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British man infected with Ebola in DR Congo to be flown back to UK

Adam Goldsmithand
Hugh Pym,Health editor
News imageEPA Medics walk into a tent in DR CongoEPA
DR Congo has been facing the deadliest Ebola outbreak in the country's history

A British man who has tested positive for Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo will be flown back to the UK.

It is the first confirmed case of a UK national contracting Ebola during the most recent outbreak of the rare but deadly virus in DR Congo, which has so far led to more than 5,000 deaths.

It is not clear when the flight will take place.

Earlier, a UK government spokesperson said there were "well-established procedures for dealing with cases like this" and that the risk to the public remains low.

Reuters news agency reported the infected man is a healthcare worker, citing an internal document BBC News has not seen.

Imported Ebola cases are extremely rare in the UK and have resulted in no deaths.

There have only been four confirmed cases of the virus in the UK - one, in 1976, resulting from a laboratory incident, and three involving health workers who were responding to an outbreak in West Africa between 2014 and 2015.

A UK government spokesperson said: "The UK has well-established procedures for dealing with cases like this, and those processes have been activated.

"Further information will be shared in due course as appropriate. The risk to the UK public from Ebola remains low."

There have been more than 10,000 confirmed cases since the recent outbreak in DR Congo started in May, which has grown to become the second most deadly recorded spate of infections, behind the outbreak in West Africa.

It has since become the deadliest in the country's history, with a fatality rate of 48.6% reported at the end of last month.

News imageGraphic showing how Ebola attacks the human body, sourced to the WHO and Cleveland Clinic. Graphic showing how Ebola systematically attacks the human body. It explains that symptoms appear two to 21 days after contact and can worsen over time. Earlier symptoms, shown with purple circles around diagrams, include headache, fatigue, sore throat, fever, muscle pain, red or bloodshot eyes, and abdominal pain. Later symptoms, shown with red circles, include diarrhoea, vomiting, rash, internal and external bleeding (less common), and impaired kidney and liver function.

Ebola can result in serious illness and death. Early symptoms include vomiting and diarrhoea but it can progress to organ failure and internal bleeding.

The virus spreads from one person to another by contact with infected bodily fluids such as blood or vomit.

The ongoing outbreak centred on DR Congo is fueled by the Bundibugyo variant of the virus.

There is no approved vaccine but the World Health Organisation said experts have recommended adding two new candidate drugs to an ongoing clinical trial.

The vaccines, one developed by the University of Oxford and the Serum Institute of India, and another by the firm Moderna, will join the trial once they are approved by Congolese health authorities.

It will be the first time jabs specifically designed to protect against the Bundibugyo virus are tested during an outbreak.

Since the outbreak, Ebola cases have also been confirmed in Kenya, Nigeria and Uganda.

Additional reporting by Richard Kagoe