David Cameron sees the outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus as a “very serious threat” to the UK, it emerged today.
The Prime Minister has ordered the emergency Cobra committee to discuss precautions the UK should take.
Public Health England has also issued a national alert to UK doctors amid fears the virus could spread here.
Meanwhile both the Health and Transport departments have been involved in discussions on further action.
An outbreak of the deadly virus erupted in Africa in February and has so far killed almost 700 people across several countries.
Speaking today Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said: “[Discussion of Ebola] certainly has reached cabinet level.
“As far as we’re aware there are no British nationals so far affected by this outbreak and certainly no cases in the UK. However the Prime Minister does regard it as a very serious threat.
“I will be chairing a Cobra meeting later on today to asses the situation and look at any measures we need to take either in the UK or in a our diplomatic posts abroad in order to manage that threat.”
He told Sky News: “We are very much focused on it as a new and emerging threat we need to deal with.”
In a letter to GPs, A&Es and health trusts, Public Health England said the likelihood of imported cases was low.
It said the disease had never been brought to Europe by travellers despite several previous outbreaks.
But the letter warned: “Health care providers in the UK are reminded to remain vigilant for travellers who have visited areas affected by viral haemorrhagic fever and who develop unexplained illness.”
Symptoms include fever, headache, sore throat and a general malaise within 21 days of visiting affected areas.
Since early cases were diagnosed at the start of the year the most recent Ebola outbreak has killed more than 670 people in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone and infected more than 1,200.
Last week an infected Liberian man was found to have travelled through a major Nigerian airport.
Several West African airlines have now stopped flying to Liberia and Sierra Leone due to concerns about the outbreak.
Wellcome Trust director Professor Jeremy Farrar, who specialises in tropical medicine, told the BBC the UK was not in grave danger, but added there was a big risk of it spreading in Africa.
He said: “This infection can be prevented from further transmission if really tight infection control measures...are put in place.
“In the settings this is in, some of the poorest countries in the world, with the health care facilities they’ve got that’s extraordinarily difficult.
“This is not a hospital in Central London with all the infection control measures, these are district clinics in rural settings.”
One 33-year-old Texan doctor who contracted the disease while treating patients in Africa is fighting for his life.
Kent Brantly is said to be in a grave condition in the country’s capital Monrovia and “terrified” he will not survive. He caught the deadly virus while directing a Liberian hospital’s Ebola clinic.
