TEXAS NURSE WHO CONTRACTED EBOLA REPEATEDLY VISITED PATIENT’S ROOM
Nurse’s apartment being cleaned after positive test
Medical records provided to The Associated Press show that about 70 staff members at a Dallas hospital were involved in the care of an Ebola patient before his death last week.
The employees at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital drew Thomas Eric Duncan’s blood, put tubes down his throat and wiped up his diarrhea. They analyzed his urine and wiped saliva from his lips, even after he had lost consciousness.
The group included a 26- yearold nurse, identified as Nina Pham, who is now being treated for Ebola.
The size of the medical team reflects the hospital’s intense effort to save Duncan’s life and suggests that many other people could have been exposed to the virus.
The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the agency must broaden the pool of people being monitored.
It will also investigate how workers took off protective gear, because removing it incorrectly can lead to contamination.
Pham’s Dallas apartment is being thoroughly cleaned after tests over the weekend confirmed she was infected. Officials said the dog in the nurse’s apartment has been removed to an undisclosed location for monitoring and care.
Other developments
• The World Health Organization on Monday called the Ebola outbreak “the most severe, acute health emergency seen in modern times.” The disease has killed more than 4,000 people, mostly in the West African countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea. In Liberia, health workers reported for duty at hospitals, largely defying calls for a strike that could have further hampered the country’s ability to respond to the epidemic.
• At a three- day symposium as part of the annual World Food Prize award ceremony in Iowa, the attendance of prominent West African government officials prompted the inclusion of Ebola’s impact on food security in the program. World Food Prize Foundation president Kenneth Quinn says Sierra Leone President Ernest Bai Koroma was to deliver the keynote address later this week but is staying home to deal with the Ebola crisis. He’ll deliver his speech via satellite.
• Over the next week, U. S. screenings of airline passengers who have travelled from Liberia, Sierra Leone or Guinea will expand to Washington Dulles, Chicago, Atlanta and Newark, N. J. Such screenings began over the weekend at New York’s JFK International Airport.
• Meanwhile, France and other European countries are considering following the lead of the U. S. and Britain to start screening passengers.
• A Louisiana judge has signed an order temporarily blocking the disposal of Ebolarelated ashes in the state. Louisiana’s attorney general sought the court order to prevent the ashes from being taken to a chemical waste disposal company in his state. The ashes are from the incinerated belongings of Duncan.
• A possible Ebola vaccine developed by the U. S. government is being tested on up to 40 medical workers in Mali, which shares a border with Guinea. If safety tests go well, larger trials could be done in the outbreak zone early next year.
Conspiracy theories
• In an interview last week, conservative icon Phyllis Schlafly said U. S. President Barack Obama purposefully allowed Ebola to enter the country so it would be more like Africa.
• Conservative radio commentator Rush Limbaugh just days earlier said Obama welcomed Ebola here as payback for slavery.
• Troubled rapper Chris Brown informed his Twitter followers Monday that Ebola must be some kind of population-control plot. His followers apparently convinced him of his own stupidity — he later tweeted it was time for him to shut up.