2nd Dallas nurse flew on airline WHILE SICK

[DrLeftover]

Oct 15, 2014

(Reuters) - A second Texas nurse who has contracted Ebola flew on a commercial flight from Ohio to Dallas with a slight temperature the day before she was diagnosed, health officials said on Wednesday, raising new concerns about U.S. efforts to control the disease.

Chances that other passengers on the plane were infected were very low, but the nurse should not have been traveling on the flight, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Dr. Thomas Frieden told reporters.

The woman, Amber Vinson, 29, was isolated immediately after reporting a fever on Tuesday, Texas Department of State Health Services officials said. She had treated Liberian patient Thomas Eric Duncan, who died of Ebola and was the first patient diagnosed with the virus in the United States.

Vinson, a worker at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, had taken a Frontier Airlines flight from Cleveland, Ohio to Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport on Monday, the officials said.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/15/us-health-ebola-usa-idUSKCN0I40UE20141015

 

[Dee]

Something truly does need to be done about this, more precautions need to be taken into consideration and put into action, people need to be questioned and tested in case they have a fever and then the policy and procedure for handling a potential Ebola infection needs to be followed. There doesn't seem to be too many places in the US right now that are fully prepared to handle that, and especially not our air travel, rail, or bus systems.

 

[Webster]

This is the kind of situation that can give disease trackers nightmares... ..because now, not only do you have to worry about Ms. Vinson's health, but you've now got to contact-trace everyone that was on that plane, see who they've been in contact with and so on, all the while keeping tabs on everyone in question...like I said, this is the stuff of disease-tracking nightmares.