Health Cabinet Secretary James Macharia said two weeks ago that the airline would resume flights to the region, which were stopped last year in the wake of the Ebola pandemic.
“We shall review the decision on suspending the flights to West Africa countries, then lift the ban,” said Mr Macharia.
KQ chief executive officer Mbuvi Ngunze said the airline was ready to resume the flights as soon as the government officially gave it the green light.
“At the moment, there has been no official communication from the government on lifting the suspension for nationals of those countries that were not allowed into Kenya. We are engaging the government on the same issue and will communicate appropriately,” he said.
Kenya suspended all flights to the two West African countries of Liberia and Sierra Leone, the countries hardest hit by the Ebola pandemic, in August last year.
Until the ban, KQ used to fly 44 times a week to 10 West African cities, comprising a quarter of the airline’s 38 destinations on the continent.
READ: East Africa airports, borders on high Ebola alert
Last October, KQ estimated that it would lose at least 4 per cent of its annual revenues if the Ebola were not controlled in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea by the end of the financial year in March 2015.
Although the airline has not indicated how much of its revenue is derived from West Africa, estimates based on the number of destinations and frequency of flights show that the West African routes may contribute up to $171 million in revenue for the airline on an annual basis.
More than 9,000 people have died from Ebola since December 2013.
According to WHO reports for last week, the number of new cases of Ebola has risen in all of West Africa’s worst-hit countries for the second week in a row, since this January.
By Wednesday Sierra Leone had registered 76 of the 144 new cases, Guinea 65 and Liberia three.
The WHO said that the increase highlights the “considerable challenges” that must still be overcome to end the outbreak.
Kenya early this year extended its support to West African countries in the fight against the deadly Ebola virus by deploying 170 Kenyan health workers to Sierra Leone and Liberia as part of the African Union mission to contain Ebola in West Africa.
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