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New Day

Dallas Nurse Contracts Ebola In U.S.; Ebola Scare On Plane at LAX; Is Baghdad at Risk of an ISIS Takeover?

Aired October 13, 2014 - 06:00   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. TOM FRIEDEN, DIRECTOR, CDC: There was a breach in protocol, and that breach in protocol resulted in this infection.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking new details on the first person to contract Ebola in America. The Dallas nurse now fighting for her life. How did she get infected, and are we doing what we need to do to protect health care workers?

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Plus, fear across the country. A Boston man now in isolation. In L.A. hazmat teams swarming this plane. And in New Jersey, NBC's on-air doctor forced into mandatory isolation after returning from the Ebola zone. We have the very latest.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Target Baghdad? ISIS on the verge of taking more territory, closer to Baghdad than ever before. Is Iraq's capital and the giant U.S. embassy there in danger? We're live from the region.

CUOMO: Your NEW DAY starts right now.

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo, Kate Bolduan, and Michaela Pereira.

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CUOMO: It's, good morning, welcome to NEW DAY. It is Monday, October 13th, 6:00 in the East. Alisyn Camerota by my side. Good to have you.

CAMEROTA: Good to be with you guys.

CUOMO: We do have breaking news for you in the battle against Ebola. A Dallas nurse becoming the first person to contract the deadly virus inside the United States. Now, health officials are scrambling this morning, trying to figure out what went wrong. They suspect human error. They're calling it a break in protocol.

CAMEROTA: Meanwhile, in Boston, a big Ebola scare shut down a Harvard medical facility for a few hours after a man who traveled to Liberia walked in complaining of a headache and body ache. And another Ebola scare disrupting travel at LAX. A passenger with flu-like symptoms on a United Airlines flight triggering a massive response from the L.A. Fire Department. This turned out to be a false alarm. So our coverage of the Ebola crisis begins in Dallas with senior medical correspondent, Elizabeth Cohen. What's the latest, Elizabeth?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Alisyn. Here in Dallas, a hospital concerned about one of its own and lots of questions this morning about how this nurse became infected with Ebola when she was wearing full protective gear.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COHEN (voice-over): This morning, hazmat crews continue to decontaminate the Dallas apartment of the first person to contract Ebola in the U.S. A female nurse tested positive for the disease Saturday night after officials say she had extensive contact with the now deceased Ebola patient, Thomas Duncan.

FRIEDEN: There was a breach in protocol.

COHEN: The CDC says the nurse was wearing protective gear, gloves, gown, and mask, and the infection could have resulted when she took her contaminated gear off.

FRIEDEN: The care of Ebola can be done safely, but it's hard to do it safely.

COHEN: The CDC also says two procedures performed on Duncan at the very end of his life, intubation to help him breathe and kidney dialysis are unusual, both putting health care workers at high risk of exposure to his bodily fluids.

FRIEDEN: I am not familiar with any prior patient with Ebola who is undergoing either intubation or dialysis.

COHEN: And as the crisis continues, health care workers across the U.S. say nurses haven't been adequately trained.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We hear they have not been following proper protocol when we have been is asking the hospitals around the country to provide us with training.

COHEN: This as another possible Ebola patient, who recently traveled to Liberia, is being isolated in a Boston hospital complaining of aches and headaches. The medical center currently treating the man is awaiting his results. But a spokesman says the chances he has Ebola are extremely low.

Meanwhile, more Ebola scares over the weekend. On Sunday, a passenger who recently traveled to Africa became ill on the United Airlines flight from New York to Los Angeles. But Ebola was quickly ruled out.

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COHEN: Now, those two procedures we mentioned, intubation and kidney dialysis, doctors I have been talking to say, look, there is extremely little chance that that would have helped Duncan, given he was dying of Ebola, but there is a relatively high chance that it could have contaminated someone -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: All right, Elizabeth Cohen, thanks so much for that update. Let's talk more with Chris.

CUOMO: All right, Alisyn, we keep hearing Ebola and right after we hear the word, "scare," we are all afraid of things and the unknown and what it could mean and what is versus what if. So let's get some perspective.

