After two Nipah virus cases were confirmed in West Bengal, the World Health Organization on Friday said that the likelihood of the outbreak spreading to other Indian states or internationally was low.
The World Health Organization said that the risk posed by the Nipah virus was “moderate at the sub-national level, and low at the national, the regional and global levels”.
The global health authority said it is not recommending travel or trade restrictions based on the information about the cases currently available.
The Nipah virus is a “zoonotic illness” transferred from animals such as pigs and fruit bats to humans. The virus can also be caught through human-to-human transmission.
It causes fever and cold-like symptoms in patients. The infection can also cause encephalitis, which is the inflammation of the brain, and myocarditis, or the inflammation of the heart, in some cases.
The World Health Organization said it assessed the risk from Nipah to be “moderate” at the sub-national level as no specific drugs or vaccines against it are available, and because early diagnosis is difficult.
However, it said that India has implemented strong public health measures to detect and control outbreaks, including surveillance mechanisms and the ability to rapidly test samples. It added that there have been no reports of cross‑border transmission, and that the current outbreak remains geographically limited.
“India has demonstrated strong capacity and experience in managing past NiV outbreaks,” the global health body said.
The statement came after Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Pakistan and Vietnam tightening airport screenings of passengers following the cases in West Bengal, Reuters reported.
The two confirmed cases in West Bengal are a 25-year-old woman and a 25-year-old man, both healthcare workers at a hospital in North 24 Parganas district’s Barasat.
They had developed symptoms in the last week of December, which later progressed to neurological complications. They were placed under isolation in early January.
As of January 21, while one patient was reported to be recovering, the other remained in a critical condition.
After the cases were confirmed, the health authorities had launched an extensive public health response. More than 190 contacts had been identified, traced and tested, with all testing negative for the virus, the World Health Organization said on Friday.
This is the seventh documented Nipah outbreak in India and the third in West Bengal, following outbreaks in Siliguri in 2001 and Nadia in 2007. The last reported outbreak of the disease in the country was in Kerala in August.
