On World Volunteer Day, December 5th, two doctors with international missions group SIM are heading to Africa to serve in hospitals treating patients with Ebola.
International Volunteer Day was established by the United Nations in 1985 as a way to encourage volunteerism around the globe. SIM International focuses on helping people around the world and Dr. Dan Crawford of SIM said he’s excited to help those in need in Africa.
“We feel like we are well prepared,” Dr. Crawford told USA Headline News. “You can’t be completely prepared until you are there, but we don’t really feel any great anxiety about the disease itself. We know we are in God’s hands wherever we are and there are dangers wherever you work. There is, however, anxiety about going to a new place.”
Dr. Crawford has spent 15 years volunteering monthly at a low-cost clinic in Portland, Oregon.
Dr. John Fankhauser will also be volunteering with SIM’s Ebola mission. Dr. Fankhauser had been practicing family medicine at the SIM ELWA Hospital in Monrovia, Liberia when the Ebola outbreak started.
He has personally been quarantined twice because of possible exposure to Ebola. He said it’s God’s call on our lives to help those in need and so he has no problem going back after his second quarantine. He trusts the Lord will plan his days and he trusts in Him.
Italy has confirmed their first case of Ebola.
Italian health officials say that a doctor who had been treating patients in Sierra Leone became contracted with the virus.
“The procedures for transfer of the Italian doctor who is positive for Ebola do not present any risk to the community,” Gianni Rezza, director of the Department of Infectious Disease at the Spallanzini clinic told the Corriere della Sera.
“We have been ready for this possibility and are already equipped to manage the situation. It is our moral duty to provide therapy and support to co nationals struck by Ebola: better here than in Sierra Leone. We can resolve this safely.”
The doctor, whose name has been withheld, was flown to Rome for treatment at the Lazzaro Spallanzani infectious diseases institute.
There are 26 Italian doctors with with the charity group Emergency in Sierra Leone.
The second Ebola victim treated in the United States has died.
Dr. Martin Salia died Monday morning while being treated at the Biocontainment Unit at Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha. A hospital spokesman said that Dr. Salia died around 4 a.m. Monday.
Officials close to the case say that Dr. Salia was already critical when he arrived at the facility, including being in kidney and respiratory failure.
“Dr. Salia was extremely critical when he arrived here, and unfortunately, despite our best efforts, we weren’t able to save him,” said Dr. Phil Smith, medical director of the biocontainment unit. “We used every possible treatment available to give Dr. Salia every possible opportunity for survival. As we have learned, early treatment with these patients is essential. In Dr. Salia’s case, his disease was already extremely advanced by the time he came here for treatment.”
Salia’s wife said she was thankful the U.S. State Department worked to bring her husband to Nebraska to help him fight for his life.
“We are so appreciative of the opportunity for my husband to be treated here and believe he was in the best place possible,” Isatu Salia said.
A surgeon from Sierra Leone is being transported to Nebraska Medical Center to be treated for Ebola.
The doctor has legal permanent resident status in the United States. Officials at NMC would not confirm the Saturday arrival of the patient but admitted they would be evaluating a patient for admission.
The State Department said they had been working with the family of the surgeon.
“His wife, who resides in Maryland, has asked the State Department to investigate whether he is well enough to be transported back to the University of Nebraska Medical Center for treatment,” a State Department statement read.
Two patients, Dr. Rick Sacra and NBC cameraman Ashoka Mukpo, were successfully treated at the Nebraska facility.
It was not clear how the doctor was exposed to the virus.
A series of rallies and strikes took place across the United States Wednesday as nurses spoke out about what they feel are insufficient measures taken for their protection when dealing with Ebola.
National Nurses United, a California-based union, said that hospitals do not have enough hazardous materials outfits that leave no skin exposed to bodily fluids along with air purifying respirators to avoid accidental inhalation of particles.
“Inadequate preparedness for Ebola symbolizes the erosion of patient care standards generally,” National Nurses United spokesman Charles Idelson told Reuters on Tuesday.
Strikes began early in California on Tuesday with over 20,000 nurses taking part in the protests.
Over 100,000 joined the protests on Wednesday including a group that held a vigil outside the White House.
Two nurses who attended to Thomas Eric Duncan in Dallas became infected with the virus and hospital workers told media outlets there were times the nurses did not have adequate protection.
Officials in Sierra Leone say that churches may be the last Ebola free zones in the country.
Infection rates in Sierra Leone are continuing to rise despite the efforts of western agencies such as Doctors Without Borders and the United Nations.