Let's bring in Dr. Amesh Adalja, a board certified physician for infectious disease and senior associate at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and Miss Mary Schiavo, CNN aviation analyst, former inspector general for the U.S. Department of Transportation. Thank you both.

Doctor, let's begin with you and the latest headline, did you hear about the flight from Dallas to Nashville, the passenger felt ill. They were going to quarantine him. They didn't foe what to do with the flight. Now they believe it was just air sickness. Do you know anything about this and what do you believe it speaks to?

DR. AMESH ADALJA, SENIOR ASSOCIATE, UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH MEDICAL CENTER: These incidents speak to this heightened panic amongst the general public where any disease is attributed to be the Ebola. If someone sneezes, collapses, vomits, it's always going to raise the fears of Ebola.

And I really think it's getting a little bit out of hand. It's understandable that people are scared. Ebola still does not pose a threat to the general public.

We have people that are going to collapse from under cardiac arrest and they are going to need bi-standard CPR. We don't want people running from everybody. We want people to put this threat into some perspective.

CUOMO: All right, help me out for a second. I will play a familiar role. I am a scared person, OK. You demystify for me. You unscare me. The nurse, they weren't supposed to get it. They were all in gowns and mask and bags. They look like they are ready to work for NASA and then she gets Ebola. Why shouldn't I be scared?

ADALJA: You shouldn't be scared because Ebola although it's deadly, it's scary, it's not very contagious. You only get it through the exposure to blood and body fluids of somebody who has symptoms. You can't get it before someone has symptoms. It's not transmitted casually like the flu or the common cold.

And really that's the only people that need to be worried, the close contacts. Those have intimate contact with an Ebola patient. Why this nurse got it is a little bit of a puzzle. It's actually disheartening she got it. You have to remember that infection control must be meticulous when you are taking care of an Ebola patient.

Not just putting on the equipment, but also taking it off. You saw what happened in Spain where this nurse's aide likely touched her face and that's why hospitals need to be prepared to do these infection control drills and have this guidance available to workers. And possibly using a buddy system where someone watches the individual take off the gear with a checklist. This is not a forgiving virus. It's not very contagious. You can't do it any favors by having any lapses in the way you adhere to infectious control.

CUOMO: One more go around on this, I hear the word puzzle, now I am scared again because that means they don't really know how she got it and how to keep other health care workers from getting it. I'm not just afraid for myself, I'm afraid for the people who are working.

And then you tell me it's only about who comes into close contact, but then I see the guys in the space suits taking her garbage away and if I'm her neighbor, why are they in space suits taking her garbage away if there is no real risk?

ADALJA: This virus is not very hardy. It doesn't survive in the environment, however, we do -- do decontamination appropriately in order to clean up what residual virus may be left.

When I say puzzle about how she got infected, it's clear that the virus hasn't changed. We know how this virus is transmitted. We know how we stopped 24 outbreaks prior to this. It's the same general low tech principals.

However health care workers have always tended to be disproportionately infected because this infection control is so important and that's we keep emphasizing that hospitals have to start preparing, have protocols.

The people that are really at risk are those who are going to be taking care of Ebola patients and their close contacts. You won't get Ebola on the subway. It just doesn't spread that way.

CUOMO: All right, I feel better now because we need to engage these things. We don't want to spread the fear. The information helps. Colonel Zarnic who is our man for the U.S. on the ground in Liberia said people have to stop worrying about what if and worry about what is.

Thank you for giving me those realities, Doctor. So now to you, Schiavo, up in the air, it seems worse than anywhere else. You go on the panic mode at the drop of a dime. You got the flu coming up. You got these screenings now. You need to coordinate.

You guys are not good at coordinating when it comes to air travel, in general. What are your concerns about how you will deal with planes full of people every time a panic comes up? What happens if you have to quarantine them? Do we even know what to do?

MARY SCHIAVO, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: And precisely -- the problem is they have designated only five airports. So I think the words of the government are not matching the actions. That's what's causing the panic.

The government said we won't stop travel from Liberia, 150 people a day compared with the 2 million of the rest of the people traveling so people don't know. There are five airports where people are tested when they land. They transfer onto the rest of the United States, where those airports are not prepared and ready.

