Mali reports second Ebola case; nurse is said to have died

A clinic in Mali is on lockdown after a nurse there died of Ebola on Tuesday in what would be the country’s second confirmed case of the disease, according to news reports.

Mahamadou Camara, the West African country’s communications minister, said on Twitter that an Ebola case had been confirmed in Bamako, the capital, and that a clinic was quarantined.

According to the BBC, Reuters and Agence France-Presse, all citing unidentified medical and government officials, the nurse died after treating a Guinean national. Camara did not mention a death or provide further details about the confirmation of a second Ebola case.

Mali has had only one other confirmed case of Ebola. A 2-year-old girl was diagnosed with the virus in the western city of Kayes on Oct. 23 and died the following day. She had lived with her family in neighboring Guinea, where several relatives are believed to have contracted the virus, and was already showing signs of the virus when she was brought to Mali.

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FOR THE RECORD

Nov. 12, 8:20 a.m.: An earlier version of this post stated that Mali’s first confirmed Ebola case, a 2-year-old girl, was brought by her father from Guinea to his hometown in Mali and died 20 days after he did. The girl was brought to a different town in Mali by relatives on her mother’s side of the family and died 21 days after her father.

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The family’s story illustrates some of the reasons that the Ebola virus has spread so rapidly in parts of West Africa.

In the current outbreak, which began in December, Ebola has infected more than 13,200 people and killed 4,960, according to estimates reported to the World Health Organization. Most of the cases and deaths have occurred in three West African countries: Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

Times staff writer Alexandra Zavis contributed to this report.

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