Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Lab Worker in Cruise Ship; Controlling Ebola

Aired October 18, 2014 - 16:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: You are in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Jim Sciutto in New York.

We begin with the far-reaching effects of the Ebola outbreak from a cruise ship off Texas to the airline industry to America's hospital. Right now the Carnival cruise ship is steaming back to Galveston, Texas where a lab supervisor who may have come into contact with the Ebola virus. Hundreds of others have been contacted after flying on planes that an Ebola patient, Amber Vincent, flew on. Vincent and Nina Pham are now still recovering in specially equipped hospitals.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organization is declining to comment on a scathing internal document on their response to Ebola. All this as the government of Canada plans to ship 800 vials of its experimental Ebola vaccine to the World Health Organization in Geneva for more tests. Well a Carnival ship carrying a Dallas lab worker who had indirect contact with the Ebola patient Thomas Duncan is now on its way, that's the ship, back to Galveston, Texas.

The governor of Belize refused to allow the lab worker to come ashore and in a sense enacted a travel ban on people traveling at all from West Africa. I want to bring in CNN's Alexandra Field.

So Alexandra, this is an interesting case. Because you have this worker, first of all, with something of indirect contact with - didn't actually treat him, touch them, et cetera, also making a decision herself to kind of quarantine herself and then you have this whole other layer, the U.S. and Belize disagreed - what do we know about this case?

ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is a passenger who worked in the lab at the hospital, may have handled a specimen from the Ebola patient, Eric Thomas Duncan, but not direct contact.

SCIUTTO: Just a specimen.

FIELD: That's right. Just a specimen, showing no symptoms of the virus at this point but a decision was made to try and get this passenger and her travel companion off the ship. So there was a request made from the State Department to the government in Belize backed by Secretary John Kerry asking to allow the passenger and her companion to disembark and then fly privately from Belize Airport back to the U.S.. And Belize flatout denied the request, which surprised a lot of people considering it came from the U.S. State Department. They said out of a preponderance of caution for their citizens and residents, they couldn't allow this. They then ban travel to that country for any one coming from the affected area of West Africa. That means this woman and her companion - they are self-quarantined in the cabin. The cruise ship says they are handling this following protocols. Here's what we're hearing from Carnival.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ARNOLD DONALD, CEO, CARNIVAL CRUISE LINES: We have a lot of practices in place, you know, that we've had incidents in the past, SARS, H1N1, so we have a lot of experience in the cruise industry, not just our brand, Carnival and our other (INAUDIBLE) brands. But the industry has a lot of experience dealing with people even with influenza, you know, the normal viruses that people toss off and about.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FIELD: This lab worker may have come in contact with that specimen 20 days ago and Jim, you know, the incubation period is 21 days and she is still, we are told, showing no symptoms. CDC says low risk.

SCIUTTO: There's a lot of this abundance of caution going around right now, not just in the U.S. but we're seeing it in Belize, refusing a request from a major ally but also now enacting this travel ban which has been debated here as a possible response to this. No travel to Belize from West Africa.

FIELD: Right. It speaks to the fear that people are feeling and certainly we've heard in this country plans to travel from West Africa. Belize has done this. You also have to take into consideration the other passengers who are on this cruise ship. Certainly they are being told that this passenger is low risk, the passenger has self- quarantined but they had to cut the trip short, they're skipping the trip to Cozumel. They're being told that they'll get a credit.

But that the point really the regulations are limited to the passenger and her companion. They are the ones being told to stay in the cabin. The rest of the people can move about and try to enjoy their cruise.

SCIUTTO: One more day they'll know because it will be outside the incubation period.

FIELD: They will.

SCIUTTO: Thanks very much, Alexandra Field. Appreciate it.

