Second Dallas health worker has Ebola; CDC announces 'more robust' response

Seventy-six health-care workers who helped treat Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan are now being monitored for potential Ebola exposure. Forty-eight others are being watched because they had contact with Duncan.

Los Angeles Times: Second Texas Healthcare Worker Tests Positive For Ebola
second female healthcare worker at a Dallas hospital has tested positive for the Ebola virus, prompting the federal Centers for Disease Control and Protection to send in a team in a bit to halt further spread of the deadly disease (Mohan and Muskal, 10/15).

The Wall Street Journal: Second Health-Care Worker In Texas Tests Positive For Ebola Virus
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday that it was actively monitoring 76 health-care workers who helped treat Mr. Duncan for potential Ebola exposure after Ms. Pham had contract the virus from Mr. Duncan, though CDC director Tom Frieden said there was no reason to think any of them were infected. The 76 workers are in addition to 48 people who were already being monitored because they were in contact with Mr. Duncan, or with people who themselves had been in close contact with the Liberian man before he was admitted to the hospital Sept. 28 (Bustillo, 10/15).

The Washington Post: Dallas Hospital Learned Its Ebola Protocols While Struggling To Save Mortally Ill Patient
The hospital that treated Ebola victim Thomas Eric Duncan had to learn on the fly how to control the deadly virus, adding new layers of protective gear for workers in what became a losing battle to keep the contagion from spreading, a top official with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday (Nutt, Phillip and Achenbach, 10/14).

The Associated Press: Dallas Nurses Cite Sloppy Conditions In Ebola Care
A Liberian Ebola patient was left in an open area of a Dallas emergency room for hours, and the nurses treating him worked for days without proper protective gear and faced constantly changing protocols, according to a statement released late Tuesday by the largest U.S. nurses' union. Nurses were forced to use medical tape to secure openings in their flimsy garments, worried that their necks and heads were exposed as they cared for a patient with explosive diarrhea and projectile vomiting, said Deborah Burger of National Nurses United (Sedensky and Mendoza, 10/15).

The Washington Post: CDC Director: We Could Have Done More To Prevent Second Ebola Infection In Texas
The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the agency regretted its initial response to the first Ebola diagnosis in the United States, acknowledging that more could have been done to combat infection at the hospital treating the patient. "We did send some expertise in infection control," Thomas Frieden said during a news conference Tuesday. "But I think we could, in retrospect, with 20/20 hindsight, have sent a more robust hospital infection control team and been more hands-on with the hospital from day one about exactly how this should be managed" (Berman, 10/14).

Stateline: Q&A: What Are States Doing to Prepare for an Ebola Outbreak?
As fears of an Ebola outbreak rise, federal agencies are taking steps to protect and inform the public. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta is taking the lead on most aspects of the effort – issuing containment guidelines to hospitals and other health workers, training airport personnel on screening methods, and creating uniform lab tests to diagnose the deadly disease. But as in all public health emergencies, state and local public health departments are the nation's first line of defense. What role do state and local health agencies play in protecting the public? (Vestal, 10,14).