The Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas where the patient is being isolated.
As Nigeria
prepares to be declared Ebola free by the World Health Organisation
(WHO), America yesterday recorded its first case in Texas.
The U.S. Centres for Disease Control and
Prevention told the AFP that since there have been no new cases since
August 31, Nigeria should be able to announce a formal end to its
outbreak on October 12.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) is expected to make the declaration.
The last three people monitored due to
potential exposure to an Ebola patient will end their 21 days of
follow-up for signs of symptoms this week.
“The last three patient contacts will
exit their 21-day follow-up on October 2, strongly suggesting the
outbreak in Nigeria has been contained,” the CDC said in a statement.
But as the country is waiting for this
announcement, up to twelve Americans could have Ebola. A male patient
who traveled to Dallas from Liberia is quarantined at Texas Health
Presbyterian Hospital
He is first person diagnosed with Ebola
in U.S. as CDC ‘disease detectives’ arrived in Texas to track down
anyone he came in contact with.
Several children whom the patient came in contact with are being monitored at home, Governor Rick Perry said yesterday
Patient arrived in U.S. on September 20 –
after flying from Liberia via Brussels in Belgium – but did not develop
symptoms until September 24
He attended Texas Health Presbyterian on
September 26 – but was dismissed with antibiotics. He was rushed to
hospital, vomiting two days later.
The man is in a ‘serious but stable
condition’ and has been quarantined since Sunday. He is ‘awake, talking
and asking for food’, doctors said today. However there are fears of the
disease spreading because the man was in the U.S. for almost a week
before being isolated.
The patient showed no symptoms of the
disease during his journey – which also included a stop en route in
Brussels, Belgium - but began to develop signs on September 24.
He sought medical care two days later at
Texas Presbyterian Hospital – where he was dismissed with antibiotics
amid reports that he had not been closely questioned about his recent
travel.
On September 28, the man, believed to be
in his fifties with children, was rushed to hospital in an ambulance
while vomiting and was quarantined. It raises the frightening prospect
that he was mixing freely with others for a full four days while showing
symptoms of the virus – the time when Ebola is most contagious.
Texas Governor Rick Perry said at a
hospital news conference yesterday that several children had come in
contact with the Ebola patient and were being kept out of school and
monitored closely at home.
He reassured the wider public that the
risk was contained and that the disease is not airborne. Governor Perry
said he had ‘full confidence’ in the medical professionals when it came
to the safety and welfare of citizens.
His family is being monitored closely as health officials reiterated that the wider public was not at risk.
Dallas County Health Department was
forced to deny that a second male patient was being closely monitored
yesterday after media reports.
The ambulance crew who transported the
patient all tested negative for Ebola on Wednesday but have been placed
in ‘reverse isolation’ at their homes for the next 21 days as a
precaution.
Ambulance 37 which transported him to
the hospital has been cordoned off. There are concerns after it was used
to move patients for two days after the Ebola patient but hospital
officials have reassured citizens that it was properly sterilised.
There is believed to be no risk to
anyone who traveled on the same flight from Liberia because he did not
have any symptoms at the time. The virus is not contagious until
symptoms develop and is then transmitted via bodily fluids.
Health officials are investigating the
misdiagnosis and why the patient’s isolation was delayed despite his
symptoms and his travel history.
A source told CNN that no one had asked the man if he had recently traveled.
The CDC recommends that all medical facilities ask patients who present with Ebola symptoms about countries they have visited.
Community leaders are also assisting
medical professionals in the hunt for those who need to be tested while
trying to quell panic in the local Dallas community.
Stanley Gaye, president of the Liberian Community Association of Dallas-Fort Worth, told MailOnline yesterday that he believed the patient was a man in his 50s.
He understood that the man had been
visiting his wife or fiancée and the house he had been staying had a lot
of children living there.
His identity has not been officially confirmed.
Mr Gaye said at a community meeting on
Tuesday: “We’ve been telling people to try to stay away from social
gatherings. We need to know who it is so that they (family members) can
all go get tested. If they are aware, they should let us know. We are
very concerned about it.”
Alben Tarty, spokesman for the
association, said he was keen to avoid a panic but that he wanted anyone
infected to come forward. He said that the patient was a ‘family man’
and was thought to have children.
Mr Tarty said: “It’s scary for them.”
The patient is reportedly not being treated with the experimental serum ZMapp – because there is none left.
“From the information that we have now,
it does not appear the individual was involved in the response to Ebola,
but that’s something we’ll investigate more,” CDC said on Tuesday.
The man’s name or nationality has not yet been released but it is understood that he was visiting relatives in the U.S.
