Winnipeg scientists flying home from Ebola scare

TORONTO – The Public Health Agency of Canada says three Winnipeg-based scientists who have been working on the Ebola response in West Africa will not return to Canada on commercial flights.

The scientists are being brought home early in response to concern for their safety.

All three are healthy, the agency said, but it would not say when they are returning to Canada.

Last weekend the World Health Organization revealed that an epidemiologist from Senegal who was working for the WHO at the same outpost had tested positive for the infection.

The scientists had been stationed at Kailahun in eastern Sierra Leone.

The Public Health Agency says three people at the hotel complex where the Canadians were staying have tested positive for Ebola.

It says it will send another team to take part in the outbreak response when steps have been taken to provide a safe living environment for the responders, who have been working there as part of the W-H-O team.

Earlier Wednesday the U-S Centers for Disease Control revealed it had flown two C-D-C scientists back to Atlanta from Kailahun in response to the same incident.
(The Canadian Press)