Cabo Verde Is Reviving Its Covid-Era Arrival Checks After Ebola Reaches Nigeria: What It Means for Travellers From Portugal

Cabo Verde is to reactivate a platform it used during the covid-19 pandemic to monitor arrivals at its airports, including a questionnaire for people entering the country, after Nigeria reported a case of Ebola on Tuesday. The national health director, Ana Paula Santos, announced the step on Friday in remarks to Rádio de Cabo Verde, reported by Lusa. She said that although the World Health Organization (WHO) classes the archipelago as an area at "low risk of infection", health workers will be prepared to act preventively.

Santos said Cabo Verde needs to reinforce surveillance, equipment and risk communication, and to strengthen its laboratory capacity alongside its reference laboratory, the Institut Pasteur in Dakar. Training will be given to "all health structures" so that they can recognise symptoms early. Lusa did not report when the questionnaire will start or what it will ask, and Cabo Verde has not reported any case.

Where the outbreak stands

The outbreak is caused by Bundibugyo virus, one of the Ebola viruses, and was declared in the Democratic Republic of the Congo on 15 May. In its Disease Outbreak News of 23 October, the WHO counted 9,704 confirmed cases in the Congo as of 20 October, including 4,687 deaths, across eight provinces. Kenya has reported nine cases, including one death, all linked to a single imported case. Nigeria's case, in Abuja, is a person who had travelled from Uganda; 44 contacts are being monitored. Uganda's outbreak has ended.

There is no licensed vaccine or specific treatment for Bundibugyo virus. On 23 October a Phase 2/3 trial of candidate vaccines, called TUMAINI, enrolled its first participants in Bunia, in the Congo, with WHO support. The WHO advises against any restriction of travel or trade with affected countries.

What it means for travellers from Portugal

The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) published a new assessment on 23 October: the risk to the EU population remains very low, and the likelihood of infection for Europeans living in or travelling to affected areas of Kenya and Nigeria is low if they follow recommended precautions. It does not recommend travel restrictions. Four cases have been treated in or imported to the EU since May, all people working in health or humanitarian roles in the Congo.

For anyone flying to Cabo Verde, the practical change is likely to be an extra form or health check on arrival. Ebola spreads through direct contact with the blood or bodily fluids of a sick person or animal; according to the ECDC, it is not airborne and people are generally not contagious before symptoms appear. Symptoms can take 2 to 21 days to show.

• Travellers returning from an affected area should watch their health for 21 days after leaving.
• If fever or other symptoms appear, the ECDC advises self-isolating and contacting health services first, mentioning the trip, rather than walking into a doctor's surgery or emergency department.
• Portugal's foreign ministry travel advice for Cabo Verde (last updated in February, with no Ebola notice) tells travellers to check the WHO and the DGS before going and to consider a travel clinic consultation.

The Direção-Geral da Saúde (DGS) has said it is following the outbreak and, on 30 May, issued updated procedures for Ebola and Marburg outbreaks; its communiqué cites the ECDC's very low risk assessment for people living in the EU. For other health news this month, see our reports on measles in Lisboa e Vale do Tejo, on the SNS 24 health line, and on checking your vaccine record.