Coordinator of the national Hajj Commission, Aliyu Tanko has confirmed that about ten Nigerians have reportedly died while observing the pilgrimage to Mecca, Saudi Arabia, according to a Daily Times report.
Tanko also revealed that via a telephone interview that about fifty thousand Nigerians have arrived Mecca so with, with all of the performing the rites of Umrah. He further urged pilgrims to get appropriate medical care before embarking on pilgrimage, advising them not to endanger themselves by over exposing themselves to the harsh weather in the holy land.
On the Ebola scare, supervisor of hajj Abdul Ghani Al-Malki said: “So far 118,000 pilgrims have arrived by air from Nigeria. There was not a single suspected case of the deadly virus among anyone of them. ’Emergency doctors and consultants in infectious diseases are participating in the execution of the plan in addition to qualified teams who are capable of checking the virus, we are particularly checking pilgrims coming from countries with reported cases of Ebola including Nigeria, Kenya and Congo,”
The kingdom of Saudi Arabia barred pilgrims from Ebola stricken Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea from taking part in the hajj.
