Mali will reportedly declare 108 people Ebola free after undergoing mandatory 21-day quarantine to prevent a possible outbreak of the deadly disease, reports confirmed on Monday.
Mali became the sixth country in West Africa to declare a confirmed case of Ebola when a two-year-old Malian died in October, which led to them searching for all people, who had contact with the child last month.
According to reports, 29 people who were with the child during a stopover in Bamako and 12 others was released on Monday, while 67 more, including 33 health workers, will be cleared on Saturday after the three-week quarantine.
"If all goes well, by this Saturday all 108 contacts we were following up will be safe and will have completed their 21 days," World Health Organization representative Ibrahima Soce Fall told Reuters.
And if there will be no cases in Mali, Fall said that the country will be declared Ebola Free on Dec. 6, but he quickly added that all Malian should remain vigilant in order to prevent a possible outbreak of the virus, which has killed around 5,000 people worldwide.
"We need to remain vigilant and to strengthen surveillance and the capacity to respond to any new cases that might come in as Mali shares an 800-km border with Guinea," Fall added.
Meanwhile, CBS News reporter Lara Logan submitted herself into a 21-day self-quarantine after she visited a hospital treating Ebola patients in Liberia.
Logan visited the hospital for her "60 Minutes" show two weeks ago. Barring any setback, Logan and four other CBS employees will be released from quarantine on Friday in South Africa.
"We wanted to try, as much as possible, to minimize our exposure to anybody while we still had to get our piece done," Logan said in a "60 Minutes Overtime" interview. "We were very mindful of the fact that this 21-day period after you've been in an Ebola-affected country is very important to everyone."
