CDC Director Signals ‘Rethink’ Of Domestic Ebola Infection Control Strategy

News outlets report the CDC is rethinking its Ebola strategy to ensure health care worker safety after a nurse who treated an infected Liberian man at a Dallas hospital contracted the virus.

The Hill: Feds rethinking Ebola strategy
“The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Monday said it is starting to ‘rethink’ its Ebola strategy after the first-ever U.S. transmission of the virus put a ‘relatively large’ number of health care workers at risk…” (Ferris/Viebeck, 10/13).

New York Times: CDC Rethinking Methods to Stop Spread of Ebola
“The transmission of the Ebola virus to a nurse [in Dallas] forced the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Monday to reconsider its approach to containing the disease, with state and federal officials re-examining whether equipment and procedures were adequate or too loosely followed, and whether more decontamination steps are necessary when health workers leave isolation units…” (Fernandez et al., 10/13).

Reuters: U.S. needs to rethink Ebola infection controls, says CDC chief
“… ‘We have to rethink the way we address Ebola infection control. Even a single infection is unacceptable,’ Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told reporters. ‘The care of Ebola is hard. We’re working to make it safer and easier’…” (Garza/Wade, 10/13).

Wall Street Journal: CDC Director Calls for Rethinking Approach to Ebola Infection Control
“…A team of senior infection control experts from the public health agency is poring over equipment, how protective gear is donned and removed, and other procedures at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas, Dr. Frieden said, to try to determine how the nurse became the first person known to have become infected with the virus in U.S….” (McKay et al., 10/13).

Washington Post: CDC chief: After Dallas nurse’s Ebola infection, U.S. must ‘rethink’ protocols
“…Frieden did not detail precisely how the extensive, government-issued safety protocols in place at many facilities might need to change or in what ways hospitals need to ramp up training for front-line doctors or nurses. But his message was clear: With Ebola, there is no margin for error. The Dallas case made that certain…” (Nutt et al., 10/13).

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