Description of the situation
19 November 1996
Disease Outbreak Reported
A source from the Ministry of Health in Gabon has notified WHO that the physician who flew to South Africa for treatment on 27 October had been in direct contact with one of two patients previously identified during the Booué outbeak. These two patients had travelled to Libreville for health care. The Ministry of Health is now looking for additional contacts in Libreville. As the maximum incubation period has elapsed since the infected physician left the country and no new cases have been seen, it is unlikely that Ebola virus transmission is still going on in the capital. If no new cases are detected, the physician who left Libreville on 27 October will be the last in the outbreak which then could be declared over on 11 December.