In Spain where a nurse came down with the
extremely disease, all the people concerned are
trying to prove they did nothing wrong. Nothing
could be farther from the truth.
OME, Italy — When Teresa Romero Ramos, the
Spanish nurse now afflicted with the deadly
Ebola virus, first felt feverish on September 30,
she reportedly called her family doctor and told
him she had been working with Ebola patients.
Her fever was low-grade, just 38 degrees
Celsius, far enough below the 38.6 degree Ebola
red alert temperature to not cause alarm. Her
doctor told her to take two aspirin, keep an eye
on her fever and keep in touch, according to
Spanish press reports quoting Romero’s
husband Limón Romero. He says she didn’t
initially exhibit any of the other Ebola
symptoms: vomiting, diarrhea, nausea, and she
didn’t feel sick enough to stay in bed.
Romero was on holiday leave from her work at
the Carlos III hospital in Madrid and she and her
husband were scheduled to go on a short
vacation, but he hurt his leg and they decided to
stay close to home instead. She used her time
off work to run errands and catch up with
friends. She also sat a government civil service
exam with 20,000 other people to try to win a
better job placement at the hospital, according
to Spain’s El País newspaper, which also reports
that Romero discussed her slight fever and how
she was feeling sick with friends and colleagues.
According to El País, she talked incessantly
about what the Ebola threshold was and, since
she was far below it, they assured her not to
worry—advice she apparently wanted to hear.
In retrospect, it would seem, standard
thresholds don’t apply to people who were in
direct contact with the disease like Romero, who
was on the treatment team for two Spanish
priests who were repatriated to Spain from
Sierra Leone in August and September. Father
Manuel García Viejo, 69, died on September 25.
Romero was in his room just twice—once to
change a soiled diaper and another after he
died when she was tasked with removing his
belongings to be destroyed.
Now Europe is grappling with its worst fear—the
threat of an Ebola outbreak. And even the
authorities can’t argue it won’t happen.
Zsuzsanna Jakab, the Europe director for the
World Health Organization, told Reuters that
more cases of Ebola in Europe were “most
likely” to happen. “Such imported cases and
similar events as have happened in Spain will
happen also in the future, most likely,” he told
Reuters by phone from her Copenhagen office.
“It is quite unavoidable.” He blamed the
inevitable outbreak on both extensive travel
between Europe and the affected African
countries, and the increasing number of victims
being brought to Europe for treatment.
It is highly likely that Romero will have infected
at least one other person, probably her
husband, because she was not isolated
immediately. Even in African nations with
limited resources hardest hit with the epidemic,
isolation is well known to be the first line of
defense against the virus that has killed more
than 7,500 people so far.
That Romero was allowed to mingle in public
after reporting a fever when she was within the
known incubation period for the virus is
unacceptable. But what makes Romero’s case
particularly troubling is that Spanish health
authorities and the hospital where she worked
appear complicit in not immediately isolating
her.
“What next, will they sacrifice me, too?”
Spain’s health minister Ana Mato says “all
possible measures” are in place to stop the
spread of the virus, assuring the public that
Romero “was not contagious” because her fever
wasn’t high enough. That will do little to calm
the fears of the more than 50 people now under
surveillance who were in contact with her
before she was finally taken out of circulation.
European Commission spokesman Frederic
Vincent told reporters on Tuesday that the
Spanish authorities have a lot to answer for.
“Spain told us all the protocols have been
followed, but obviously something wrong
happened,” he said at a press conference.
According to Spanish press reports quoting the
Spanish nurses’ union, Romero called Carlos III
hospital several times between September 30
and October 2 when her fever finally hit the
38.6 threshold. Still, it took until October 6 when
she had become so deathly ill she was begging
for an Ebola test before anyone at the hospital
where she worked reportedly reacted. Then,
rather than immediately isolating her and
rushing her to the special ward used to treat the
previous Ebola patients, they told her to go to
the nearby emergency room at Alcorcón, where
press reports say she sat in the public waiting
room for several hours absent of any protective
gear. “I think I have ebola,” she reportedly told
anyone who would listen. But no one took
notice until her first test came back positive. By
then, dripping with fevered sweat, she would
have been inarguably contagious.
Spain’s El Mundo newspaper was able to reach
Romero by cellphone from her hospital bed on
Tuesday, from where she uttered monosyllabic
responses to their questions until she was too
tired to hold up the phone. “Yes,” she told the
paper she followed protocols put in place. “No,”
she said, she had no idea how she got the
disease. She is being treated with the antibodies
of Ebola patients who survived, which has
become a standard WHO approved treatment
for the virus, which has no known cure.
El Mundo was also able to reach Romero’s
husband, who is in isolation in the same
hospital. He complained that not only has their
house been cordoned off and “fumigated” but
most of the neighbors have fled in fear. He also
said police intend to put their beloved family
pet, a Staffordshire bull terrier named Excalibur,
to sleep. He even launched a Facebook
campaign on an animal welfare page from his
hospital room to try to save the pet. “I won’t give
permission, and they said that if I don’t they will
get a court order to kill the dog,” he told El
Mundo. “What next, will they sacrifice me, too?”
Romero’s husband says that his wife followed all
available protocols to keep herself safe while
she treated the two Spanish priests who both
died of Ebola in the hospital where she worked,
but he implied the hospital did not offer enough
protection.
Carlos III director Yolanda Fuentes told El País
that the biohazard suits they provided did
indeed conform with safety protocols
established by the World Health Organization
and the Spanish Ministry of Health. But the
Spanish press report that the hospital was
underequipped to handle cases and that rather
than the Level IV suits they require, the Carlos
III hospital only had Level II gear. The World
Health Organization requires that hospitals
taking Ebola patients wear impermeable gloves,
goggles, biohazard suits with closed wrist
openings and head gear with breathing
apparatuses. Even in the African nations where
supplies are at a premium, medical workers
know to use duct tape to close the sleeves of
their suits.
According to El Pais the Carlos III hospital did
not make those suits available and instead they
were given latex gloves and adhesive tape.
They also reported that the human waste from
the Ebola patients was transported to the
medical incinerator in the same elevators used
by unprotected staff. The BBC reports that
Spanish health workers have staged a
demonstration waving signs in their inadequate
biohazard suits to protest the apparent safety
failures. For Romero and the scores of people
she may have infected before she was isolated,
those failures could prove to be fatal.

Link source:www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/10/08/ebola-in-europe-what-went-wrong.html#

hmmmm. so some Hospitals in Europe are not prepared for Ebola? wishing Teresa speedy recovery