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."

[Mulan]

Am I understanding this correctly, that a man who claims to be an MD but has no US license, no proof of ANY license, and who decided to personally "investigate the scope and severity of the Ebola situation" by flying around West Africa is now holding press conferences about his self-imposed quarantine?

How much of a nutball IS this guy?!

Quarantined man identifies self on social media

"A man who has studied and written about time travel in space has identified himself as the Vermonter quarantined in a rural section of Rutland County following a trip to West Africa, where Ebola is raging.

Peter James Italia, who says he is a doctor, posted on Facebook that he is the undisclosed man Gov. Peter Shumlin and others revealed Tuesday had been quarantined for 21 days."

"Italia writes that he "was born and raised in Florida and later received a bachelor of science degree from Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia as well as earning degrees from Champlain College in Burlington Vermont.""

Champlain College spokesman Steve Mease said Wednesday evening he was unable to access records that would show what, if any, degrees Italia had earned.

Italia also noted that he graduated from a school of medicine at a university in the Dominican Republic and later studied surgery in the United States, but he provided no information as to where.

In one bio online, Italia states that he likes to tell people about his personal experiences and "how I intervene in other people's lives — and their deaths. It's important for people to know that time travel is not just something that might be possible some day or is it science fiction. It's real and it's happening now!"

[Mulan]

Quantum Medicine: True Stories Involving the Use of Time Travel in the Treatment and Prevention of Death and Disease by Peter James Italia, MD | 2940044523593 | NOOK Book (eBook) | Barnes & Noble

"This book is truly unique in that the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of illness and disease (including death) occur using methods that are out of necessity far beyond current medical knowledge and abilities. Within its pages, the reader will discover an amazing firsthand account of dozens of actual cases in which Dr. Italia has used time travel and other special powers and abilities that he possesses to come to the aid of seriously ill and dying patients at several major hospitals and medical centers. In addition, many different types of cases are presented including cancer, trauma, burns, heart disease, stroke, coma, and much more."

"On numerous occasions, he has also provided government, military and local authorities in the United States, as well as the news media and friends, with important information about "future" news and world events of major significance (only to be ignored and thus has given up), especially with regard to terrorism, crime, politics, war, and the weather, including the following: the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the anthrax letters, the shoe bomber, the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping, the D.C. snipers, the space shuttle "Columbia" disaster, the Madrid and London bombings, the small airplane crash in New York City involving Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle, the ambush and killing of U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, Hurricanes Katrina and Irene, the major earthquakes and tsunamis in Indonesia and Japan, the Secret Service scandal, and more."

[AmyRN303, BSN, RN]

Good grief.

[MissyWrite]

KACI HAS WON!!!!!!!

Maine Judge Rejects Ebola Quarantine for Nurse

FORT KENT, Me.-Less than a day after restricting the movements of a nurse who treated Ebola victims in West Africa, a judge in Maine has lifted the measures, rejecting arguments by the State of Maine that a quarantine was necessary to protect the public.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/01/us/ebola-maine-nurse-kaci-hickox.html

"The court is fully aware of the misconceptions, misinformation, bad science and bad information being spread from shore to shore in our country with respect to Ebola," the judge said. "The Court is fully aware that people are acting out of fear and that this fear is not entirely rational.

However, whether that fear is rational or not, it is present and it is real. She should guide herself accordingly."

[chadrn65]

Yep just saw it on CNN! Yea!!

"Late Thursday, the judge had ordered stricter limits on Hickox, requiring that she "not to be present in public places," such as shopping centers or movie theaters, except to receive necessary health care. The temporary order permitted her to engage in "non-congregate public activities," such as walking or jogging, but said she had to maintain a 3-foot distance from people. And it forbade her from leaving the municipality of Fort Kent without consulting local health authorities".

Maine judge rejects quarantine for nurse Kaci Hickox - CNN.com

[RNsRWe, ASN, RN]

Mulan: Not sure if I should thank you for all that information, or cry that this screwball is gaining national attention. Or both!

Something tells me that authorities are going to go into this freak's hideaway, to find him sitting amid stacks and stacks of hoarding stuff and wearing a suit made of aluminum foil. And the requisite aluminum foil helmet, of course, to keep people from hearing his thoughts and stealing his brilliant ideas for their own research.

[Mulan]

It's now being reported that her roommate in Africa had Ebola.

[RNsRWe, ASN, RN]

It's now being reported that her roommate in Africa had Ebola.

Hmmm....New York Post?

[chadrn65]

Here is the interview with the vice president of Maine Medical Association. He brings up many excellent rebuttals to quarantine, as well as the harm such quarantines will have and the fact that it is simply reinforcing the public's hysteria. I especially love Rachel Maddow's geography lesson!

Uncowed Kaci Hickox supported by state health leaders | MSNBC

Thanks. Rachel Maddow is funny!

[Mulan]

noooo

[chadrn65]

It's now being reported that her roommate in Africa had Ebola.

Whose roommate?

[SnowballDVM]

"Dr." Italia ought to go back in time and stop the Ebola outbreak before it began. What a whacko.