ominous virus.

The Cabinet meeting on Thursday approved the proposal of the Ministry of Health and Population to grant the amount to encourage health workers to help stop the spread of the deadly virus and treat people.

Although no patients have been diagnosed with Ebola in the country, the precautionary move comes in wake of numerous deaths of health workers who perished while treating patients infected with the disease. The deaths of health professionals have brought in fear and suspicion among many the workers to attend patients.

“We have heard that doctors and other health staffs flee the Ebola infested zones in West Africa. But we want to keep our health force intact if we are to see any cases of Ebola,” said Dr Baburam Marasini, director of Epidemiology and Disease Control Division which had proposed the supportive measure. “Any health worker contracting the disease will also be treated for free.”

According to World Health Organisation, 269 health care workers have died due to EVD till date. It states that a total of 523 healthcare workers are known to have been infected with EVD up to the end of 29 October. Among them, 82 were infected in Guinea; 299 in Liberia; 11 in Nigeria; 127 in Sierra Leone; one in Spain; and three in the United States.

The country has already set-up a medical screening facility at the Tribhuvan International Airport to examine people returning from African nations. The EDCD states that over 1,000 people have been screened so far. The Nepal Army, Armed Police Force and Nepal Police too sent their personnel returning from Liberia, one of the worst affected countries, to 21-days quarantine, an incubation period during which disease symptoms emerge.

There have been 13,567 reported Ebola cases in eight affected countries since the outbreak began, with 4951 reported deaths with the epidemic spreading mostly in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. WHO states that the symptoms of EVD includes sudden onset of fever fatigue, muscle pain, headache and sore throat. This is followed by vomiting, diarrhoea, rash, symptoms of impaired kidney and liver function, and in some cases, both internal and external bleeding.