So this scene is going to repeat itself again and again because people don't have confidence that when they step on the plane, they don't have confidence in the government, that they have kept people off the planes. This will only increase.

The problem is once you have these things, you have to respond. L.A. called the fire department. They didn't know what to do. Once they were flying to Nashville, all of the airports are going to have to have some kind of a program if place.

And that's the problem with not having a travel ban because we have 547 airports. The CDC didn't have that many people.

CUOMO: One quick question, so something happens on an airplane, OK. They're testing, making sure what is it? Maybe it's just the flu. Does that plane stay or is it now gone back on its routes and now what do we do?

SCHIAVO: Well, that's a great question because it's been treated in two different ways. For example the one in Los Angeles, they were taken there. The plane was taken to a remote area of the airport.

In other cases, the passengers have gotten off the plane. It was cleaned by the regular cleaning crew. They have to very quickly. That's way aviation works, very quickly get the plane on its way. By that way, it's moved on to its next stop.

We haven't had a uniform policy. That's very important and that's part of the distrust of travelers. We have to be able to trust our government and that means uniformity and treatment.

CUOMO: Cold and flu season is coming. We know what that means. Everybody is going to be having fevers and all these other things. That's why we have to deal with, again, what is versus what if. Mary Schiavo, thank you very much.

I know you will forgive me for making you the representative for all things air travel. Dr. Adalja, thank you very much. Thank you for debunking the fears. It's very important to do. Appreciate it. Mich, over to you.

PEREIRA: A great way to start the show. Chris, thanks so much for that. Let's get a look at your headlines at 9 minutes past the hour.

New concern this morning that home grown terrorists will try to carry out attacks against the FBI and media outlets in the U.S. It comes after authorities got wind of ISIS leaders using social media encourage would-be terrorist to carry out such plots.

Law enforcement officials say they are beefing up security. They do not know of any specific threats. We are going to talk more about this potential attack coming up in a live report. Breaking overnight, crowds in St. Louis, more than a thousand people in fact are gathering in St. Louis to protest the Michael Brown shooting as well as the police shooting of an 18-year-old Vonderrit Myers.

Police in riot gear monitoring the peaceful demonstrations. All of this comes amid the weekend of resistance rally in Ferguson, Missouri, all in response to the shooting death of Brown. Seventeen people were arrested in a St. Louis neighborhood during the mostly peaceful protest Sunday night.

The demonstrations will culminate in a series of actions today. They are expected to get under way in just a few hours' time. We'll keep an eye on that for you.

Also overnight, overseas protests heating up in Hong Kong, scuffles breaking out as anti-protest groups took on pro-democracy demonstrators who have occupied the streets over the past several weeks.

There are reports angry taxis and truck drivers opposed to the protest demanded an end to the demonstrations, which they say have seriously hurt their livelihoods.

A heckler using a bullhorn interrupting Hillary Clinton during a speech Sunday night, she was the key note speaker at the American Academy of Pediatrics Conference held in San Diego, California. She was initially caught off guard, but she did recover nicely. Take a listen.

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HILLARY CLINTON, FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE: Millions of people -- you are all. You know, there are some people who miss important developmental stages.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: Thinking on her feet. Obviously, you saw the heckler being removed by security. I think they all anticipated there will be somebody that stands up.

CAMEROTA: They should.

PEREIRA: They have to. If they don't, yes.

CAMEROTA: At first you saw her sort of --

CUOMO: She's had some things happen to her on stage.

PEREIRA: Yes, she has.

CUOMO: Remember the whole shoe. Yes, it happens.

PEREIRA: I'm not going to throw my shoe at you. I might hit you with it. CUOMO: You might hit me with it, but don't throw it.

PEREIRA: Not today.

CUOMO: You brought in banana nut bread, Zucchini bread. Today is not the day. Save it.

CAMEROTA: All right, coming up, coalition airstrikes, doing little to stop ISIS from moving towards Baghdad. Is the terror group about to seize control of the Iraqi capital and what would that mean to the future of the Middle East?

CUOMO: Plus, TV news crew quarantined in New Jersey after their photographer was diagnosed with Ebola. One member of the team has been spotted around town in violation of the quarantine, what is going on here? Is anybody at risk? We'll find out.

