Ebola angel’s fury: I was a scapegoat
In her first major interview, brave nurse blasts health watchdogs who claimed she hid deadly infection... and insists: THEY put UK at risk
WHEN nurse Pauline Cafferkey volunteered to help fight ebola in Sierra Leone, she nearly paid the ultimate price.
She was herself struck down by the deadly virus and only survived after a desperate battle that became headline news throughout the UK. Even after recovering, Pauline faces a lifetime of medical problems.
But in the last few months, instead of being hailed as a heroine, she has been accused by officials of risking the lives of thousands by deliberately covering up her symptoms.
It was claimed that when she returned from Sierra Leone, she had attempted to conceal her high temperature – one of the first symptoms of ebola – and then acted recklessly by leaving the Public Health England screening area at Heathrow without permission. She was also accused of bringing the nursing profession into disrepute.
Now, after being cleared of wrongdoing, Miss Cafferkey, 40, has hit back at her accusers, claiming that she was ‘hung out to dry’ to cover up their failures.
In an exclusive interview with The Mail on Sunday, she reveals:
Health watchdog Public Health England struggled to cope with large numbers of returning medics, and did not have enough screening kits;
Doctors and nurses were told to take each other’s temperatures, in breach of PHE’s own rules;
When she alerted them to her elevated temperature, PHE staff couldn’t contact experts – because they had the wrong telephone number;
She was cleared to fly before officials sought the opinion of an infectious diseases specialist;
Despite nearly dying twice from a virus that kills half of its victims, she was ruthlessly scapegoated.
Last week, after an 18-month investigation and a two-day hearing, Miss Cafferkey was finally cleared of all wrongdoing by her professional body, the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC). Now, free to speak of her ordeal for the first time, she told this newspaper: ‘I went out there to help save lives but I came back to a system that failed. I was made a scapegoat for a catalogue of errors. PHE were entirely responsible.
‘They, not me, put public lives at risk by allowing me to fly before they had an opinion from an infectious diseases official.’
She added: ‘It’s been awful being thought of as dishonest. It’s like
my reputation had been destroyed, even though I knew I had done nothing wrong.
‘I feel tremendous relief that I can finally talk about it and that I’ve been believed. For a long time, I felt guilty about having walked out of the screening area. In my mind, I really thought I was to blame for something that could have put the public at risk.
‘But as the investigation went on, and I started reading other people’s statements, I realised that, no, it was a catalogue of errors by PHE that brought us all to this. They put the public at risk when their job was to protect the public.’
Chaotic scenes greeted Miss Cafferkey at Heathrow – Europe’s busiest airport – when she arrived in December 2014 after six weeks nursing ebola sufferers in the West African country.
The NMC hearing heard that the Heathrow unit had not been prepared for a large influx of passengers from Sierra Leone and the screening area was ‘busy, disorganised and even chaotic’.
Each of the 50-strong group of NHS doctors and nurses was given a port-of-entry ebola health assessment form, on which their temperature and other information was to be recorded by medical staff.
Miss Cafferkey, who had been working at the Save The Children centre outside Sierra Leone’s capital, Freetown, said: ‘I would like to say something positive about the screening unit but I can’t. They were not prepared. There weren’t enough screening kits.
‘It was hot, busy and disorganised. Everyone was just walking past us while we waited. We were fanning ourselves with our forms.
‘Finally, one of the PHE screening staff took us to a small room and told us we could take each other’s temperatures.
‘I feel sorry for her now because that was against procedures, but that’s what happened. We didn’t just decide to do it ourselves without someone telling us to.’
A doctor in the group took Miss Cafferkey’s temperature twice and found it to be 38.2C, then 38.3C. Any temperature above 37.5C is considered to be elevated and should be reported to a consultant for further assessment.
Miss Cafferkey, who was ‘feeling fine’ at that stage, was shocked when her colleague said: ‘You’ve got a fever.’
She said: ‘My jaw dropped in surprise. I just automatically reached for the paracetamol in my bag without thinking. I don’t know why I didn’t think it could be a sign of anything worse but I honestly didn’t. I’d slept on the plane, exhausted by the night shift I’d just done. I thought I felt fine but I clearly wasn’t. I thought if it was anything, it might be linked to malaria or typhoid infection, both rife out there, but ebola was way down my list.’
She added: ‘I didn’t know another member of the group recorded my temperature on the form as 37.2C.
‘I just heard someone say, “Let’s get out of here and we’ll sort it out.” I followed the others to security, thinking that’s what we would do.’
