Madrid, 18 October 2014: The health of Teresa Romero, the 44-year-old nursing auxiliary who was the first person to be infected with the Ebola virus outside of Africa continues to improve according to reports in Spain on Saturday morning.
Meanwhile the 15 people considered at risk of having caught the virus from the nurse and currently under observation in the Carlos III Hospital in Madrid, remain clear of any symptoms.
Nevertheless it will not be until Oct. 27 that the maximum 21 day incubation period for symptoms to appear has been completed and they can leave the hospital.
Romero will be given a test for the virus over the next 24-48 hours and there are high hopes that she may give a negative result, given that the number of virus in her body is now reported to be very low.
If that is the case, she will then undergo a second test 72 hours later and if that too comes back negative, she will be considered to be cured, although a long convalescence still lies ahead.
Friday saw the medical staff who treated missionary Manuel Garcia Viejo for Ebola before he died on Sept. 26 in the Carlos III Hospital pass the 21 day benchmark and it has now been ruled out that they could have caught the disease along with Romero.
Friday also saw Spanish health authorities confirm that the four people taken to hospital on Thursday with symptoms similar to those of Ebola had all tested negative in their first tests for the virus.
One of those was a Nigerian man, who arrived at Madrid’s Adolfo Suarez- Barajas airport with a fever, shivers and a headache, another was a person who had travelled in the ambulance which originally took Romero to hospital, while the remaining two were a missionary, who had recently returned from Liberia and a Red Cross worker back from Sierra Leone.
They will undergo a second test in 48 hours and if that confirms the results of the first, they will be allowed to leave hospital.
