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October 8, 2014

Dallas Ebola Patient Remains Critical as Concerns Raised over Treatment 
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The first Ebola patient diagnosed in the United States remains in
critical but stable condition at a Dallas hospital. Thomas Eric Duncan
is receiving an experimental drug and is on dialysis in a fight for his
life. On a visit to Dallas to support Duncan's extended family, Rev.
Jesse Jackson expressed concerns about his treatment.

Rev. Jesse Jackson: "In the case of Eric Duncan, the concern here is
that we see him as a patient, and not see him as a criminal. When he was
in Liberia with a great reputation, he assisted a woman who was pregnant
to get healthcare. She died. No wonder that she had the Ebola. He came
to America to marry, without feeling any symptoms of sickness. He came
and went straight home to be with his to-be family. Clearly, if he had
an infectious disease, to his knowledge, he would not have done that. He
got sick and came to the hospital, and the symptoms of vomiting and the
symptoms of temperature rising and the like, and was sent back home,
back into the world with these diseases."

Duncan, who has no health insurance, was initially sent home from a
Dallas hospital despite telling a nurse he had been to Liberia. He was
readmitted by ambulance four days later. Four of Duncan's relatives have
been quarantined, and dozens of others with whom he may have come into
contact are being monitored. An American journalist being treated in
Nebraska after contracting Ebola in Liberia is receiving the same
experimental drug as Duncan. The journalist, Ashoka Mukpo, is said to be
in stable condition.

 

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