Miss Cafferkey, who faced being struck off if found guilty, was accused of allowing the incorrect temperature to be recorded in the screening unit on December 28, 2014. She was also charged with leaving the unit without reporting her true temperature, and with taking paracetamol, that would have lowered her temperature.
It was claimed her actions had potentially put the public at risk and jeopardised the reputation of her profession, rendering her unfit to practice.
She was cleared last Wednesday after an independent panel at the hearing in Edinburgh ruled she was in a ‘diminished medical state’ and merely ‘swept along with events’. It found no attempt to mislead PHE doctors.
But the case prompted stinging criticism of PHE for raising the complaint against her, and of the NMC for treating it seriously.
It is understood that both colleagues who recorded Miss Cafferkey’s details in the unit are facing separate disciplinary hearings – something that angers her.
She said: ‘There were so many system errors. A complete catalogue of them from start to finish – nothing to do with any of us. I’ve no idea if any of the PHE workers faced an internal investigation but I hope they did because they deserve to.’ She recalled how after leaving the screening unit, her group passed through security and found themselves in international arrivals before reconvening to discuss Miss Cafferkey’s temperature.
One medic urged her to call the Health Protection Agency, the response centre for infectious diseases. She did and they told her they would get in contact with the PHE and send someone through from the screening unit to take her back to it. She was then escorted back through to the unit by a PHE official. ‘I’ve been very open with the investigating authorities from the start,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry I left the screening area and I’m still not sure why I did. But I think I was already not thinking straight because of the ebola in my system.’
Miss Cafferkey claims that after voluntarily returning to the unit, she told staff she’d taken paracetamol, which lowered her temperature – but it fell on deaf ears.
She saw a PHE consultant who took her temperature and noted it was elevated. Miss Cafferkey recalls telling her of the higher reading recorded by her colleague, but was not asked by the doctor if she had taken any medication.
Miss Cafferkey said: ‘I told everyone when I returned to the unit that I’d taken paracetamol which is why I was stunned to find later I was accused of trying to conceal the fact. I was also aware there were attempts to reach infectious disease specialists but it turns out the staff had the wrong number, so didn’t get through.
‘Instead, I was told after a while: “It’s fine, you can make your flight”. I feel let down that they knew I had a fever yet they failed to protect me. I think they’ve been pretty irresponsible. They didn’t do their jobs properly.
‘Imagine when they found out the next day that the nurse they’d allowed to leave, had actually been suffering from ebola?
‘I should have been sent to the infectious diseases unit from Heathrow – not allowed to get on a plane to Glasgow. The minute they let me fly, they (PHE) put the health of the public at risk. Not me. I feel very bitter that this has been turned around on me and I’m the one they’ve tried to make a scapegoat for their failings.’
The following day, Miss Cafferkey was diagnosed with ebola, with one of the highest viral loads recorded. A nationwide alert was triggered that would lead to her evacuation by military aircraft in an isolation tent to the specialist unit for highly infectious patients at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead, North London, where she spent a month fighting for her life.
Miss Cafferkey made what was believed to be a full recovery and even appeared at the Pride Of Britain awards last September in relation to her work saving lives of patients in Sierra Leone.
But days later she became critically ill from meningitis triggered by the virus in her spinal fluid and was re-admitted to the Royal Free. She was admitted to the hospital for a third time in February following further complications.
At last week’s hearing, Miss Cafferkey’s lawyer successfully argued that an isolated incident of poor judgment brought about by extreme exhaustion and the early stages of ebola infection should not be allowed to blight the nurse’s otherwise impeccable record. After the ruling, the PHE said it ‘supported the judgment of the panel’.
Miss Cafferkey has returned to her job as a public health nurse in Blantyre, Lanarkshire, but has to take drugs daily to keep epileptic seizures, spinal swelling, nerve pain and body aches at bay.
She said last night: ‘I don’t know what I would do if I wasn’t a nurse. It’s all I’ve ever wanted to be. It’s just everything to me. It’s such a privileged job to be in.’
A PHE spokesman said of Miss Cafferkey’s comments last night: ‘There is an agreed version of facts between the NMC and Pauline Cafferkey and her representatives and this description goes beyond these. PHE screened thousands of returners from countries most at risk of ebola and did so with efficiency and courtesy throughout. We have nothing further to add.’
‘Catalogue of errors by Public Health England’ ‘Being a nurse is all I’ve ever wanted’