SUMMARY: What looks like an ordinary greenhouse is actually an around-the-clock Ebola vaccine factory. At a facility in Kentucky, plants are being injected with a protein in order to spur them into producing one of the three antibodies used in the experimental drug ZMapp. Special correspondent Mary Jo Brooks reports on how bio-pharming is helping to ramp up the speed of drug production to fight the disease.
MARY JO BROOKS (NewsHour): It looks like an ordinary greenhouse filled with plants basking under light, but at this facility just outside Owensboro, Kentucky, the plants themselves have become a labor force, working around the clock to manufacture a cure for Ebola.
HUGH HAYDON, CEO, Kentucky Bioprocessing: These plants are 27 days old.
MARY JO BROOKS: Three days earlier, these plants were injected with a genetic blueprint for one of three antibodies used in the experimental drug ZMapp.
Hugh Haydon of Kentucky Bioprocessing explains how it works.
HUGH HAYDON:The plant recognizes that gene and its machinery turns on and it starts to manufacture that protein for us. And it’s really that simple. It becomes a little bitty factory.
MARY JO BROOKS: ZMapp was still in the developmental stage when Ebola first broke out in West Africa in March of 2014. The disease has since claimed more than 10,000 victims. But a handful of people were successfully tweeted with ZMapp, including Dr. Kent Brantly.
DR. KENT BRANTLY, Ebola Survivor: Today is a miraculous day. I am thrilled to be alive, to be well, and to be reunited with my family.
MARY JO BROOKS: Since then, the drug has being undergoing clinical trials in West Africa and the FDA has granted it fast-track approval status.
Larry Zeitlin and Kevin Whaley are the scientists from San Diego (1) who developed the ZMapp antibodies, which were designed to quickly attack the Ebola virus.
SUMMARY: Dr. Kent Brantly contracted Ebola while treating patients during last year's epidemic in West Africa. He was airlifted from Liberia back to the U.S. and received an experimental drug and other treatment at Emory University Hospital. Brantly joins Hari Sreenivasan to discuss his experience, faith and new book, "Called for Life.”
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): Next, the medical doctor who was airlifted from Liberia to the U.S. one year ago this month after he contracted Ebola while treating patients in West Africa.
Kent Brantly and a medical missionary colleague, Nancy Writebol, who was also infected, were treated with the experimental drug ZMapp at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. Both eventually recovered.
Now Dr. Brantly and his wife, Amber, have written a book about the experience. He recently sat down with Hari Sreenivasan in our New York studio.
HARI SREENIVASAN (NewsHour): So, it’s almost exactly a year ago, after you quarantined yourself. You have got all the symptoms. You have got the vomiting, the diarrhea, the bloodshot eyes, things that you have been seeing in patients and treating. And, for the most part, those patients have been dying. What’s going through your head?
DR. KENT BRANTLY, Author, “Called for Life”: Before I received my diagnosis, the main symptoms I had were fever, fatigue, body aches and diarrhea.
When the diarrhea started, that was more mounting evidence that this really is probably Ebola. But I held on to that hope that it was something else until we had the definitive test result.
HARI SREENIVASAN: You were the first human to get ZMapp. Before that, I think it’s been a dozen, maybe 18 monkeys had got it. What went through your mind in making that decision to say either yourself or your colleague at the time Nancy should take this?
DR. KENT BRANTLY: Nancy and I actually talked on the phone. I remember she called me and said, after we had the kind of informed consent discussion with the doctor that was in charge of our care, she said, “Kent, what are you going to do? Because I’ll probably do whatever you do.”
And I said, “I think I would be willing to receive it.”
But it was — you know, I thought, otherwise, I’m probably going to otherwise, and this may or may not help, but at least I could be a guinea pig and let the world know whether there is any benefit to it or not.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Once you get this special air ambulance that is arranged, the State Department, lots of people working to try to make this happen, it’s a bit cloak and dagger. You’re literally taken to the airport at night. There’s — before this, there are countries that don’t even want you flying over their airspace.
DR. KENT BRANTLY: It did seem like something from a movie.
