Psychosis in Texas is not about to abate. After the death of Thomas Eric Duncan, a Liberian patient who had contracted the virus on American soil returning from Liberia and the contamination of a nurse from the hospital who had taken care of him, a new case of infection is announced among the nursing staff. It is a wind of panic which blows in the corridors of the Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, place from now on of all the suspicions and the fears about a possible spread of the virus.
The second caregiver who also took care of the Liberian’s treatment complained of a high fever on Tuesday. We do not yet know his identity but health authorities have confirmed that the diagnosis made on the patient was positive. He was placed in segregation.
He is the second member of hospital staff to contract the virus after a 26-year-old nurse was infected. Nina Pham was infected after providing care to the Liberian patient, the first Ebola case diagnosed in the United States. This nurse is currently in treatment.
A protection protocol called into question
While the U.S. Federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) expressed confidence in preventing the spread of the virus, they are now looking for accountability. And point to the flaws in the protection protocol set up in the Texan hospital.
The reality could be worse, if we are to believe the response to the CDC from a union of nurses at the Dallas establishment. There would have been no protection protocol at all, assures the collective. Words which, if confirmed, should reinforce Americans’ feeling of insecurity in the face of the Ebola virus, which has already killed 4,447 people around the world, mainly in West Africa.