A patient was diagnosed with Ebola for the first time in the US, at a Dallas hospital, according to CNN. The yet unidentified man didn’t show any symptoms until after four or five days of arriving to the US from Liberia. He is currently treated in a hospital in Dallas, but there is no word about how he contracted the dangerous virus or how he is treated. Given that Ebola is not an airborne virus, the passengers of the airplane the patient flew from Liberia to Texas are not in danger. The disease can only be contracted through direct contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person, and only after the first symptoms of the disease show. Thus, the citizens of the United States need not panic.
The Center for Disease Control has issued warnings to avoid unnecessary travels to Ebola hot zones on the world: Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone. Besides, it is working with airport officials of the affected nations and Nigeria to screen every person leaving the countries by airplane to be screened for fever. If a person is detected to be ill, he or she can’t board any planes until Ebola has been ruled out. The chances of contracting such a disease while on an airplane are slim – this is why US authorities are not planning to ban any flights coming from the most affected countries to enter American airspace. Once the planes have landed, though, the passengers will be screened again for fever and other symptoms of the disease, just to make sure don’t introduce it to the country. And if they show symptoms, they will be quarantined and evaluated by medical professionals.
[ads2]
This screening not always works – sometimes airport personnel is not instructed sufficiently about the procedures. Besides, people infected only recently show symptoms later on – the Dallas victim started showing the symptoms of the disease only after four days from returning to the US. One thing is for sure: there is no need to panic. Ebola, although a scary and deadly disease, needs direct contact with a sick person’s bodily fluids to spread – and in a country where medical care is so advanced as in the US it hardly has chances to become a serious threat.