SUMMARY: In Sierra Leone and Liberia, where the Ebola epidemic has been a nightmare, the promise of a vaccine offers hope. Science correspondent Miles O’Brien reports on the challenges of conducting experimental drug trials there and the desperate need to find a fix.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): Now the last in our series on Ebola in West Africa — tonight, a look at new research to help stop or slow the next outbreak. The best hope may ultimately come from a new vaccine.
Science correspondent Miles O’Brien reports, part of his series on Cracking Ebola’s Code.
MILES O’BRIEN (NewsHour): It’s dark and early in Freetown, Sierra Leone. A team of pharmacists is in a nondescript government building preparing the day’s supply of an experimental vaccine against Ebola.
The clock starts running when they take the vaccine out of a very deep freeze. This is likely the coldest spot in the whole country. The vaccine can only be thawed out right before it is injected, or it will lose its potency, and all of this will be a waste of time, money and hope.
So, right now, timing and temperature are absolutely critical. And then it happens.
WOMAN: The power went out.
MILES O’BRIEN:Another reminder of how hard it is to conduct a high-tech vaccine trial in one of the poorest countries on the planet. But they are ready. They have got two backup generators for the building, solar-charged batteries, and, if all else fails, a special container that maintains about 100 degrees below zero Fahrenheit for five days without power.
Pharmacist Morrison Jusu is delivering the vaccine three-and-a-half miles across Freetown. After a seemingly endless national nightmare, he carries a cooler full of expectations. He knows much is riding with him.
MORRISON JUSU, STRIVE Trial Research Team: Some people lost family members. And some families were essentially wiped out as a result of this thing. And if this vaccine proves out to be something that prevents such in the future, then it’s — it’s — words cannot describe how much relief that would be to this community.
MILES O’BRIEN: While Jusu and the vaccine are wending their way, a line is growing outside their destination, Freetown’s Connaught Hospital.
The volunteers start showing up before dawn. They are health care workers. This trial is limited to them because they are, by far, the most at risk of contracting Ebola virus disease. Even though there is no evidence the vaccine poses any real danger, they must weigh the rumors and the uncertainties.
SUMMARY: The deadly Ebola virus normally spreads among animals but occasionally spills over to humans, to dire effect. To understand how such diseases make that jump, scientists must find the animal host. But the hunt for live samples of Ebola in animals has never turned up a smoking gun. Science correspondent Miles O’Brien follows epidemiologists in Sierra Leone on their hunt for deadly diseases.
LINA MOSES, Tulane University: Kenema became the epicenter of the outbreak in July.
MILES O’BRIEN (NewsHour): Lina Moses is back at it, on the trail of a killer virus near Kenema, Sierra Leone. She is still haunted by memories of the worst days of the Ebola epidemic last year.
LINA MOSES:We didn’t go searching for Ebola. Ebola came to us. It came with a vengeance.
MILES O’BRIEN: She took us to the remote villages of Kpalu.
LINA MOSES: This is the first time we have trapped for a while since the Ebola outbreak started.
MILES O’BRIEN: An epidemiologist and disease ecologist with Tulane University’s Viral Hemorrhagic Fever Program, Lina leads a team focused primarily on a virus with Ebola-like symptoms, Lassa fever. Lassa and Ebola are so-called zoonotic diseases caused by viruses, parasites or bacteria that are normally spread among animals, but occasionally spill over to humans, often causing severe disease.
Understanding how these viruses make the jump into humans is at the core of her research.
LINA MOSES: Any time you’re looking at zoonotic disease, you have to start looking at the animal that carries it, the animal that maintains it in nature, and that’s the only way you can start to control it.
SUMMARY: In Sierra Leone, health care workers use infrared thermometers to monitor those who may have come in contact with Ebola. It takes 21 days before they can be deemed virus-free. That’s why researchers are trying to create more precise infection detection. In the second in the series, science correspondent Miles O’Brien looks at the efforts to create faster, more reliable testing for the virus.
SUMMARY: Liberia was declared Ebola-free this weekend, marking a major milestone in the fight against the epidemic in West Africa, where it killed more than 10,000. But for survivors, the disease can still wreak serious after-effects. Judy Woodruff learns more about those health complications from Ebola patient Dr. Ian Crozier, who nearly went blind from the virus after making a narrow escape from death.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): This weekend marked a major milestone in the fight to end the Ebola outbreak. Liberia was declared Ebola-free after 42 days without a new case. Many took to the streets to celebrate.
