Chinese Coronavirus Could Affect Côte d’Ivoire – Health Ministry

An Ivorian unnamed student, who returned to Côte d’Ivoire coming from Beijing on Saturday, is undergoing further tests after showing flu-like symptoms.

The 34-year-old woman is currently in isolation, the health ministry said. If confirmed, it will be the first case of the deadly virus in Africa.

The virus, which first emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan, has spread to over 2,000 people and killed over 80.

The traveller has lived in China for the past five years, according to the statement released by the Ivorian health ministry, and had shown flu-like symptoms before boarding the plane to Abidjan.

Authorities believe it is a case of pneumonia and not coronavirus, but the final diagnosis will be made after tests results, the ministry said.

“Her general state is satisfactory,” the ministry said. “There are, at this stage, suspicions of a case of pneumonia tied to the coronavirus.”

In recent years, West Africa has suffered a deadly epidemic of Ebola that claimed the lives of thousands. In 2014-2015, Ebola caused global alarm when the world’s worst outbreak began in West Africa, killing 11,323 people and infecting an estimated 28,600 as it swept through Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, and to a lesser extent in Nigeria.