Ontario resident being tested for Ebola after travel to East Africa, says health ministry

An Ontario resident who recently travelled to East Africa is being tested for Ebola, according to the province's health ministry.

In an email to CBC News Wednesday, a spokesperson for Ontario's Ministry of Health said that the patient is being assessed in hospital. "Out of an abundance of caution" the person is being tested for a variety of infectious diseases, including Ebola, as they recently travelled to the region which is experiencing a large and deadly outbreak, the spokesperson said.

"All appropriate infection prevention and control measures are in place," reads part of the ministry's statement.

"There are currently no confirmed cases of Ebola in Ontario."

The ministry did not say whether the person is currently experiencing symptoms or where in Ontario they are located.

This comes just days after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Uganda one of international concern.

The WHO says there are about 600 suspected cases and at least 139 suspected deaths from the Bundibugyo strain of the Ebola virus. The outbreak was first confirmed by health authorities in those regions on Friday.

The Bundibugyo strain is a rare type of Ebola that does not currently have any treatments or vaccines.

Ebola is highly contagious and can be contracted via bodily fluids. The symptoms include fever, headache, muscle pain, weakness, diarrhea, vomiting, stomach pain and unexplained bleeding or bruising.

The WHO head in Congo estimates that the outbreak could last at least two months.

The virus spread undetected for weeks following the first known death as authorities tested for the more common Ebola Zaire strain and came up negative.

Investigations continued into where and when the outbreak started, but "given the scale, we are thinking that it has started probably a couple of months ago," said Anaïs Legand, a technical officer in the WHO emergencies program.

The London-based MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis estimated that cases have been substantially undercounted and actual number could already exceed 1,000. "The true magnitude remains uncertain," the research group said in a statement.

This is Congo's 17th Ebola outbreak, and the WHO has said its health ministry has experienced staff and capacity to respond. Most outbreaks, however, were of the more common Ebola type.