And efforts are under way to rebuild schools, hospitals and other clinics. The disease has killed more than 10,000 people in West Africa, including 500-plus health care workers. While the outbreak has slowed considerably, there are new health complications for survivors.
Dr. Ian Crozier is one American health care worker who nearly lost his life while volunteering in Sierra Leone with the World Health Organization. After contracting the virus, he was evacuated to Atlanta’s Emory University Hospital and he eventually recovered. Months later, the virus was found in his eye and it nearly blinded him before a series of procedures and treatments. He is still experiencing a number of other symptoms.
And he joins me now.
And, Dr. Crozier, welcome. And we’re so glad to see you doing much better.
DR. IAN CROZIER, Ebola Patient/Survivor: Good afternoon. It’s a pleasure to be here. It’s a pleasure to be anywhere.
(LAUGHTER)
JUDY WOODRUFF: Tell us, first of all, how are you doing? It’s, what, been eight months since you were first diagnosed.
DR. IAN CROZIER: So, I’m doing remarkably well, given what I have been through.
First of all, I’m fortunate to be here and to be alive, and, secondly, to be looking at you through two fairly clear eyes is quite remarkable. So still struggling with a few symptoms that have been part of my sort of post-Ebola syndrome, but I’m doing much better than I was a few months ago. Thank you.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): Now an update on the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.
As of yesterday, the World Health Organization reported nearly 18,500 confirmed cases in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea, with more than 6,800 deaths. And while a newly published study finds that the number of unreported, and therefore undercounted, cases may not be as high as once feared, health officials say that, to halt the outbreak, every infection must be traced to its source.
Here to talk about that and more is the president of the World Bank Group, Dr. Jim Yong Kim. He is a medical doctor, and he has just returned from West Africa.
Dr. Kim, thank you for being here.
DR. JIM YONG KIM, President, World Bank Group: Thank you, Judy. Thanks for having me.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So you wrote while you were there that this is the worst epidemic you have ever seen. Of course, I guess, to many, that wouldn’t be surprising, considering the numbers, but what did you see in West Africa?
DR. JIM YONG KIM: Well, when I say it’s the worst, I spent a lot of my life fighting AIDS in Africa. And that was pretty bad, and drug-resistant tuberculosis.
The reason this is so bad is because it is so deadly, and we have to get to zero. There’s no getting almost to zero. Each one of the epidemics in the three countries started with a single case. And what we now know is — especially in this epidemic, is that if you leave a single case untreated and then if you let that transmission continue, it could explode again.
I’m very, very worried about this, because we still don’t have in place plans to get to zero in each of the three countries.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So what is it going to take? You wrote — in the column that you wrote the other day, you said it’s not just money, it’s more local control over what’s happening there.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): .....the battle to contain Ebola in West Africa.
The World Health Organization reported today that Liberia and Guinea have met two key targets. They’re now isolating 70 percent of those infected, and ensuring safe burials for 70 percent of those who have died. More than 6,900 people have been killed by the virus during this outbreak.
Laurie Garrett of the Council on Foreign Relations is back from a recent trip to Liberia and Sierra Leone. She has a new e-book called “Ebola: Story of an Outbreak.” She is symptom-free, but since she is still being monitored, we spoke with her by Skype from New York.
Laurie Garrett, welcome.
So there is some good news today from the WHO about Guinea and Liberia. How do you size up the situation there, having just come back?
LAURIE GARRETT, Council on Foreign Relations: Well, certainly, in Liberia, the American presence has made a difference. The staggering capacity of the Liberians themselves, the way they have organized, has made a difference.
And, indeed, that epidemic, which was doom and gloom in September, has plummeted. Now, the danger is to get cocky and think, OK, so, it’s all over, we can all go back to behaving exactly as we did before Ebola emerged.
And, of course, Liberia made that mistake before, back in April, thinking that it had this small intrusion from Guinea, but it was over and everybody could go back to business as usual. And, of course, we know what happened after that.
Guinea, I have not been in Guinea, but I can say that the data we have so far looks promising. That’s a country where the president himself has deeply engaged in fighting the epidemic. Sierra Leone is another story.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Well, what about the challenges in Sierra Leone, based on what you saw?
