Egypt announced it had not recorded any Ebola cases and had stepped up screening measures at ports of entry, as Middle Eastern countries respond to a growing outbreak in Central Africa that has already spread beyond the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Egypt said on Sunday it had not recorded any Ebola virus infections, as countries across the Middle East moved to tighten precautions amid a worsening outbreak in Central Africa.
In a statement, Egypt's health ministry said authorities had raised preparedness levels and activated preventive measures at all air, sea and land entry points as part of the country's epidemiological surveillance system.
"Current risk assessments indicate that the likelihood of the disease spreading to Egypt remains low," health ministry spokesman Hossam Abdel Ghaffar said, adding that Ebola "is not transmitted as easily as respiratory diseases" because infection requires "direct and close contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person after symptoms appear".
He added that travellers arriving from affected areas could be monitored for 21 days "in line with approved preventive protocols".
The announcement comes as the World Health Organisation (WHO) warned about the "scale and speed" of the outbreak centred in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Wednesday there were around 600 suspected Ebola cases and 139 suspected deaths, warning that figures were expected to rise because the virus circulated undetected for some time.
The outbreak involves the rare Bundibugyo strain of Ebola, for which no approved vaccine or treatment currently exists. The WHO has declared the outbreak a public health emergency of international concern, though it stopped short of classifying it as a global pandemic emergency.
The UN agency said the risk level was currently high at national and regional levels but remained low globally.
Regional governments have already begun responding to fears of cross-border spread.
Bahrain announced on Tuesday it was suspending the entry of foreign travellers arriving from South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda for 30 days.
The outbreak has already spread into Uganda, where authorities confirmed cases in the capital Kampala, including one death involving travellers arriving from Congo, according to the WHO .
The epicentre of the outbreak is in Congo's conflict-hit Ituri province near the Ugandan and South Sudanese borders, an area marked by armed violence and large population displacements.
The WHO said humanitarian access and coordination remain major challenges in containing the outbreak, while African and international health bodies have activated emergency response mechanisms.