Asked how many people the patient may
have had close contact with, the CDC said: “I think a handful is the
right characterization.’
The man is not believed to have gone to any other hospitals in the area.
President Obama is aware of the patient’s Ebola diagnosis and the public health investigation, the White House said.
CDC said the case also marked the first time this strain of Ebola has been diagnosed outside of West Africa.
The unidentified patient is being kept
in isolation and the hospital is following Centers for Disease Control
recommendations to keep doctors, staff and patients safe.
Dr Edward Goodman, epidemiologist for
Texas Health Presbyterian, said the hospital had a plan for handling
Ebola should a suspected case emerge and was ‘well prepared’ to provide
care.
Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings told CBS DFW:
“We have quarantined both [the ambulance crew that took the patient to
the hospital and the unit itself to make sure that nothing was there
that can be spread.
“First and foremost, we got to have our
thoughts and prayers for this man, who is very sick and hopefully he’ll
get well. But we’re gonna sure everybody else is safe at the same time.”
The patient’s symptoms and recent travel indicated a case of Ebola.
Specimens from the patient were tested
by a state lab and confirmed by a separate test by the Centers for
Disease Control, said Carrie Williams, spokeswoman for the Texas
Department of State Health Services.
The hospital is reviewing why the patient was initially sent home with antibiotics.
Zachary Thompson, director of Dallas
County Health & Human Services, said health officials in North Texas
are well equipped to care for the patient.
“This is not Africa,” he told Dallas station WFAA. “We have a great infrastructure to deal with an outbreak.”
Twelve other people in the U.S. have
been tested for Ebola since July 27, according to the CDC. All of those
tests were negative.
Four U.S. aid workers who became
infected while volunteering in West Africa have been treated in special
isolation facilities in hospitals in Atlanta and Nebraska.
A U.S. doctor exposed to the virus in
Sierra Leone is under observation in a similar facility at the National
Institutes of Health.
The U.S. has only four such isolation
units. But asked whether the male patient from Liberia would be moved to
one of those specialty facilities, CDC said there was no need and
virtually any hospital can provide the proper care and infection
control.
One of the health workers who contracted
Ebola, Samaritan’s Purse Dr Kent Brantly, testified to the Senate
Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee about prevention methods
earlier this month, The National Journal reported.
“Many have used the analogy of a fire burning out of control to describe this unprecedented Ebola outbreak,” Brantly said.
“Indeed it is a fire – it is a fire
straight from the pit of hell. We cannot fool ourselves into thinking
that the vast moat of the Atlantic Ocean will protect us from the flames
of this fire.
“Instead, we must mobilize the resources… to keep entire nations from being reduced to ashes.’
Just one day before the Dallas Ebola
case was publicly confirmed, Bill Gates said at a breakfast meeting that
countries should get ready to handle a possible outbreak of the deadly
virus as people from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea move across
borders.
“Because of that uncertainty, I am not
going to hazard a guess,’ Gates said when asked whether he thinks the
massive ramping up of international aid over the past few weeks is
enough.
“We are sorry to learn of the confirmed
case of Ebola in Dallas,’ Samaritan’s Purse president Bruce Johnson said
in a statement on Tuesday.
“This person did exactly the right thing – report to a hospital.’
He added: ‘I am grateful for what we
have available in the U.S. We have seen the success and survival rate of
Americans cared for in a well-equipped medical center. We need to help
share this with the people of West Africa.
“We will be praying for the survival of
this patient and that doctors will continue to learn at a quickened pace
what will help fight this epidemic across West Africa.”
Ebola symptoms can include fever, muscle
pain, vomiting and bleeding, and can appear as long as 21 days after
exposure to the virus.
Ebola is not contagious until symptoms begin, and it takes close contact with bodily fluids to spread.
The New York Times reported
traveling medical workers are treated with suspicion, and that they must
also deal with “a belief that simply saying “Ebola” aloud makes the
disease appears.’
Health officials use two primary
guidelines when deciding whether to test a person for the virus –
whether that person has traveled to West Africa and whether he or she
has been near friends or relatives or other people who have been exposed
to the virus, said CDC spokesman Jason McDonald.
Since the summer months, U.S. health
officials have been preparing for the possibility that an individual
traveler could unknowingly arrive with the infection. Health authorities
have advised hospitals on how to prevent the virus from spreading
within their facilities.
People boarding planes in the outbreak
zone are checked for fever, but that does not guarantee that an infected
person won’t get through. Liberia is one of the three hardest-hit
countries in the epidemic, along with Sierra Leone and Guinea.
The epidemic has killed more than 3,000 people in West Africa.
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