Well, the governor of Ohio is another one calling for a travel ban on countries affected by Ebola. Today, Ohio health officials said 29 people who came into contact with Amber Vincent are now being monitored or are self-monitoring. Vincent is the second Dallas nurse who contracted Ebola. She then flew to Cleveland and back earlier this month. A health official tried to allay fears of an Ebola outbreak in his state.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) GENE NIXON, SUMMIT COUNTRY PUBLIC HEALTH COMMISSIONER: I want to say there is no Ebola in Summit County as far as I know, no Ebola in Ohio. We have a number of contacts. We have one person in Summit County in quarantine. That person is healthy. All of the contacts that we have are healthy. We're keeping track of these folks. We are visiting folks. We are calling folks. But we have a large staff that are in constant communication with all of these folks. I can tell you they're all healthy today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: Eight seven people who were on the plane with Vincent during her trip are also being monitored. Meanwhile, the monitoring period for 48 people who had direct contact with Thomas Eric Duncan, before he was hospitalized, that ends tomorrow. It's a key date. Duncan is the Liberian-Ebola patient who died last week.

Now for the first time we're hearing from a doctor who was instrumental in treating Duncan and from two nurses who contracted the disease as well. CNN's Alina Machado joins us now, live from Dallas.

Alina, Dr. Gary Weinstein, he got emotional when, in effect, defending his hospital, saying they did everything they could do at great risk to save Duncan's life. Is that coming across as a credible defense for how the hospital handled this case?

ALINA MACHADO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Jim, that's really up for debate, right? It all depends on how you interpret what Dr. Weinstein has said as well as what the hospital had said. But there's no doubt this was a very emotional interview that he had with CNN affiliate, WFAA.

In that interview the reporter did ask Dr. Weinstein specifically about allegations that Duncan did not receive the best care because possibly of his race, because he was black, and also because he did not have health insurance. Listen to what Dr. Weinstein had to say about that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. GARY WEINSTEIN, TEXAS HEALTH PRESBYTERIAN HOSPITAL: I find that remarkably insulting. That's - I don't know how better to describe that. The team here worked their tails off trying to save his life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACHADO: Now, in that same interview Dr. Weinstein was also asked about whether the teams were given the proper personal protection and equipment. His response was that his team was given everything they asked for. Jim?

SCIUTTO: Well, that's going to be tested over time. Now a whole host of hospitals in the U.S. changing their practices based on that experience. Thanks very much to Alina Machado, in Dallas today.

Well, the World Health Organization is to release a scathing report, an internal report on the response to the Ebola outbreak. But not until the crisis itself is over. The news of the pending report came from an internal document. CNN's Nic Robertson has more.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Jim, the World Health Organization, the W.H.O., is saying that this was an initial internal report, that it had not been fact checked yet, but the facts look like this - Ebola was first announced, discovered on the 22nd of March in Guinea. On the 1st of April, (INAUDIBLE) Doctors Without Borders, MSF said that this was unprecedented. The same day the W.H.O. spokesman said that this was - the numbers were typical of what they had seen before. It wasn't until the 8th of August that the W.H.O. announced that this was an international disaster.

Now, I spoke with Isabelle Nuttle, who Dr. Isabelle Nuttle who is the director of the W.H.O., of their global response unit, and what she told me was that more could have been done. She wished that more had been done because she said more is important, but she also said that in the early stages they didn't have a diagnosis for Ebola, that it was very, very difficult to get information from West Africa, and she also said that when the W.H.O. put out a request for volunteers to go to West Africa to treat Ebola she said there was a huge fear factor, volunteers weren't forth coming in the big numbers.

This also contributed to the escalation of the Ebola crisis. She said unlike a natural disaster, she said, Ebola was striking fear in people's minds. Jim?

SCIUTTO: Nic Robertson in London. That report also calling the Ebola outbreak a perfect storm brewing ready to burst open in full force.

Well, people are asking a lot of questions about Ebola, even legal questions now like could Thomas Eric Duncan's family win a wrongful death lawsuit or could you sue an airline if the passenger next to you had Ebola? We're going to answer those questions right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SCIUTTO: There are now more than 200 people being monitored in three states and on a cruise ship for any sign of Ebola. And in the very small chance that any of them contracts the virus, what would their legal options be?

Joining me now CNN commentator and legal analyst Mel Robbins. Mel, as you look at this, and this is America, right so, there's always the chance of someone suing for something, as you and I both well know, but when you look at all the companies now involved here, you've got a hospital in Texas that seemed to make some mistakes, you got an airline, you got a cruise liner, you even have the CDC, right, who arguably made some mistakes. Are they vulnerable to lawsuits that could be very expensive?

