FLICKR, NIAIDAmber Vinson, a registered nurse who cared for a now-deceased Ebola patient in Dallas, flew to Cleveland between the time she treated her patient and when she developed symptoms. Vinson’s preliminary test results have come back positive for the infection, making her the second person to have contracted Ebola on US soil.
“She should not have traveled on a commercial airliner,” Thomas Frieden, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), told reporters. “From this moment forward we will make sure that any individual who is being monitored” will not take public transportation.
Vinson flew on Frontier Airlines flight 1143 on October 13, and the CDC is contacting her fellow passengers to interview them about the flight and answer any questions, the agency said in a statement. Frieden said that because Vinson was not symptomatic at the time, the risk to others of catching Ebola on the plane is very low.
The incident highlights what some are calling poor preparation by the US hospitals to grapple with a pathogen that has pummeled communities and ...