LAURIE GARRETT: It’s a really tough situation.
Physically, it’s a very tough country, mountainous, hilly, lots of mud, very difficult just to simply get around from place to place. And in Freetown, in the capital, you have a really massive level of denial.
The kind of social distancing, where everybody in Liberia stays a certain distance away from the next person and washes their hands in bleach, you don’t really see that in Freetown. You don’t really see that in Sierra Leone. You don’t have a sense that people are really appropriately fearful.
And then, on top of everything else, they have very complicated burial and funeral rituals that are quite dangerous. And people are not reporting loved ones that are sick or dead, because they don’t want to be forbidden to practice traditional funereal services.
SUMMARY: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week’s news, including what Ebola anxiety says about the national mood, as well as what challenges both parties may face going into the November elections.
SUMMARY: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and Washington Post columnist Michael Gerson join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week’s news, including the response to Ebola in the U.S. and how it affects national politics, as well as the outlook for the midterm elections and the gubernatorial debate in Florida.
SUMMARY: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week’s news, including the Supreme Court decision not to hear cases on gay marriage bans, criticism for the government’s handling of and response to the Ebola epidemic, plus a tribute to former White House press secretary and gun control activist James Brady. ---- JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): Just quickly, one other issue the court rule on, or made itself — declared itself on this week, Mark, was voter identification. They basically said that they blocked — they blocked a tighter voter I.D. law in the state of Wisconsin.
So are we — do you have a sense that this makes a difference, that other states will be reluctant to pass these laws because of what the court does?
MARK SHIELDS: I’m not sure. This is such an aberration from American history, if you think of it. Only white male property owners over the age of 21 could vote when this country began. It eventually expanded to all males and even nonwhites and then eventually to women.
And, you know, then in 1965, Judy, the Voting Rights Act came and said that the federal government has a responsibility to make sure that everybody can vote. And 96 percent of Republican senators voted for the Voting Rights Act, only 73 percent of Democrats.
I mean, it was a great Lincoln issue. And what happened in 2010, when the Republicans swept all these statehouses and state legislatures, they did two things in shorthand. They made it easier to buy a gun and tougher to vote. And this week, the Government Accountability Office, nonpartisan research, found that, in a study of voter I.D. laws, that it actually lowered the turnout in Tennessee and Kansas, two states studied, among minority voters and younger voters.
And I hate to say it, but that was the objective of those people who pushed it.
JUDY WOODRUFF: What effect do you see on the…
(CROSSTALK)
DAVID BROOKS: Yes. I confess I was persuaded by that study.
I had assumed, looking especially at the national election results, that it had this backfiring effect, that the voter I.D. laws had so mobilized especially African-American voters that they had swamped, that it was actually harmful. And I think a lot of people believed that after the 2012 — or 2012, 2008 election.
But the GAO support — study suggests that it actually did suppress votes. The other thing the GAO study said, which I think is the key to a lot of this — and I oppose these laws — is that the assertion that there’s a lot of fraud out there is just not true. There’s scattered fraud. But the idea that there is systemic fraud that you need the picture I.D.s to combat is just not out there.
Nobody has ever been able to find it. And so it does lead to the worst assertions of why the people — these laws are being passed.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): Even as top administration officials were answering questions at the White House about the federal response to Ebola, much of this day’s attention was focused on the latest developments in Texas.
Hari Sreenivasan has the story.
HARI SREENIVASAN (NewsHour): A hazardous materials team arrived this morning at the Dallas apartment complex where Thomas Duncan stayed before being hospitalized on Sunday. They collected anything contaminated, including a car that they covered with a giant plastic bag.
The Dallas fire marshal said four of Duncan’s relatives are being moved from the apartment complex to new accommodations. They have been quarantined under armed guard after they refused to remain inside voluntarily.
SALLY NURAN, Property Manager: Nobody is supposed to go inside the apartment. They are in their apartment. They cannot come out. They are not even allowed to come on the porch.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins, the county’s top administrator, voiced concern for the family’s plight and apologized for the delay in removing the soiled items. Meanwhile, Texas health officials said they have narrowed the group being monitored to 50 people who had direct or indirect contact with Duncan.
