Two Nigerian men, who health officials believed to be infected with the deadly Ebola virus, were discharged from a Ho Chi Minh City hospital on Tuesday evening. It is the latest instance of an ever-widening, and disturbing story, of a trend targeting Nigerian nationals, and other Africans, who have symptoms of an illness to which health officials overreact.
The two unidentified men are university students studying in Vietnam. They were taken in for observation, and isolated by Vietnamese health officials late Monday. The story was first reported on-line in the Ho Chi Minh City-based Thanh Nien News.
They were later discharged from the hospital, as health officials found that while they may have had a fever, likely from a cold, no Ebola-like symptoms were discovered, said the Vietnamese Health Ministry’s spokesman.
Nguyen Dac Phu, chief of the Ministry’s Preventive Medicine Department, said the two men were allowed to leave after 24 hours. They were held in the Tropical Diseases Hospital’s isolation ward. Their blood samples were sent to the US for laboratory testing to see whether it is Ebola or not.
The two Nigerian men, 34 and 32 years old, respectively, were later asked to stay indoors under a 21-day fever watch, Phu told reporters.
Published reports say that the men arrived at Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City on a Qatar Airways flight on August 19th. It was there that they were sent to the Tropical Diseases Hospital after being detected as having high temperatures, and a higher than normal body temperature. The airport’s thermal imaging cameras made the finding as the men had passed through customs. The discovery caused a panic at the airport.
On Wednesday morning, doctors and other health officials said the two Nigerian nationals were not having a fever, and both were in good health.
No Ebola-infected cases has been detected in Vietnam so far, the health officials said.