DALLAS (AP) — A team of federal health officials is tracking anyone who had close contact with a man who’s now being treated for Ebola in a Dallas hospital.
The head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the nine-member team is in Dallas to work with local and state health agencies, and to make sure that those people are watched every day for 21 days.
CDC Director Tom Frieden says, “If anyone develops fever, we’ll immediately isolate them to stop the chain of transmission.”
The people being monitored are those who’ve had contact with a man who’s been in isolation at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital since Sunday. Authorities haven’t revealed his nationality or age.
The man left Liberia on September 19th, arrived the next day to visit relatives, and started feeling ill four or five days later.
Three members of the ambulance crew that transported him to the hospital are among those being monitored. They’ve tested negative for the virus.
Frieden says he doesn’t believe anyone who was on board flights with the patient is at risk, since Ebola doesn’t spread until the person with the virus shows symptoms.
%@AP Links
122-w-36-(Matt Small, AP correspondent, with CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden)–Federal health investigators are in Texas working with officials there to prevent the one case of Ebola there from spreading. AP correspondent Matt Small reports. ((watch for possible dating on ID and condition of patient)) (1 Oct 2014)
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112-a-12-(Dr. Tom Frieden (FREE’-dehn), director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in AP interview)-“chain of transmission”-CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden says a team from the CDC has been dispatched to North Texas to work with local and state authorities in an effort to prevent any additional cases of Ebola. (1 Oct 2014)
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APPHOTO TXMO101: An ambulance pulls into the Dallas Fire-Rescue station 37 in Dallas, Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2014. Three EMT’s from this location are under a 21 day quarantine after a patient they transported tested positive for Ebola. (AP Photo/LM Otero) (30 Sep 2014)
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