A suspected Ebola case reported to Taiwan’s Centers for Disease Control (CDC) turned out to be a hoax.
The CDC said Saturday that a 19-year-old man tested negative for the Ebola virus. It also said that a search based on the personal information provided by the man showed no record of him ever leaving the country.
The man was admitted to a hospital in the southern city of Kaohsiung late Friday. He told doctors at the hospital that he had recently traveled to Nigeria, where he ate a meal made from bat meat. Bats are known to be carriers of the Ebola virus, which has caused some 6,000 deaths in West Africa.
The man was hospitalized for developing a fever. He also complained of other symptoms such as vomiting and diarrhea. However, he has shown no symptoms since being admitted to the hospital and has given contradictory accounts of his conditions and purposed travels.