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EBOLA CASE RAISES CONCERNS IN SPAIN

 
Published Oct. 8, 2014|Updated Oct. 8, 2014

Four quarantined in Madrid

Health officials in Spain rushed to contain the Ebola virus Tuesday after it got past Europe's defenses, quarantining four people at a Madrid hospital where a nursing assistant became infected. The first case of Ebola transmitted outside Africa is raising questions about how prepared wealthier countries really are. Health workers in Madrid complained Tuesday that they lack the training and equipment to handle the virus.

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Can dogs carry the virus?

Madrid's regional government even got a court order to euthanize and incinerate the Spanish nurse's mixed-breed dog, Excalibur, against the objections of her and her husband. The animal was not tested for the disease. Some reports in medical journals suggest that dogs can be infected with Ebola without showing symptoms, but whether they can spread the disease to people is unclear.

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Airline passenger screening

Obama administration spokesman Josh Earnest said Tuesday that more airline passenger screening measures would be announced "in the next couple of days," even though the White House remains "confident in the screening measures that are currently in place." CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden said the agency is continuing to discuss increased screening of travelers from West Africa.

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Health care workers cite poor training

BARCELONA, Spain - Spain's government came under heavy criticism Tuesday as it dealt with the repercussions of Western Europe's first Ebola case, quarantining three more people and monitoring dozens who had come into contact with an infected nurse.

Health care workers, who have been sparring with the government over cutbacks, said they had not received proper training or equipment to handle an Ebola case. The European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union, asked for an explanation, according to news reports. Health officials have said that the nurse became infected while treating a missionary, Manuel Garcia Viejo, who died in the Carlos III Hospital in Madrid on Sept. 25, after being repatriated from Sierra Leone. The officials said the nurse went on vacation the day after he died, then told a medical center that she had a fever of about 100 degrees on Sept. 30. She was hospitalized only on Monday, initially in another establishment without any unit specifically for handling diseases like Ebola.

The nurse's husband has shown no signs of having the disease but was isolated as a precaution.

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DALLAS

Ebola patient sedated, in critical condition

The family of a man diagnosed with the first U.S. case of Ebola again visited him at the hospital Tuesday but declined to view him via video as the last time had been too upsetting.

Relatives of Thomas Eric Duncan glimpsed him using a video system at Dallas' Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital on Monday. But when they returned anew, this time with Rev. Jessie Jackson, they decided such images were too much.

"What we saw was very painful. It didn't look good," said Duncan's nephew, Josephus Weeks.

The hospital says Duncan is in critical condition and is sedated but stable. He is on a breathing machine and kidney dialysis. Duncan's liver function, which declined over the weekend, has improved, though doctors say it may not stay that way.

David Lakey, commissioner of Texas' Department of State Health Services, walked the hospital ward housing Duncan, which is otherwise vacant. He said security and medical officials wear gowns, double gloves and masks, and are following protocols on removing them and showering when they leave the ward.

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UNITED NATIONS

$49 million approved to fight outbreak

A United Nations committee has approved $49 million in funding for the global body's unprecedented emergency mission to combat Ebola. The General Assembly budget committee on Tuesday adopted a resolution supporting the U.N. secretary-general's funding request, which is expected to cover operations through the end of December. The World Health Organization says Ebola has killed more than 3,400 people in West Africa and infected at least twice that many.

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MONROVIA, LIBERIA

U.S. troops set to openfirst mobile hospital

The U.S. military was preparing to open a 25-bed mobile hospital catering to health care workers with Ebola, before building a total of 17 promised 100-bed Ebola Treatment Units in Liberia. The virus has taken an especially devastating toll on health care workers, sickening or killing more than 370 in the hardest-hit countries of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, where doctors and nurses were already in short supply.