VLADIVOSTOK, January 31. /TASS/. Aeroflot’s Boeing-777, which brought on Sunday morning from Moscow to Vladivostok a patient with suspected Ebola, was disinfected fully. Due to the disinfection procedures, the return flight was delayed by one hour, press service of the regional healthcare authority told TASS.
A Russian citizen with suspected Ebola, staff member of the Red Cross, was taken by plane to a hospital in Novosibirsk as the plane from Moscow landed in Vladivostok (in Far East) on Sunday.
The man was taken to the virology and biotechnology centre, where test results may be ready within 3-4 days. Meanwhile, the patient will be at the anti-plague division of the Ussuriysk city hospital. This mobile division, which is adjusted for treatment of dangerous infections was organised on Sunday immediately following the information the dangerous illness may have been taken to the region, representative of the local healthcare department Kseniya Gusentsova told TASS. She said the patient’s state remains stable.
First results of tests will be known by late afternoon on Sunday, press secretary of the Russian healthcare ministry Oleg Salagai told reporters. "The man does not have whatever specific symptoms typical for the disease, thus it is not highly probable that his poor feeling is caused by the Ebola virus."
The staff member of the International Committee of the Red Cross, who returned recently after work in Senegal and Guinea, arrived in Vladivostok from Moscow by an Aeroflot flight. During the flight he complained about fever and poor conditions. The flight attendants isolated the man in the rear part of the plane. On landing at the airport, healthcare experts suspected the man of being infected with Ebola and the decision was to take him to a specialised hospital.
All the people on board the flight, visited doctors. For a month on, both passengers and the crew will be monitored by their local doctors.
"All the services, which were involved in meeting the passenger suspected of being infected with Ebola, worked properly," deputy governor Pavel Serebryakov said. "They have practiced actions at several specialised drills."
Russia has not yet registered cases of illnesses caused by the Ebola virus. In late October, 2014, in Komsomolsk-on-Amur to hospital were taken a mother and her nine-month old baby, who had returned from Nigeria. Luckily, their tests were negative. Another suspicion was about a woman, who arrived in Moscow from Paris on January 19. Her tests were negative, too.