Ivory Coast’s first Ebola case in 25 years has recovered from the disease.
Ivorian health ministry spokesman and head of the country’s infectious diseases department Serge Eholie said, “We performed on the patient two biological tests which were negative in an interval of 48 hours. She is therefore declared cured.”
“We are lifting her isolation today (Tuesday). She is no longer a risk of contamination. She is still very tired, we are keeping her in hospital,” he added.
The young Guinean woman’s diagnosis was the first confirmed case of Ebola in Ivory Coast since 1994.
The 18-year-old had traveled to Abidjan by bus from Labe in northern Guinea, a journey of about 1,500 kilometers (950 miles) that traverses a densely-forested region where Ebola epidemics broke out earlier this year and 2013-16.
The World Health Organization has identified 49 people who have been in contact with the woman, and Ivory Coast started a vaccination campaign earlier this month to target those who were in immediate contact with the patient.
Ebola, which is transmitted through close contact with bodily fluids, is a fatal viral disease that causes severe fever and, in the worst cases, unstoppable bleeding.
Ivory Coast is the third African country this year to have been affected by the Ebola virus after the Democratic Republic of Congo and Guinea.