MEL ROBBINS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, Jim, you asked the question with a nod toward I think the first issue that we need to talk about, which is anybody can sue anyone for anything. The question is whether or not these cases will be successful. So why don't we kind of break them down one at a time. How about that?

SCIUTTO: Sounds great. Let's start with, say, a hospital, Texas Presbyterian, they treated this patient and you'd have to think the strongest claim is the family of Thomas Eric Duncan, he came in, they turned him away, he came back, he was sick, he died. Do they have a likely legal claim that could be successful in court?

ROBBINS: Well, they definitely have a claim for wrongful death and for medical malpractice. I kind of doubt it's going to be successful. Back in 2003, Texas passed a tremendous amount of tort reform. And they made it extremely difficult in the state of Texas to prove that a doctor or a facility committed medical malpractice. And here's why it's so hard to prove, Jim.

In the state of Texas, Mr. Duncan's family would have to prove that the hospital and the staff members acted not just negligently. I think everybody sort of agrees with the litmus test that, geez, you know, you let a guy discharge after going through all this training knowing he's from Liberia with all these symptoms and you don't diagnose him correctly? That's negligence.

Well, in the case of Texas, you've got to move from the hospital acted willfully or wantonly, which basically means you've got to move from the hospital knew he had Ebola and willfully neglected taking care of him, which is not what we're seeing out of the facts here.

Second, Jim, you have to prove that the hospital's actions actually caused the death. And so in this case when you're dealing with a patient that has a disease with such a high mortality rate and there are so many unknowns and there's not a certain cure. There's no way I think that you could see them prove that the hospital's failure to diagnose him immediately and the fact that Mr. Duncan then didn't receive the proper hydration protocol for those two days, that that actually caused the death when, in fact, he was already suffering severely from Ebola.

And then one last thing. The state of Texas is also limited to damages that somebody can receive. You can only receive $250,000 from the hospital and $250,000 for emotional suffering.

SCIUTTO: Big limits there. One, they have to willfully have done it and two what they did, the hospital, et cetera, had to be the thing that put him over the edge. That's a very high legal standard. Thanks very much to Mel Robbins on that.

Some say the fear of Ebola may be worse than the disease itself. Misinformation, irrational thinking can be incredibly contagious. And we're seeing that. So how can we avoid it? That's coming up after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SCIUTTO: So as we've been covering Ebola, this next question has been at the top of my own mind, and that is all the talk, all the reports about Ebola causing another outbreak of fear mongering.

And my next guest say the answer is yes. I want to bring in Abby Haglage. She's a reporter for "The Daily Beast," and also joining us again CNN contributor and legal analyst, Mel Robbins. Abby, if I could begin with you, I'm just going to share a story.

Driving over here this morning I'm talking to my dad, he's going to Canada next week to visit friends. He says, you know what, I don't think I'm going to go, I'm afraid that we're going to catch Ebola on the plane. I'm saying "Dad, don't worry about it, you're not going to catch it on the plane." But it just struck me, my dad'a a pretty well- read guy, watches the news a lot. Is this common in the U.S. that the fear is getting ahead of the actual threat of this disease?

ABBY HAGLAGE, "THE DAILY BEAST": Yes, actually I think it is. Even before Thomas Eric Duncan, the first patient here came to the U.S., the CDC reported getting, I believe, 50 calls a day from Americans concerned that they had Ebola. In the first week of October they reported 800 calls. I imagine now there are two nurses who are infected with the disease. You know, those calls have skyrocketed. So absolutely I think that a lot of Americans are concerned. And in some ways the fear is warranted but I think it's overblown.

SCIUTTO: You want the right amounts of people taking proper precautions but you don't want people starting to make decisions that aren't necessary.

HAGLAGE: Exactly.

ROBBINS: Mel, I know you have very strong feelings about this, you wrote a strong op-ed for CNN on what you called and I'm going to give you credit for it, I don't know if you were the first, you called it fear-bola. I'm going to quote from your op-ed here. "Fear-bola, an airborne disease that spreads through conversation entering your brain through your ear. Fear-bola is so contagious some victims have contracted it by simply seeing images and videos about Ebola. Once inside your body, Fear-bola attacks the part of the brain responsible for rational thinking." I love the word. I love the definition. I think sadly there's a lot of truth to do that.

