Doctor who treated source of second Mali Ebola outbreak dies

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[November 21, 2014]  BAMAKO (Reuters) - A doctor in Mali who treated the patient that sparked a second wave of Ebola in the West African country has died, the government said in a statement on state-owned television on Thursday.

The government said the death of the doctor, whose name was not released, brought the total number of those who have died of Ebola in Mali to five. Before Thursday's announcement, the World Health Organization was already reporting five Ebola deaths in Mali, while medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) put the figure at seven.

The doctor worked at the Bamako clinic where Oussa Koita, a 70-year-old imam from Guinea who traveled to Mali last month, was admitted and wrongly diagnosed with kidney problems. He died but had already exposed others to the disease.
 


The doctor tested positive for Ebola on Nov. 12.

MSF said later on Thursday that is was evacuating home a Spanish member of its staff in Bamako after the worker was pricked by a needle that had been used on a confirmed Ebola patient earlier in the day.

"The member of the team is not showing symptoms of the disease and the repatriation is part of the protocols established by the medical organization for security and preventive measures," MSF said in a statement.

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(Reporting by Tiemoko Diallo and Cheik Amadou Diouare in Bamako and David Lewis in Dakar; Writing by Joe Bavier; Editing by Ralph Boulton, Emma Farge, Toni Reinhold)

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