ABC NewsA second health care worker at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital who tended to Thomas Eric Duncan as he died of Ebola has tested positive for the lethal virus, and a local official said this morning that additional cases among the hospital’s health care workers is a “very real possibility.”
“The fight against Ebola in Dallas is a two-front fight now,” Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins said, speaking at a morning press conference.
Authorities said they are now tracking 75 people following the second hospital worker’s diagnosis. The unidentified health care worker reported a fever Tuesday and was isolated at the hospital, authorities said.
The preliminary Ebola test was run late Tuesday at the state public health laboratory in Austin, and results were received at about midnight, authorities said. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has begun confirmation testing.
The woman was put into isolation within 90 minutes, and she is dealing with her diagnosis “with grit and grace,” Jenkins said.
Authorities said this may not be the last case to be found among the hospital’s staff.
“We are preparing contingencies for more and that is a very real possibility,” Jenkins said.
Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings also suggested additional people may get sick.
“It may get worse before it gets better, but it will get better,” the mayor said.
Dr. Daniel Varga of Texas Health Resources defended practices at the hospital, which has faced criticism amid the Ebola diagnoses.
“It’s clear there was an exposure somewhere, sometime in our treatment of Duncan. Let’s be clear we’re a hospital that serves this community extremely well,” Varga said at the press conference.
“We’re the first to diagnose and treat this insidious disease that has attacked two of our own.”
City workers went to the neighborhood of the second patient early this morning to knock on doors to alert people to the news and to be alert to possible symptoms. They handed out flyers and later began robo calls to the area, Varga said.
Rawlings said the community remains vigilant.
“The only way that we are going to beat this is person by person, moment by moment, detail by detail,” Rawlings said. “While Dallas is anxious about this … We are not fearful.”
Health officials interviewed the patient, hoping to track down any contacts or potential exposures in the community, the CDC said in a statement.
“While this is troubling news for the patient, the patient’s family and colleagues and the greater Dallas community, the CDC and the Texas Department of State Health Services remain confident that wider spread in the community can be prevented with proper public health measures including ongoing contact tracing, health monitoring among those known to have been in contact with the index patient and immediate isolations if symptoms develop,” the CDC said in a statement.
Authorities visited the patient’s apartment this morning to begin decontamination efforts.
Decon in progress in apt building of 2nd health care worker with Ebola. @dallasfireres_q @dallaspiosana #DallasEbola pic.twitter.com/cjbgO7EKZi
— Dallas Police Dept (@DallasPD) October 15, 2014
The workers donned hazmat suits, trying to protect themselves from exposure.
.@MaxDPD :@DallasFireRes_q hazmat suiting up to decon apartment of 2nd health care worker with Ebola #DallasEbola pic.twitter.com/Y2nM2q6GWx
— Dallas Police Dept (@DallasPD) October 15, 2014
The new diagnosis comes days after nurse Nina Pham, 26, who also treated Duncan, was diagnosed with Ebola. Duncan was diagnosed with Ebola Sept. 30 and died Oct. 8.
CDC Director Thomas Frieden had previously suggested that Pham may not be the only person who became infected while treating Duncan. “It is possible that other individuals could have been infected,” Frieden said.
Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell admitted that the reasons for the hospital workers becoming infected aren’t clear.
“Those are people that came in contact because we don’t understand exactly how the breach in protocol occurred,” Burwell told ABC News today. “We are taking the precaution of making sure that anyone within that treatment phase will be tracked and monitored in a more serious way.”
Ebola has killed more than 4,000 people, mostly in the West African countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, according to recent figures by the World Health Organization.
“Those are people that came in contact because we don’t understand exactly how the breach in protocol occurred,…”
Here’s another reason why I’m finding all of this Ebola hype hard to believe. Anyone who works in a hospital protects themselves from airborne contagions as a matter of standard operating procedure, and I’m sure that and alleged Ebola victim in the hospital had all of them on their toes to a greater degree, but somewhere in the course of this incident they just had to have a potential spreader or they wouldn’t be able to spread the fear. I think I could have written them a better script, because this was too predictable.
“Ebola has killed more than 4,000 people..”
Yesterday I read 2,700, and we still haven’t seen a photo in this age when everyone and their uncle has a camera on their cell phone.
I guess the crisis actors are warming up for their parts right now. They’re walking around their apartments acting like zombies, with fake blood oozing from their eyes.
BREAKING NEWS 2ND EBOLA PATIENT JUST CAME DOWN THE PIPE
2nd health care worker with Ebola flew from Cleveland to Dallas on Frontier Airlines the day before presenting symptoms, according to CDC, Frontier – @NBCNews
IF she’s real, and IF she’s hot, I’d sleep with her tonight just to put all their bullsh#t lies to rest.
JUST sleep, though.
(hard falling asleep next to an ugly woman).