RN Detained and Quarantined As Ebola Hysteria Reaches a New Low

[MissyWrite]

NJ and NY have instituted a policy of placing health workers into mandatory 21-day quarantine upon their return from West Africa if they came into contact with Ebola patients.

This new policy is a reaction to unfounded public hysteria surrounding Dr. Craig Spencer's return to NYC after working with Doctors Without Borders, and his subsequent diagnosis of Ebola, after he had taken the subway and gone bowling. People fear Ebola can be spread through casual contact with an asymptomatic person, even though public health experts say there's plenty of scientific evidence indicating that isn't the case.

Is this policy based on the facts about Ebola transmission? Is it based on science? No, it's not, and in fact no one is saying that it is:

"Voluntary quarantine is almost an oxymoron," New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said. "We've seen what happens. ... You ride a subway. You ride a bus. You could infect hundreds and hundreds of people."

"Public health experts say there's plenty of scientific evidence indicating that there's very little chance that a random person will get Ebola, unless they are in very close contact -- close enough to share bodily fluids -- with someone who has it.

Still, there's also a sense that authorities have to do something because of Americans' fears -- rational or not -- and belief that the country is better off being safe than sorry.

Osterholm says, "You want to try to eliminate not just real risk, but perceived risk."

Mike Osterholm is an infectious disease epidemiologist at the University of Minnesota.

Because of this irrational "perceived" risk, Kaci Hickox, 33, an RN who has been caring for Ebola patients while on assignment with Doctors Without Borders in Sierra Leone, was detained at the airport, interrogated for hours, and placed in mandatory quarantine at a New Jersey hospital upon her return to the U.S. on Friday.

She has tested negative in a preliminary test for Ebola, and she does not have a fever, but the hospital says she will remain under mandatory quarantine for 21 days. She is not allowed to leave the hospital, unless officials reconsider that decision.

Here are some excerpts from her experience so far:

I am a nurse who has just returned to the U.S. after working with Doctors Without Borders in Sierra Leone - an Ebola-affected country. I have been quarantined in New Jersey. This is not a situation I would wish on anyone, and I am scared for those who will follow me...

I arrived at the Newark Liberty International Airport around 1 p.m. on Friday, after a grueling two-day journey from Sierra Leone. I walked up to the immigration official...

I told him that I have traveled from Sierra Leone and he replied, a little less enthusiastically: "No problem. They are probably going to ask you a few questions."...

He put on gloves and a mask and called someone. Then he escorted me to the quarantine office a few yards away. I was told to sit down. Everyone that came out of the offices was hurrying from room to room in white protective coveralls, gloves, masks, and a disposable face shield.

One after another, people asked me questions. Some introduced themselves, some didn't. One man who must have been an immigration officer because he was wearing a weapon belt that I could see protruding from his white coveralls barked questions at me as if I was a criminal.

Two other officials asked about my work in Sierra Leone. One of them was from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

I was tired, hungry and confused, but I tried to remain calm. My temperature was taken using a forehead scanner and it read a temperature of 98. I was feeling physically healthy but emotionally exhausted.

Three hours passed. No one seemed to be in charge. No one would tell me what was going on or what would happen to me.

I called my family to let them know that I was OK. I was hungry and thirsty and asked for something to eat and drink. I was given a granola bar and some water. I wondered what I had done wrong.

Four hours after I landed at the airport, an official approached me with a forehead scanner. My cheeks were flushed, I was upset at being held with no explanation. The scanner recorded my temperature as 101. The female officer looked smug. "You have a fever now," she said. I explained that an oral thermometer would be more accurate and that the forehead scanner was recording an elevated temperature because I was flushed and upset.

I was left alone in the room for another three hours. At around 7 p.m., I was told that I must go to a local hospital. I asked for the name and address of the facility. I realized that information was only shared with me if I asked.

Eight police cars escorted me to the University Hospital in Newark. Sirens blared, lights flashed. Again, I wondered what I had done wrong.

At the hospital, I was escorted to a tent that sat outside of the building. The infectious disease and emergency department doctors took my temperature and other vitals and looked puzzled. "Your temperature is 98.6," they said. "You don't have a fever but we were told you had a fever."

After my temperature was recorded as 98.6 on the oral thermometer, the doctor decided to see what the forehead scanner records. It read 101. The doctor felts my neck and looked at the temperature again. "There's no way you have a fever," he said. "Your face is just flushed."

My blood was taken and tested for Ebola. It came back negative........

http://www.dallasnews.com/ebola/headlines/20141025-uta-grad-isolated-at-new-jersey-hospital-as-part-of-ebola-quarantine.ece

This is what happens to nurses when public ignorance and hysteria is placated by politicians.

We've already seen nurses blamed for just about everything Ebola-related since the first case in Dallas, and now we see a nurse being held against her will, for no reason except to make scared people "feel safer."

