According to The Daily NonPareil, Elwood said the Treynor Community School District reached out to the student’s family as well as the Iowa Department of Public Health and the school’s attorney. He said the student has agreed to voluntary self-isolation for 21 days after returning from the central African country.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is asking travelers to avoid nonessential trips to Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone and to practice enhanced precautions in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Uganda is located in central Africa and borders the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west. It is located halfway across the continent from the west African nations where active Ebola cases are found.

However, the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s Ministry of Health states that an isolated outbreak of Ebola – separate from the outbreak in west Africa – is ongoing in the northwestern portion of the country. The CDC said that was connected to a single person infected after preparing bushmeat. There were 68 cases and 49 deaths reported as of Oct. 9, according to the CDC.

A fact sheet from the Iowa Department of Health advises schools that students with “someone in their household or a close contact recently returned from Guinea, Sierra Leone or Liberia” should not be excluded from school because they pose “no risk to others at the school, and needs to continue his/her education.”

Elwood acknowledged in his statement that neither state nor federal officials are discouraging travel to that portion of Africa. But he said the district will continue to communicate with authorities about the student’s case.