Ebola Alert: Ministry of Health Suspends Hotel Meetings and Conferences Across Kenya
The Ministry of Health has basically put the kibosh on government meetings and conferences in hotels across Kenya, at least for the time being, as they try and get a grip on the reported Ebola outbreak.
The rule, which kicked in on Wednesday October 7 2026, was a direct result of confirmation on October 6 of an Ebola type virus – Bundibugyo disease – turning up in Kenya. The new case it seems was an imported one.
In a memo to her own department, Principal Secretary for Public Health and Professional Standards Mary Muthoni Muriuki told the State Department to put emergency preparedness, contact tracing and swift response measures at the top of the priority list to stop the bug from spreading.
The ban on meetings and conferences in hotels is still in place, for the time being. But if there’s a good enough reason to hold a meeting, then a formal nod from the Principal Secretary’s office is required.
Ministry of Health Suspends Hotel Meetings and Conferences
The Ministry of Health is sending a message to all its own directorates, divisions and programmes to pay attention to the directive and get on board with the new measures as the government tries to get the Ebola response back on track.
The directive itself covers all the official shindigs that were planned in hotels , meetings, seminars and conferences and all that.
The idea behind the new rules is that by not tying up govt staff and resources with non-essential stuff, they’ll be free to do what really matters – that is, supporting the response to the outbreak.
A memo to all and sundry from the ministry says simply : “All Directorates, Divisions and Programmes, implement the standard operating procedures for preventing, preparing for and dealing with Ebola and other super-infectious diseases”
The Ministry also made it clear that if you need to do somethin that breaks the rules then you need to get the Principal Secretary’s office to sign off on it first.
It seems that the Heads of the various directorates, divisions and programmes have been told to keep the government meetings running, but make sure they do it in a way that lets them put the legwork and resources into the Ebola response.
Why Kenya Has Suspended Hotel Conferences
Kenyas been stepping up its Ebola game, in response to that one imported case of the Bundibugyo virus. And it’s not like they were sitting on their hands before either.
According to the latest word from the health ministry, the top priority right now is making sure theyre ready for anything which means emergency prep, tracin contacts who may have been in close contact with the person who brought the virus in, and anything else they can think of to stop it from spreading further.
The ministry has been telling its different teams to get to work on the procedures they already have in place for handling Ebola & other super contagious illnesses. The idea is that the experts wont be tied up with routine meetings, and will be on hand to help with the response.
Government Mobilises Billions for Ebola Response
The suspension of those hotel conferences has come at a pretty bad time, the government is scraping together a war chest of KSh70 billion to try & be ready for the worst.
The National Treasury has put aside a good chunk of change (KSh 2.6 billion) to pay for the emergency response but the real heavy lifting will be coming from the US – KSh 21 billion is being promised and the World Bank – who are stumping up KSh 51.8 billion through their Rapid Response Option.
Alot of that cash is earmarked for getting the healthcare system ready, as well as the public health teams. But lets be clear, that’s what they think theyll need to do, it’s not necessarily a guarantee that its all going to get spent.
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Ebola Alert: Ministry of Health Suspends Hotel Meetings and Conferences Across Kenya
