Nigeria's only confirmed Ebola patient was flown out of Abuja to Switzerland early on Monday, October 26, Health Minister Muhammad Ali Pate has confirmed, as health authorities in Africa's most populous country continue to monitor dozens of people she came into contact with.

The patient, a 42-year-old woman who is married to a Swiss diplomat based in the Nigerian capital, was airlifted on a medical evacuation aircraft from Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport at about 6am, according to Nigerian media. Her husband, who has not shown any symptoms, travelled with her.

Pate, who announced the evacuation on X, said her condition had improved markedly. He described her as "much improved, stable, conscious, communicating, and her clinical laboratory test results closing towards baseline," according to AFP. But he warned against reading too much into the progress: "This does not mean she is not still infectious, hence the strict protocols in place."

Premium Times reported that a convoy of ambulances and diplomatic vehicles was seen entering the private jet section of the airport before the flight. Pate did not say which Swiss hospital would treat her.

53 contacts under watch

The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC) has identified 53 contacts, up from the 44 first announced. They include health workers, members of her household, domestic staff, her husband, and people who attended to her at a clinic before she was admitted. None had developed symptoms or tested positive by the latest briefing, and all will be monitored for 21 days from their last possible exposure.

The woman, who was born in Uganda and lives in Abuja, arrived back in Nigeria on October 3 after a holiday and developed symptoms on October 6, Premium Times reported. She first went to a private hospital believing she had malaria before being admitted to another facility. Her diagnosis was announced on October 20, making her Nigeria's first Ebola case in more than a decade.

That gap of more than two weeks between her return and diagnosis has worried some experts, who fear the virus could have spread before she was isolated, AFP reported.

Row over the source

Where she was infected remains contested. Swiss authorities have said she caught the virus during a visit to Uganda, a claim Ugandan Health Minister Chris Baryomunsi pushed back against on Sunday, insisting Uganda is Ebola-free and urging that the matter be handled with "science, not politics." Africa CDC says investigations are still under way.

Nigeria last fought Ebola about 12 years ago, when it contained an outbreak that began with an imported case, an effort widely credited to rapid contact tracing.

A continent-wide threat

The case is part of a wider Bundibugyo outbreak centred in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where the virus has killed more than 4,600 people since May. The strain has no approved vaccine or specific treatment. The World Health Organization has warned that Africa now faces a "complex" outbreak, with the virus present in the west, east and centre of the continent.

In Kenya, the Ministry of Health on Monday released the first 20 of its quarantined contacts after they completed 21 days without symptoms. The country has recorded nine cases and two deaths, all linked to an imported case from the DRC that travelled through Uganda. Earlier genomic analysis reported by Kenyan media linked Nigeria's case to the same virus strain circulating in the region.

Photos: TheCable, AFP via Citizen Digital