"It does present serious civil liberties questions," said Norman Siegel, a civil liberties lawyer in New York and the former executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union. "Historically, we've had these kinds of issues occur previously, and the courts then resolved the individual liberty issue against the larger concerns of the public's health concerns. So it then becomes a factual issue, the fact that she tested negative."

"It's completely unnecessary," said Harvard's Ashish Jha, the director of the Harvard Global Health Institute).

"I'm a believer in an abundance of caution but I'm not a believer of an abundance of idiocy."

[Tenebrae, BSN, RN]

It is embarassing as a nurse to see someone who calls herself a nurse to act so reckless. She must be a real dope to not understand the importance of the quarantine and that she should be a role model and not a disgrace to the profession. I guess some people crave attention on any level.

Why should someone be quarantined who has shown to be free from all symptoms and has twice tested negative for the disease?

What is reckless is allowing public hysteria to overrule evidence based medicine.

[Tenebrae, BSN, RN]

I'm not a nurse...yet. But personally, if I was as selfless to take the chance of going to a place with ebola I would wait to be quarantined, I'd request it. I know the likelihood is low but who wants to take easily avoidable risks when you could stay home and catch up on your Netflix/keep people safe/make people feel more secure?

Mega difference between voluntary confinement at home and being confined to a tent in a hospital car park with no access to flushing toilets or shower and being denied access to a lawyer

The issue, a nurse who had comitted no crime was being denied basic human rights

[Tenebrae, BSN, RN]

I guess a Public health disaster would be better...... then a little common sense . I dont think its anxiety fueling public outrage for this nurse .... its thinking of the greater good..... why should innocent people be exposed to a deadly disease when a 21 day voluntary quarantined will avoid the risk....I guess when the outbreaks occurs and people die .... attitudes will change.

They cant be exposed to a deadly disease when she didnt have said disease

[Tenebrae, BSN, RN]

Only if they have an elevated temperature....like Kaci Hickox did.

GAHHHHH

She had one elevated temperature reading with an electronic forehead temperature scanner with like alot of the electronic devices we use can misread a patients vitals

I've shared this before however a while back I had a patient whose blood glucose test came back as 1.9mmol. Yet this lady was completely asymptomatic. When I retested with another blood glucose meter, the reading was 7.9mmol

A few years back I had my blood pressure taken and in the space of five minutes it went from 180/100 to 90/40 and I was asymptomatic

Electronic thermometers, blood pressure cuffs, blood glucose kits are great at times they dont read correctly, which I why I was always taught follow up a deviation in vitals with a manual reading as well.

One elevated temperature reading after someone has been stuck in isolation and feeling frustrated and angry does not a temperature make.

[OCNRN63, RN]

Hickox and boyfriend staying in Maine

"FORT KENT, Maine (NEWS CENTER) -- The nurse who worked with Ebola patients in West Africa and gained international attention over a quarantine mandate will not be leaving Maine. Kaci Hickox said she and her boyfriend will remain in the state."

""There has been a lot of misinformation about this....We are leaving Fort Kent because our purpose of being here was Ted attending nursing school at UMFK and he will not continue at an institution of higher learning that has acted so poorly, shown no leadership, and completely disregarding him during the past few weeks," wrote Hickox in a Facebook message. "We are heading to Southern Maine this week, but we have never said we were 'leaving the state.' Thanks for taking the time to clarify the point. It is unfortunate that some media outlets have chosen to now dramatize and report false information.""

"Hickox said she and Wilbur will be in Freeport, Maine. Wilbur's family resides in the town and owns the Wilbur's Chocolates."

They own Wilbur chocolates? OMG, I would follow him to the ends of the Earth. Wilbur chocolate is...OMG. One of their factories is in a small town near me, and when they're making chocolate, the whole town smells divine.

​Now I'm craving some Wilbur Buds.

[Rose_Queen, BSN, MSN, RN]

​Now I'm craving some Wilbur Buds.

You can have the Wilbur Buds. I want the peanut butter meltaways. But anything that comes out of that factory is delicious and welcome.

[OCNRN63, RN]

You can have the Wilbur Buds. I want the peanut butter meltaways. But anything that comes out of that factory is delicious and welcome.

Yeah, they're pretty awesome too. If I ever get to walk again, I want to make some chocolate salted caramel pretzel bark.

[Not_A_Hat_Person, RN]

i believe NH is the only state to "licence" NAs.

Vermont and Michigan also license nursing assistants.

[morte, LPN, LVN]

Vermont and Michigan also license nursing assistants.

interesting, when did that start? it has been generally accepted around here that it was only NH

[toomuchbaloney]

interesting, when did that start? it has been generally accepted around here that it was only NH

Late 80's early 90's maybe?