Closure of Coventry health centre following Ebola scare “not necessary”

The recent decision to close Coventry’s main walk-in centre at Hillfields following Ebola fears has been described as unnecessary by virology professor Andrew Easton of Warwick University.

According to a spokesperson for clinical commissioning groups in Coventry, the centre was closed as a “precautionary measure” after a patient who had recently arrived from Nigeria was being treated.

Professor Andrew Easton; photo: Warwick Media Library

Professor Easton has disputed this decision, describing it to have been founded upon a common “misconception” that a national pandemic is imminent, despite Ebola infecting a total of 8997 people according to the World Health Organisation (WHO), mainly in western Africa.

Easton claimed that the chances of the disease spreading within Coventry is “vanishingly small” from a single patient as the disease is only contagious once symptoms are shown, which can potentially take up to 21 days.

Easton has claimed that the decision to take the patient to Coventry Hospital for tests was “the right thing to do as they are better equipped”, despite results coming back negative for Ebola. Last week, Ebola infected someone outside Africa for the first time with a case involving a Spanish nurse who had treated an infected missionary in Madrid.

However, Easton has described the closure of the entire centre on Saturday for “deep cleaning” as an “overreaction” and that “it’s important to get a sense of perspective”.

This scare coincided with the government’s decision to carry out emergency Ebola drills across the country in an effort to assess how the UK would cope if affected by the disease, which has led to over 4000 deaths so far.