Spanish authorities quarantine nurse and three others in fight against Ebola

A nurse in Spain who cared for an Ebola patient has come down with the disease, the first known transmission outside West Africa during the current epidemic.

Her husband and a second nurse who treated the patient are now in quarantine, Spanish officials said.

A man who arrived on a flight from Nigeria has also been quarantined, they said.

Authorities are making a list of other people who may have had contact with the nurse, public health director Mercedes Vinuesa told Parliament.

The nurse has not been publicly identified and the couple have no children.

She was in stable condition and her life not in any immediate danger, the Health Ministry’s chief coordinator for health alerts and emergencies, Fernando Simon, told Cadena SER radio.

Health officials said the nurse, reported to be 44 years old, had no symptoms besides the fever. Mr Simon said her husband was “okay and relatively calm”.

There is a low risk that some people in contact with the nurse could develop Ebola, Mr Simon said, but he insisted this did not represent a public health threat. He disputed critics who said authorities were slow to react to the case.

The nurse, who was admitted to hospital on Sunday, had helped treat Manuel Garcia Viejo, a Spanish priest returned from Sierra Leone who died on September 25 in another Madrid hospital designated for treating Ebola patients.

She had changed a dressing for the patient and collected material from his room following his death. She then went on holiday.

Ms Vinuesa said Spain had several therapies available and began applying them yesterday but gave no further details.

The nurse had also assisted treating 75-year-old Spanish priest Miguel Pajares, flown back to Spain from Liberia. He died after being treated with the experimental Ebola medicine ZMapp.

Mr Garcia Viejo, who was in charge of the San Juan del Dios hospital in Lunsar, Sierra Leone, was not given the treatment because worldwide supplies ran out.

The virus that causes Ebola spreads only through direct contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person showing symptoms.

The World Health Organisation estimates the latest Ebola outbreak has killed more than 3,400 people.