Spain boosts numbers being monitored for Ebola

Three more people are under observation in a Madrid hospital, boosting the number currently being monitored for Ebola symptoms to 16.

A nursing assistant infected with the virus remains stable.

The three are a nurse who treated Teresa Romero, a hairdresser who served her and a hospital cleaner were admitted to Madrid’s Carlos III hospital.

A government statement on Saturday said none of the 16 in quarantine - including Romero’s husband, five doctors and five nurses – have shown any symptoms.

Romero, 44, the first person known to have contracted the disease outside West Africa in the current outbreak, had cared for two Spanish priests who died of Ebola at the hospital in August and September.

In Barcelona people took to the streets to protest at authorities destroying Romero’s pet dog, Excalibur, as part of precautions to prevent the spread of Ebola.