A Texas health worker has contracted Ebola after treating a Liberian who died of the disease at a Dallas hospital last week, raising concern about how US medical guidelines aimed at stopping the spread of the disease were breached.
Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, where the new case was announced on Sunday, has already faced criticism for its management of the infection.
The infected worker, a woman who was not named, is the first person to contract the disease in the United States. She had close and frequent contact during the 11-day treatment of Thomas Eric Duncan, who died on Wednesday, health officials said.
The current Ebola outbreak is the worst outbreak on record and has killed more than 4,000 people, mostly in West Africa’s Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.
Duncan, a Liberian, was exposed to Ebola in his home country and developed the disease while visiting the United States.
The new case in Texas indicated a professional lapse that may have caused other health workers at the hospital to be infected as well, said the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
“We don’t know what occurred in the care of the index patient, the original patient, in Dallas, but at some point there was a breach in protocol, and that breach in protocol resulted in this infection,” CDC director Dr Thomas Frieden told a news conference.
Hospital officials said the worker had been wearing CDC-recommended protective gear during treatment, including gowns, gloves, masks and shields.
“We are evaluating other potential healthcare worker exposures because if this individual was exposed, which they were, it is possible that other individuals were exposed,” Frieden said.
Tests by the CDC confirmed the patient had been infected with Ebola.
“Unfortunately it is possible in the coming days that we will see additional cases of Ebola,” he said. Frieden said there was one person who may have had contact with the infected health worker when she could transmit the disease and that person is being monitored.
None of the 10 people who had close contact with Duncan or 38 people who had contact with that group have shown any symptoms, state health officials said.
The infected worker was not among the 48 being monitored.
The Dallas hospital failed to recognise that Duncan had the symptoms of Ebola when he first went to the emergency room.
He was sent home, allowing him to potentially expose others to the virus. Even though he was admitted two days later, his family has called for an examination of his care.
