Obama Says Health Response Teams Readied for Ebola Cases

President Barack Obama said the government is examining what went wrong at a Texas hospital, where two nurses contracted Ebola, and will now send rapid response teams of specialists to be on-site within 24 hours after a patient is diagnosed in the U.S.

As public concern over the spread of Ebola rises, Obama said the federal government would be “much more aggressive” in ensuring that hospitals have proper protocols and training in place to contain the disease.

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also is reviewing every step taken at the Dallas hospital that treated a Liberian man who has since died of Ebola, to determine what went wrong, he said.

“We are taking this very seriously at the highest levels of government,” Obama said yesterday after meeting at the White House with members of his cabinet and others involved in the Ebola response. “We are going to be able to manage this particular situation, but we have to look toward the future.”

Obama convened the meeting in the White House Cabinet Room as calls from lawmakers mounted to improve the U.S. response. House Speaker John Boehner said Obama should consider a ban on travel to the United States from the countries in Africa where the disease has been spreading.

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The House Energy and Commerce Committee will hold a hearing today about the CDC and its response, with testimony from Director Thomas Frieden and Daniel Varga, chief clinical officer for Texas Health Resources, which owns Dallas Presbyterian Hospital, where the two nurses were infected.

Varga, in testimony prepared for the hearing, said “mistakes were made.”

“We did not correctly diagnose his symptoms as those of Ebola,” Varga said, referring to Thomas Eric Duncan, a Liberian man who was initially sent home from the hospital and later died after he returned by ambulance. “We are deeply sorry.”

Obama postponed a campaign trip to New Jersey and Connecticut yesterday to hold the meeting. It came hours after discovery of the second case of Ebola contracted in the U.S. and the revelation that the nurse took a commercial airline flight just before becoming seriously ill with the disease. Obama also canceled a trip planned for today to Rhode Island and New York for a Democratic fundraiser and a speech about women and the economy.

The disease now has infected at least three health-care workers in the U.S. and Europe stemming from an epidemic in West Africa, which has killed more than 4,000 people, almost all of them in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea. Frieden said officials are “planning for additional cases in the coming days” in the U.S.

The administration is coming under pressure to take more actions. Besides the federal help for local hospitals, some Republicans have urged Obama to appoint an Ebola “czar” to oversee the response, to fire Frieden, and to ban U.S. entry of travelers from West Africa.

Frieden attended the White House meeting via videoconference. Other participants included Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, National Security Adviser Susan Rice and Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker.

Obama sought to reassure the public that the U.S. has the knowledge and capability to keep the virus in check. He said he understood that health care workers in Dallas and other members of the public are scared.

“We will make sure that on a day to day basis we provide the public with any information they need,” he said. “Widespread Ebola in this country is unlikely.”

Representative Pete Sessions, whose Texas district includes the Dallas hospital where the workers were infected, and Pennsylvania Representative Tom Marino, both Republicans, called for Frieden to step down.

Marino said the Ebola situation “is beginning to spiral beyond control” and the CDC chief has failed in his job to inform the public “clearly and honestly.”

Marino was one of 27 House lawmakers -- 3 Democrats and 24 Republicans -- who signed an Oct. 8 letter to Obama calling for a ban on individuals entering the U.S. from the worst-affected countries in West Africa.

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said yesterday that Obama has confidence in Frieden and that the administration isn’t considering a ban on travel from West Africa “at the moment.”

“Shutting down travel to that area of the world would prevent the expeditious flow of people and equipment into the region,” he said at a briefing.

Additional traveler screening that’s already under way at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York will be expanded today to Washington Dulles, Newark Liberty, Chicago O’Hare and Atlanta Hartsfield airports.

The depth of the concern at the White House, less than three weeks before Nov. 4 congressional elections, was reflected by Obama’s decision to put off yesterday’s political trip and cancel today's travel. The president has been criticized for going forward with golf games and fundraisers even as he has dealt with crises.

Texas Governor Rick Perry, a Republican who was criticized by Democrats in his state for leaving for a trade mission to Europe, said yesterday he is returning early.

The president also discussed the outbreak yesterday in a videoconference with U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande and Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi.

Obama has been pressing other nations to step up their assistance in Africa. He said that if Ebola rages out of control in Africa, frequent air travel and cross-border interactions mean “it will spread globally.”

U.S. health officials said the second infected health-care worker flew between Cleveland and Dallas hours before she reported symptoms. Obama, seeking to tamp down panic, told reporters yesterday that the virus is difficult to spread and that he felt safe when he “shook hands with, hugged and kissed” nurses last month who had treated an Ebola patient in Atlanta.

The U.S. is sending as many as 4,000 military personnel to Africa to assist the effort. Among other tasks, they will help help aid agencies by moving equipment, building treatment centers and training health-care workers.

Major General Darryl Williams, the U.S. Army commander for Africa, said that about 600 U.S. military personnel are in Liberia assisting. The U.S. also has committed almost $1 billion to the effort.

To contact the reporters on this story: Angela Greiling Keane in Washington at agreilingkea@bloomberg.net; Toluse Olorunnipa in Washington at tolorunnipa@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Steven Komarow at skomarow1@bloomberg.net Joe Sobczyk