By Leilani S. Junio
MANILA, Sept. 10 (PNA) — The Department of Health (DOH) reiterated on Thursday that the possibility of transmission among humans of the ebola reston virus (ERV) detected positive in some Philippine monkeys in the country is very low.
“The chance of ebola reston virus to be transmitted among human is very low. Mutation is very far,” said DOH Secretary Janette L. Garin in a press briefing held at the DOH Conference Room in Tayuman, Sta. Cruz, Manila.
According to Dr. Garin, although the ebola reston virus present in some of the tested monkeys in a facility in the country belongs to the same family of ebola — ebola zaire among humans in Africa, where ebola virus disease was first reported, the two are exactly opposite in terms of effects to humans.
“Ebola reston virus is opposite of the ebola zaire. While in Africa, ebola zaire is fatal among humans, the ebola reston virus here (in the country) can be described as very kind to humans because it does not cause harmful effects on their health,” Garin said to avoid confusion among people that the ERV present in monkeys can be fatal among humans.
“We would like to assure the public that this (ERV) is limited to monkeys,” she stressed.
She also said that the caretakers and handlers of the monkeys in the facility who undertook testing yielded negative results from ERV.
In the same press conference, Secretary Garin said the DOH is working closely with the Department of Agriculture (DA) and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) in tracing the source of the ERV found in some Philippine monkeys.
She added that the DENR will start bat surveillance which is being seen as possible source of ERV transmission.
Together with DA Undersecretary for Livestock Jose Reano, the DOH official cited that due to urbanization, some home sites of the bats are being damaged — a situation that results to disturbance of bats that can probably transmit ERV to monkeys or other animals as they move away from one place to another.
It may be recalled that the DOH collaborated with the DA in the aftermath of a suspicion on the cause of death of 10 monkeys in the month of August in two monkey facilities in the country.
While the exact cause of the death of the monkeys was not identified, there was suspicion that such was due to ERV because of the signs and symptoms they had displayed prior to death.
The cause of death could not be attributed to ERV because there were no samples taken since the bodies of the said dead monkeys were already administered with formalin.
As a result, the DOH was prompted to conduct test among samples from the monkeys in the facility wherein about 10 yielded positive with ERV.
The DOH also provided Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) among the workers to ensure their safety from ERV.
A test was also done among the workers to be sure that they are free of ERV.
At present, out of the 10 monkeys which turned positive with ERV, one had died, bringing the total number of deaths or mortality among the monkeys to 11.
“The remaining nine are recovering…They are being monitored closely,” the DOH chief said.
Testing of the monkeys for ERV is continuous among the two monkey facilities to identify the other possible sources of transmission.
Meanwhile, in the same press briefing, DA Undersecretary Reano said they are doing the necessary precautions to lessen transmission by limiting the movements of the monkeys under surveillance.
At the same time, Reano cautioned the public against keeping monkeys as pets.
“It is high time to ask people not to make monkeys as pets,” he said, adding that in case the people are having pets like monkeys, they should exercise caution because they can never be sure of the situations. (PNA)