ROBBINS: You know, I didn't mean to be all tongue-in-cheek because obviously this is a very, very serious disease. I meant to be provocative so people would read the darn article, Jim, because my kids said that flying (INAUDIBLE) next week, and they're like, what if you get Ebola?

I was like, listen, unless somebody barfs or poops on me on the plane, I'm not getting sick. I think people need to keep in mind, Jim, unless you are a health care worker or you are a family member with somebody with a diagnosed case, you have almost nothing to worry about, Jim.

SCIUTTO: You make a great point. This is something the White House is trying to say repeatedly, watching their twitter feed, the same thing. It is not an airborne disease, you have to have very close contact with bodily fluids, et cetera, to get the disease. But what's also interesting is that contributing to this fear has been the response so far, right?

Because I was speaking to health officials before there was the first U.S. case, heads of CDC and IH et cetera saying that our health care system is so much better than Africa's that you could never have an outbreak here. The hospitals will identify it, health care workers will contain it, and yet we've seen the holes in that in response to the hospital in Texas. Not enough to justify the fear, but enough to raise hard questions about how prepared we are, don't you think?

HAGLAGE: Absolutely. I think that's the pivotal issue here. I think that the issue has really turned (INAUDIBLE) to two sides. You know, it's the apocalypse or we're handling it fine. I think the answer is somewhere in the middle. And I think that the idea that the CDC has fallen short, that some of their protocols haven't worked can co-exist with the idea that, you know, they're still at extremely low risk despite some of their missteps, extremely low risk. As Mel said, this is a virus that's difficult to catch.

SCIUTTO: Right. Big advantage, staying away from it. Mel, big day tomorrow, 21 days since Thomas Eric Duncan, the people who came into contact with him, reach the incubation period so we're going to know tomorrow to a large degree whether there will be more cases stemming from that one case. Is that right?

ROBBINS: Yes. And I think there will be a couple more days beyond just tomorrow, Jim, but I do suspect that we'll see a few more cases in Dallas, but after that, I'd be shocked if there's anything else. This is not anywhere near a massive crisis in the United States. It's very important for people to be informed, it's important for us to cover this story, it's also important to make sure that we are addressing the myths that are out there and the discrimination that's happening because of this.

There's a community college in Texas that has rejected every applicant from Nigeria, and that is a country who as of tomorrow will be cleared by the World Health Organization and has been Ebola free for over a month now after only having 19 cases. That would be like Harvard, Jim, sending everybody a letter who applied from Texas saying nobody from Texas is going to be admitted this year. So the fear is out of hand. The coverage that we have is very warranted. But put it in perspective, folks. If you're scared about Ebola, you better go get a flu shot for crying out loud.

SCIUTTO: Right. You just identified one of the worst cases I've heard so far is eliminating a whole country, which in great irony is Nigeria, unlike the U.S., has managed to contain the disease at this point. Thanks very much to Abby and Mel Robbins.

Just ahead, we have a very special "Sanjay Gupta M.D." as Sanjay takes his family to Pakistan to trace his roots.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) SCIUTTO: It's time to meet your CNN hero of the week.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was tough. It was tough growing up here because it was just so easy to take the wrong path. I was walking around with a lot on my shoulders at a young age. I didn't really care about my life anymore. When I met Miss Cuddy, everything changed. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He was hurting. He needed a place that he could be just be himself. Our program provides a year-round urban oasis, seven days a week, 12 months a year, for children five to 19 years old. We use horses to create pride, esteem, and healing.

The children take care of animals, take care of the farm. When they get to a certain riding level, young men become mounted park rangers. When they put their cowboy hats on and they go out on patrol the myth of the urban male is changed instantly. When kids see other kids ride they want to know how it's done. That's the hook.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I can't tell you where I would be without this program. It changed my life. It's helped me set goals for myself. I'm a part of something.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When you teach a child to ride a horse, they learn that they are the center of their environment. Once they make that connection on connection, they can change what happens in school, at home, and the community. It's through their minds and through hearts. They have ability. They just have to unlock it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO: Great story. Modern-day cowboys.

Well, all this week, 13 of CNN's anchors and hosts have been tracing their family roots. It's time for our chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta to tell his story.

SANJAY GUPTA, M.D. starts right now.