FALSE: There are no recorded cases of Ebola in Kenya
Kenya’s Ministry of Health affirmed that the suspected case in Kakamega County turned out negative.
A Facebook post purporting that Ebola is “finally” in Kenya is FALSE.
“Ebola! Finally in Kenya! Ngai fafa (Father God)!” the post reads.
Ebola Virus Disease (EVD), according to the World Health Organisation, is a deadly disease in people and primates. It “is a rare but severe, often fatal illness in humans”.
The global health body says “the virus is transmitted to people from wild animals and spreads in the human population through human-to-human transmission”.
EVD first appeared in 1976 in two simultaneous outbreaks, one in Nzara, South Sudan, and the other in Yambuku in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The most recent EVD outbreak was declared on 20 September 2022 by the Ugandan Ministry of Health, following laboratory confirmation of a Mubende district patient.
Kenya has never had a confirmed EVD case. The country experienced a scare in Kericho in 2019, but it turned out negative. On 30 September 2022, health officials in Kakamega County, western Kenya, were investigating a suspected case of a patient who had travelled to eastern Uganda.
However, the Ministry of Health confirmed that the patient tested negative for the disease.
The statement, released on 1 October 2022, reads in part: “We would like to inform the public that the laboratory tests for samples taken from the patient have since turned out to be Negative and therefore there is no cause for alarm.”
The statement adds: “Following the declaration of an outbreak of Ebola Virus disease (EVD) in Mubende district of Central Uganda, on 20th September 2022, the Ministry of Health has heightened surveillance and screening at all our points of entry to curtail the spread of the Ebola virus into the country.”
Speaking after attending a Sunday thanksgiving mass at St Kizito Catholic Church Lusumu in Navakholo Sub-County, Kakamega County Governor Fernandes Barasa assured residents that the county was Ebola free.
“Yesterday we received a report from the Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI) confirming that samples taken from the reported suspect have come out Negative of the virus, so as of now there is no Ebola in Kakamega,” Barasa said.
“As a county, we have put in place the necessary measures to combat the virus. We have an isolation centre and capable doctors. I implore the residents of Kakamega to scale down movement into the neighbouring country of Uganda, as the Ebola disease is in Uganda,” Barasa cautioned.
PesaCheck has looked into a Facebook post purporting that Ebola is “finally” in Kenya and finds it to be FALSE.
This post is part of an ongoing series of PesaCheck fact-checks examining content marked as potential misinformation on Facebook and other social media platforms.
By partnering with Facebook and similar social media platforms, third-party fact-checking organisations like PesaCheck are helping to sort fact from fiction. We do this by giving the public deeper insight and context to posts they see in their social media feeds.
Have you spotted what you think is fake or false information on Facebook? Here’s how you can report. And, here’s more information on PesaCheck’s methodology for fact-checking questionable content.
This fact-check was written by PesaCheck Fact-Checker Peris Gachahi and edited by PesaCheck Senior Copy Editor Cédrick Irakoze and acting chief copy editor Francis Mwaniki.
The article was approved for publication by PesaCheck managing editor Doreen Wainainah.
PesaCheck is East Africa’s first public finance fact-checking initiative. It was co-founded by Catherine Gicheru and Justin Arenstein, and is being incubated by the continent’s largest civic technology and data journalism accelerator: Code for Africa. It seeks to help the public separate fact from fiction in public pronouncements about the numbers that shape our world, with a special emphasis on pronouncements about public finances that shape government’s delivery of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) public services, such as healthcare, rural development and access to water / sanitation. PesaCheck also tests the accuracy of media reportage. To find out more about the project, visit pesacheck.org.
PesaCheck is an initiative of Code for Africa, through its innovateAFRICA fund, with support from Deutsche Welle Akademie, in partnership with a coalition of local African media and other civic watchdog organisations.
