested positive and who was evacuated, via Nairobi, to Germany, where he was hospitalized on Monday for treatment.
At the end of May, the Kenyan courts prohibited the Kenyan government from continuing with this American quarantine center project and allowing the entry into Kenya of people exposed to Ebola.
She then declared Aden Duale guilty of “contempt” because he had publicly stated that he wanted to move forward despite the court decision. But the minister was exempted from punishment when he announced at the hearing the suspension of the project.
More than 2,000 infections have been confirmed and nearly 800 deaths recorded in the DRC since the start of the epidemic, which continues to spread there.
Uganda, neighboring the DRC and Kenya, has managed to stem the epidemic. 20 cases were recorded there, including two fatalities, but the last patient, cured, left the hospital on Thursday.