Crews have also cleaned schools attended by five students who were exposed to Duncan. But some parents say they’re far from reassured.
CANDIS HOLT, Parent: And then we just got letters in the kids’ backpack yesterday saying that they had it basically under control. But I feel otherwise, because if you really had it under control, the kids wouldn’t have came to school in the first place, but you will never know.
HARI SREENIVASAN: As for Duncan himself, questions continue to swirl over the handling his case. He managed to fly out of Liberia last month after having contact with an Ebola patient. He showed no symptoms at the time. But after falling ill in Dallas, he was initially turned away by Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital. The hospital blames a flaw in its electronic records system. Duncan was admitted on Sunday, but even then, his nephew complained that Duncan was mishandled.
At the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Anthony Fauci says he agrees.
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, Director, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases: The idea that this person went to an emergency room and they didn’t flag that he had recently been in Liberia and thus immediately put him in isolation was unfortunate that that missed. That happens. I think the important thing is to have that as a lesson learned to look forward.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Infected hospital waste has also become an issue. Dallas officials announced today a disposal company is now in place.
This was a day when even one of the government’s top health officials said there were things that didn’t go the way they should have.
SUMMARY: Why was Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan initially turned away from the hospital even though he had symptoms of the disease? Hari Sreenivasan speaks with Stephan Morris of the Center for Strategic and International Studies about lessons from the handling of the first case of the disease in the U.S.
SUMMARY: How can the spread of the Ebola virus be stopped? Dr. Anthony Fauci, the Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, joins Hari Sreenivasan to discuss lessons learned in the missteps made in treating Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan, who is now in critical condition at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital.
HARI SREENIVASAN (NewsHour): We further explore the efforts to contain and deal with the first case of Ebola diagnosed in the U.S. Officials sought to reassure Americans there are systems in place to control its spread, even amid local reports of a possible second case and new confirmation that others appear to have been exposed.
The Ebola patient at Texas Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas was identified today as Thomas Eric Duncan, a Liberian visiting the U.S. Officials also announced that five schoolchildren are among 12 to 18 people who came in contact with Duncan, and they are now being closely watched.
Texas Governor Rick Perry:
GOV. RICK PERRY, (R) Texas: These children have been identified and they are being monitored. And the disease cannot be transmitted before having any symptoms.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Not much is known about Duncan, except that he traveled from Liberia with a stopover in Brussels, Belgium, on September 19, then flew on to Dallas the next day.
Under screening policies at many West African airports, he was checked for signs of fever before boarding in Monrovia, but wasn’t sick then. Then, six days after arriving in Dallas, he went to an emergency room with a fever and was sent home. Two days later, he returned and was admitted.
DR. EDWARD GOODMAN, Epidemiologist, Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital: Since his arrival on Friday, he wasn’t vomiting or having diarrhea. And, therefore, there was no exposures. So we really think there is very little likelihood that any health care worker was exposed on Friday, and certainly virtually zero exposure starting Sunday.
HARI SREENIVASAN:Ambulance workers who transported Duncan tested negative for Ebola, but they’re now under quarantine. Doctors say they’re tracking all of Duncan’s movements, but state health officials say Dallas is equipped to stop Ebola’s spread.
DR. DAVID LAKEY, Commissioner, Texas Department of State Health Services: This is not West Africa. This is a very sophisticated city, a very sophisticated hospital. And the dynamics are so significantly different than they are in East Africa — excuse me — in West Africa — that the chances of it being spread are very, very, very small.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Back in Liberia, some 2000 people have already died from the disease, with thousands more infected. The chief of the U.N. mission there appealed again for help.
KARIN LANDGREN, U.N. Special Representative to Liberia: The world is absolutely not doing enough yet. We are still challenged to outrun the disease. And as long as the new cases continue to increase the way they are, as long as we look around and don’t see spare bed spaces in Ebola treatment units, we know we aren’t winning yet.
Ebola needs to be tackled here, or it will be on everyone else’s doorstep, and the Texas case shows us this.
HARI SREENIVASAN: U.S. Navy engineers have now broken ground on a new Ebola facility in Liberia to house 25 patients.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): In West Africa, doctors are fighting the world’s most deadly Ebola outbreak with makeshift hospitals, a handful of vehicles and a few brave volunteer health workers. Meanwhile, terrified villagers and city-dwellers alike can only watch helplessly as their loved ones succumb to the disease.
