Health officials widened the search for people possibly exposed to an
Ebola-infected nurse to include the passengers and crew aboard a
Frontier Airlines jet from Dallas to Ohio last week.
Amber
Vinson helped care for Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person diagnosed
with Ebola in the U.S., at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas. He
died Oct. 8. Two days later, she flew to Cleveland. She returned to Dallas on Oct. 13, the night before she went to the hospital with a fever.
Officials
are seeking to contact anyone who was on Cleveland-bound Frontier
flight 1142 from Dallas-Fort Worth on Oct. 10, the U.S. Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention said yesterday. The CDC previously said
it was trying to locate 132 people on the Texas-bound return flight,
Frontier 1143.
The investigation expanded as new information
came to light that Vinson may have been sick as early as Oct. 10, said
Donna Skoda, assistant health commissioner for Summit County Public
Health, where Akron is the county seat.
“They’re trying to be
overly cautious and make sure they check that first flight as well,”
Skoda said yesterday in a telephone interview.
So far, 12 people
are known to have had contact with Vinson, and all are in voluntary
quarantine, Skoda said. Eight are in Summit County, she said, and four
are in Cuyahoga County, whose county seat is Cleveland.
The department is still investigating along with state and federal authorities, Skoda said.
There
are no confirmed cases of Ebola virus in Summit County, Margo Erme,
medical director of Summit County Public Health, said in a statement
on the department’s website. The department isn’t advocating the
closing of schools or cancellation of public events, she said.
While
Vinson had “very limited” contacts during her Ohio trip, Erme advised
anyone who was at the Coming Attractions bridal shop in Akron that
Vinson visited on the afternoon of Oct. 11 to call the health
department.
Vinson’s condition is “stable,” according to a
statement from her uncle, Lawrence Vinson, that was released through
Kent State University, where three of her relatives, including her
mother, work.
“Amber is a respected professional and has always
had a strong passion for nursing,” according to the statement. “She
followed all of the protocols necessary when treating a patient in
Dallas, and right now, she’s trusting in her doctors and nurses as she
is now the patient.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Elizabeth Campbell in Chicago at ecampbell14@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Stephen Merelman at smerelman@bloomberg.net Pete Young, Mark Schoifet
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