BREAKING NEWS: CDC officials rush to Newark Airport to meet Liberian passenger flying from Brussels who 'showed symptoms of Ebola'
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...sels-showed-symptoms-Ebola.html#ixzz3FCcXJC6V
CDC officials have rushed to Newark Liberty International Airport after a passenger believed to be from Liberia showed symptoms of Ebola.
The man traveling with his daughter on a United Airlines flight from Brussels was reported vomiting as they landed in New Jersey.
They were both removed from the plane by a CDC crew in full Hazmat attire, ABC reported.
Other passengers were told to remain on the aircraft as the pair were taken away.
The man is believed to have flown from Liberia via Brussels, Belgium - the same route taken by Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person to be diagnosed with Ebola in the United States.
Duncan is now being treated for the disease in Dallas, Texas, and 10 people linked to him have been classed as 'high risk'.
'Upon arrival at Newark Airport from Brussels, medical professionals instructed that customers and crew of United flight 988 remain on board until they could assist an ill customer,' the statement said.
'We are working with authorities and will accommodate our customers as quickly as we can.'
Welsh passenger Paul Chard tweeted a picture of immigration officials on board the plane, adding: 'Drama on the flight from BRU, pax taken off by CDC, we are stuck on the plane, Immigration staff now on!'
The incident comes just a day after the government conceded that its handling of the crisis has so far been 'rocky' as Thomas Duncan is treated for the disease in Texas and 10 people are now classed as 'high risk'.
The handling of the Dallas case in the early stages of Duncan's illness has raised questions about how prepared local and national health officials were to handle that case and whether people were unnecessarily exposed.
Dr Anthony Fauci, a director at the National Institutes of Health, insisted to reporters at the White House that although it 'may be entirely conceivable' that there would be another Ebola case in the United States, the strength of the healthcare infrastructure 'would make it extraordinarily unlikely that we would have an outbreak.'
Authorities have narrowed their focus to about 50 people who had direct or indirect contact with the infected Liberian visitor, including 10 at high risk who are being checked twice daily for symptoms.
Dr Fauci said contact tracing is 'now' going on, five days after Duncan was hospitalized.
Officials were asked at a news conference why the patient was able to get past screening in his journey from Liberia on September 19 and then be sent home after telling a Dallas hospital a few days later about his travel to a country where there had been an Ebola outbreak.
The case has put authorities and the public on alert over concerns that the worst epidemic of Ebola on record could spread from West Africa, where it began in March. The World Health Organization on Friday updated its death toll to at least 3,439 out of 7,492 suspected, probable and confirmed cases. The epidemic has hit hardest in impoverished Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.
At Friday's news conference, White House adviser Lisa Monaco was asked whether she would recommend to President Barack Obama that he impose a travel ban on West Africa, as some public officials have called for.
'Right now we believe those types of steps actually impede the response,' Monaco said.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...sels-showed-symptoms-Ebola.html#ixzz3FCcXJC6V
CDC officials have rushed to Newark Liberty International Airport after a passenger believed to be from Liberia showed symptoms of Ebola.
The man traveling with his daughter on a United Airlines flight from Brussels was reported vomiting as they landed in New Jersey.
They were both removed from the plane by a CDC crew in full Hazmat attire, ABC reported.
Other passengers were told to remain on the aircraft as the pair were taken away.
The man is believed to have flown from Liberia via Brussels, Belgium - the same route taken by Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person to be diagnosed with Ebola in the United States.
Duncan is now being treated for the disease in Dallas, Texas, and 10 people linked to him have been classed as 'high risk'.
'Upon arrival at Newark Airport from Brussels, medical professionals instructed that customers and crew of United flight 988 remain on board until they could assist an ill customer,' the statement said.
'We are working with authorities and will accommodate our customers as quickly as we can.'
Welsh passenger Paul Chard tweeted a picture of immigration officials on board the plane, adding: 'Drama on the flight from BRU, pax taken off by CDC, we are stuck on the plane, Immigration staff now on!'
The incident comes just a day after the government conceded that its handling of the crisis has so far been 'rocky' as Thomas Duncan is treated for the disease in Texas and 10 people are now classed as 'high risk'.
The handling of the Dallas case in the early stages of Duncan's illness has raised questions about how prepared local and national health officials were to handle that case and whether people were unnecessarily exposed.
Dr Anthony Fauci, a director at the National Institutes of Health, insisted to reporters at the White House that although it 'may be entirely conceivable' that there would be another Ebola case in the United States, the strength of the healthcare infrastructure 'would make it extraordinarily unlikely that we would have an outbreak.'
Authorities have narrowed their focus to about 50 people who had direct or indirect contact with the infected Liberian visitor, including 10 at high risk who are being checked twice daily for symptoms.
Dr Fauci said contact tracing is 'now' going on, five days after Duncan was hospitalized.
Officials were asked at a news conference why the patient was able to get past screening in his journey from Liberia on September 19 and then be sent home after telling a Dallas hospital a few days later about his travel to a country where there had been an Ebola outbreak.
The case has put authorities and the public on alert over concerns that the worst epidemic of Ebola on record could spread from West Africa, where it began in March. The World Health Organization on Friday updated its death toll to at least 3,439 out of 7,492 suspected, probable and confirmed cases. The epidemic has hit hardest in impoverished Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.
At Friday's news conference, White House adviser Lisa Monaco was asked whether she would recommend to President Barack Obama that he impose a travel ban on West Africa, as some public officials have called for.
'Right now we believe those types of steps actually impede the response,' Monaco said.