A patient is being tested for suspected Ebola virus after being admitted to the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital (QEUH) in Glasgow in the early hours of Tuesday, health officials said.
Tests are under way to determine whether the individual has contracted the disease. Public Health Scotland said there are currently no confirmed cases of Ebola in Scotland and that the risk to the general public remains low.
Public Health Scotland added that it is working closely with the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) to assess potential routes by which travellers may enter the UK from areas affected by Ebola. It said established protocols are in place for assessing and testing people arriving from those regions, and that where needed contact tracing would be carried out and contacts may receive clinical assessment and precautionary testing.
The UKHSA Returning Workers Scheme has also been activated, which is designed to protect and monitor people who may travel to affected areas for work and could be exposed through their roles.
Health officials said there were no ward closures at the QEUH, and patients and visitors were not being advised to stay away. They also stressed that Ebola is not spread through the air in the way that diseases such as flu or Covid can be, meaning it does not spread simply by being near an infected person.
The latest development comes amid an Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo and neighbouring Uganda that was declared a public health emergency of international concern by the World Health Organization.
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