Tonight’s episode of “Frontline” on PBS takes an intimate and harrowing look at all this on the ground in Sierra Leone. In the following scene, “Frontline” cameras travel with a group of health workers who go to remote villages, searching for Ebola’s victims.
NARRATOR: They’re heading to a village where Ebola has already killed an old man. Everyone they encounter, even those who look healthy, could be infectious.
The team used to wear protective clothing, but the suits terrified the villagers, who ran, hid and sometimes even attacked them. Manjo now relies on keeping his distance from everyone he meets.
MANJO: My name is Manjo, and this is Ishata (ph) from the World Health Organization.
NARRATOR: A young woman is clearly unwell.
MANJO: What’s wrong with you?
NARRATOR: Kadiatu Jusu (ph) is 25 years old, the mother of four children.
WOMAN: Do you have a fever?
WOMAN: Yes, I have temperature, diarrhea and I’m vomiting.
NARRATOR: Her husband, Fallah (ph), is a farmer. He’s 35.0 It was his father who died two weeks ago. Ishata Conteh (ph) can see Kadiatu is almost certainly infected.
GWEN IFILL (NewsHour): Adding to the difficulty, a different strain of Ebola has appeared in the Democratic Republic of Congo, causing 13 deaths so far.
Here at home, the National Institutes of Health announced today it will start testing an experimental Ebola vaccine next week.
For more on that development, I’m joined by Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at NIH. He will oversee those trials.
Dr. Fauci, thanks for joining us again.
What would trials like this look like?
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, Director, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases: Well, first of all, it’s an early phase one trial.
And by phase one, we mean this is the first time this vaccine has been put in humans. So safety is paramount, so you take a very small number of people, 20 in total, three at a time, and you use the vaccine to determine if there are untoward effects, any inflammation, any idiosyncratic or hypersensitivity reactions, pain or anything that might be a red flag about safety.
And also you learn whether it induces the kind of response in a person that you would hope would be protective against Ebola infection. The reason why we chose this vaccine is that it showed very favorable results in an animal model, a monkey model, in which it protected monkeys very well against a challenge with lethal Ebola.
So this is a first, because it’s the first time this has been in a human, in now what will be a series of steps to ultimately develop it to determine if, in fact, it is effective.
SUMMARY: The Ebola virus has now reached a fifth country. Officials announced a Guinean student in Senegal was confirmed to have the disease. Meanwhile, a new report traces the deadly outbreak to a funeral in Guinea near the Sierra Leone border. Hari Sreenivasan talks to Stephen Gire of Harvard University about his on-the-ground experience in Sierra Leone and the latest on how the virus has spread.
JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour): I spoke to John Moore, a photographer with Getty Images, a short time ago. He witnessed the attack on the quarantine center and has been documenting the outbreak in Monrovia.
John Moore, thanks for joining us.
First, tell us more about the event. Who was involved and why did they seem to be doing it?
JOHN MOORE, Getty Images: Well, it was an angry crowd who had just driven away a burial team who had come to claim several bodies that were suspected of — people suspected of dying of Ebola.
And the crowd drove away the burial teams and the police and then marched on the isolation ward, the holding center for Ebola patients. They pushed through the doors and told people that they really didn’t have Ebola after all, that they were sick of other causes, and that it was safe to come out.
There’s a lot of people who deny the existence of Ebola here. They think that it’s a scheme, a hoax, a plot by the government to bring in international money. And they pulled these people out of the ward. And then I left the scene because it was getting difficult.
And afterwards this crowd looted the facility, taking soiled mattresses and contaminated medical equipment, and I assume spreading the disease much more in their community.
I am Retired U.S. Navy (22yrs) and a Vietnam Veteran. After my Navy retirement I was in the computer related industry, now retired. In 2000 I was a registered Republican and voted for George W. Bush. Six months of having Bush in the Whitehouse forced me to re-evaluate my political stance. I had always thought of myself as a Moderate Republican, but was a Republican by "default" NOT because of close examination of the GOP. Due to what has happened in America since 2000, I now consider myself a progressive, and registered as a Non-Affiliated voter.
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