“We will overcome Ebola through the blood of Christ, with His help, and with prayer,” Pastor Olatunji Oseni told his congregation at a church in Freetown according ot the Christian Post.
Sierra Leone has forbidden most public gatherings such as soccer matches, concerts, schools or movies but the faithful have been continuing to flood into churches despite the concerns over the killer virus.
A deacon at Winner’s Chapel told the Christian Post that some measures have ben taken to safeguard against Ebola such as elimination of shaking hands and hugging.
Meanwhile, the United Nations is reporting that their latest survey estimates 50 percent of the Ebola cases in Sierra Leone were not reported to officials and most of the patients who did not seek medical attention died from the virus.
On the heels of the United Nations saying it lacked the resources necessary to stop the Ebola outbreak in west Africa, President Obama is asking Congress for billions in aid to fight the killer virus.
The President wants $6.18 billion to fund efforts both within the U.S. and in Africa to combat the virus.
“The funding is needed immediately to strengthen and sustain our whole-of-government response to strengthen preparedness in the U.S. and to help end the Ebola epidemic at its source in West Africa, and to prevent disease outbreaks, detect them early, and swiftly respond before they become epidemics that threaten the American people,” the administration said. “It’s in situations like this one, when activities surpass the current level of funding, that the request is deemed an emergency.”
The World Health Organization reported Wednesday that the death toll is at least 4,818 people out of 13,042 confirmed cases.
The head of the U.N. mission fighting the virus said there are still villages in the impacted countries that have received no aid or help from outside their nation.
“It’s not here yet,” Tony Banbury said about the needed resources. “There are still people, villages, towns [and] areas that [are] not getting any type of help right now and we definitely don’t have the response capability on the ground now from the international community.”
In what officials are calling “an abundance of caution,” 357 New Yorkers are under active monitoring for possible signs of the Ebola virus.
The New York Department of Health said the majority are people who entered the U.S. from Ebola impacted nations.
“The vast majority of these individuals are travelers arriving in New York City within the past 21 days from the three Ebola-affected countries who are being monitored post-arrival, as well as Bellevue Hospital staff caring for Dr. Spencer,” said a joint statement from the New York City Department of Health and the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation Wednesday.
“The list also includes FDNY EMS staff who transported Dr. Spencer to Bellevue and the lab workers who conducted Dr. Spencer’s blood test. All of these individuals are being monitored out of an abundance of caution, and none are showing any symptoms. The number of individuals who will be actively monitored will continue to fluctuate as people arrive or depart New York City, we learn more about people’s exposures, and 21 days of monitoring has passed.”
The NYC Department of Health also said that Dr. Spencer was “stable” and beginning to show improvement in his fight with the virus.
Officials stressed that no one under monitoring is showing any signs of Ebola.
A nurse who worked on Ebola patients in Sierra Leone who returned to the U.S. and complained about mandatory quarantine is now flaunting a voluntary quarantine.
Kaci Hickox, 33, had been working in Sierra Leone as part of Doctors Without Borders. New Jersey officials ordered her into quarantine when she returned to the United States and she hired lawyers to challenge the ruling. She eventually was allowed to leave for her home state of Maine if she agreed to a voluntary quarantine.
Hickok said she would flaunt any quarantine order because she believes there’s no risk of exposing anyone to Ebola because she’s not sick.
She left her home to take a bike ride with her boyfriend this morning in full view of national media cameras. Her lawyer said that because Hickox didn’t want to “freak people out” she didn’t ride through the center of town.
“Since there’s no court order, she can be out in public,” Siegel said. “Even if people disagree with her position, I would hope they respect the fact that she’s taking into account the fear, which is based on misinformation about the way the disease is transmitted.”
Hickox and her lawyer claim the orders for quarantine are just politically motivated.
The Centers For Disease Control has finally admitted that Ebola could be transferred through sneezing.
Dr. Meryl Nass of the Institute For Public Accuracy in Washington, D.C. publicized the fact the CDC posted on their website a poster that says Ebola can be spread through “droplets.”
“Droplet spread happens when germs traveling inside droplets that are coughed or sneezed from a sick person enter the eyes, nose or mouth of another person,” the poster reads.
“If you are sniffling and sneezing, you produce microorganisms that can get on stuff in a room. If people touch them, they could be” infected, Dr. Nass told the New York Post.
Dr. Nass slammed the CDC for their continual statements in public that Ebola could not be spread through the air.
“The CDC said it doesn’t spread at all by air, then Friday they came out with this poster,” she said. “They admit that these particles or droplets may land on objects such as doorknobs and that Ebola can be transmitted that way.”
The CDC did not answer the New York Post’s requests to comment on their contradiction.
