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]

There is no verification that this is true.

Assuming that it is true, so what? The fact that they shared an apartment DOES NOT MEAN that Kaci would have acquired ebola from her. Please reference the experiment that TX conducted using the heavily contagious contents of the Duncan apartment and his close personal contacts.

So what?

Inquiring minds want to know.

That's so what.

[Mulan]

There is no verification that this is true.

Assuming that it is true, so what? The fact that they shared an apartment DOES NOT MEAN that Kaci would have acquired ebola from her. Please reference the experiment that TX conducted using the heavily contagious contents of the Duncan apartment and his close personal contacts.

..and exactly where did I say that she could have acquired it from the roommate?

[toomuchbaloney]

So what?

Inquiring minds want to know.

That's so what.

That's right.

IF her roommate came down with ebola, so what?

It makes no difference in whether or not she requires quarantine at this time while she is asymptomatic.

[Mulan]

That's right.

IF her roommate came down with ebola, so what?

It makes no difference in whether or not she requires quarantine at this time while she is asymptomatic.

Did I say that it did?

[BlueDevil, DNP]

Does anyone else find it ironic that physicians are supporting Kaci far more than her nursing peers? (If AN is a snapshot of today's nurses?)

Yes, I have noticed, and I think it speaks to a rampant ignorance of actual science among practicing nurses. It is humiliating to those of us who take science seriously and have advocated for the profession. It is a huge set back for our position, which is that nurses need to be respected and awarded parity as full partners of the health care team. How can I argue that with a straight face now?

[toomuchbaloney]

Did I say that it did?

I'm not trying to put words in your mouth.

I am simply trying to respond to your posts in a way that is not easily misinterpreted by the fearful people reading these threads.

[BlueDevil, DNP]

So what?

Inquiring minds want to know.

That's so what.

Why? It is irrelevant gossip mongering.

[MissyWrite]

Kaci's attorney, Norman Siegel, called the decision a victory.

"She won," he said. "She is not quarantined. She can go out in the public. ... (The judge) got the understanding of what liberty is about and how the government can't restrict your liberty unless there is compelling justification."

Thank goodness rational minds prevailed.

America is not about things like Gov. Christie forcibly detaining a citizen in a tent with no running water and no access to a lawyer, for no reason. There must be a good reason. If he did it to one person, he would do it to us all. This should scare people far more than Ebola.

I'm definitely looking forward to her case against NJ. She deserves justice for that, and we deserve to know we can't have our freedom taken from us so easily, and have it considered only 'an inconvenience.'

What's happened to America? Our founders are rolling in their graves, no doubt. It seems the majority of people don't know how to think anymore.

[Mulan]

Why? It is irrelevant gossip mongering.

So now it's gossip to wonder how someone got infected with Ebola and what the outcome was?

[BlueDevil, DNP]

It is if one is trying to use it as some sort of weird rationale for quarantining Kaci Hickox. I assumed, perhaps unfairly, that since it was posted in this particular thread, that there was an implied connection between this individuals unconfirmed illness and the current topic. If it was posted here by accident and really intended to be a new discussion about a potential new victim, then I apologize.

[OCNRN63, RN]

Yes, I have noticed, and I think it speaks to a rampant ignorance of actual science among practicing nurses. It is humiliating to those of us who take science seriously and have advocated for the profession. It is a huge set back for our position, which is that nurses need to be respected and awarded parity as full partners of the health care team. How can I argue that with a straight face now?

​Well, if you figure that out, let me know, because I wonder the same thing.

[chadrn65]

Does anyone else find it ironic that physicians are supporting Kaci far more than her nursing peers? (If AN is a snapshot of today's nurses?)

What you don't like Rachel Maddow? You quoted me in your post, so unsure what you meant.