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CAMEROTA: ISIS making startling advances in Iraq and Syria despite coalition airstrikes. General Martin Dempsey, who is leading U.S. efforts to fight the terror group, says fighters came within 15 miles of Baghdad's airport.

But the U.S. insists the Iraqi capital is not in danger of falling to ISIS, even though the group stands on the verge of controlling an entire province on Baghdad's doorstep. This as Turkey now says it will let the U.S. use its military bases to fight ISIS.

So, let's get to our team on the frontline. Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr, CNN international correspondent Ben Wedeman in Baghdad, and senior international correspondent Nick Paton Walsh on the Turkey- Syria border.

It's great to see all of you this morning.

Ben, I want to start with you. We are hearing conflicting reports as to whether or not ISIS could take Baghdad. They are less than 15 miles away. You are there on the ground. What's the assessment?

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: ISIS couldn't take Baghdad under the current circumstances. It's a huge city. Most of the population is Shia, which is very hostile to ISIS, in addition to the Iraqi army, which is concentrated in and around Baghdad. There are tens of thousands of Shia volunteers who have been armed and trained with militias as well. So, it's a huge task and ISIS, despite its traumatic gains elsewhere has never been able to take a large population center where the local population does not welcome it if some form or another.

CAMEROTA: Barbara, is that the same assessment at the Pentagon?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's what they certainly hope. They hope ISIS doesn't really have designs on taking Baghdad. But really, it is the airport right now, Baghdad International Airport. I think it's the U.S. military's focus. They can not lose that airport.

What if ISIS were to make some sort of a lightening strike on the west side of the city to try to get control of the airport or shut it down. For the 1,000 or more U.S. military and diplomatic personnel in Iraq, that airport is the only way out if this all goes sideways. That is really right now what the U.S. is -- seems to be very determined to protect.

CAMEROTA: You are right. That's what General Martin Dempsey talked about yesterday, about the ISIS encroachment on the airport. Let's listen.

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GEN. MARTIN DEMPSEY, JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN: You're not going to wait until they were climbing over the wall. They were within, you know, 20 or 25 kilometers.

INTERVIEWER: Of Baghdad airport.

DEMPSEY: Sure. And had they overrun the Iraqi unit, it was a straight shot to the airport. So, we're not going to allow that to happen. We need that airport.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Barbara, when he said, "We're not going to allow that to happen," what's the plan?

STARR: Well, I think Ben will tell you, there -- and Nick as well -- there are significant Iraqi defenses on the west front of the approaches to Baghdad. There are U.S. apache helicopters, which have already been used to push ISIS back. There are also regular drone flights overhead trying to keep an eye on ISIS.

But right now, it is becoming tougher by the day because ISIS fighters are changing their strategy, they're blending into local population. They're moving in very small groups. When are you a fighter bomber aircraft at 30,000 feet looking for a target to strike, they are getting tougher and tougher to see day-by-day.

So, this is going to be exactly what the Pentagon promised. Airstrikes alone won't work. It's going to be a very long call.

CAMEROTA: Nick, speaking of ISIS changing its strategy. You talk about how impossible to predict what ISIS will do next, because tactically, they keep people guessing.

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: They are more advanced than perhaps just what you can see by simply reading what they have done in the past 24 hours, certainly. We've seen them on face with moderate rebels in Syria and potential for big showdown there. They pull back, melted away. Months later, they were focusing in Iraq, on taking territory.

We are seeing a definite decisive move by them to take Kobani behind them him and there's a key reason for that. Once they have this town, they have 100 kilometers of the Turkish-Syrian border. That's ordinarily useful for them in terms of leverage with the Turkish government in terms of the ability to use this porous area, to get supplies in and out.

They may be moving down Anbar. There are suggestions from some observers actually they are moving also towards the south of the capital, to again to confuse the Iraqi army, divide, fracture, corrupt, incompetent in many ways already and certainly not be able to be light-footed as ISIS can be given the discipline they effectively have better numbers on the battlefield, too.

In some ways, yes, an extraordinary complex task, trying to work out precisely what a group like ISIS wants to do next -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: So, Nick, how deep is Turkey's commitment today to helping?

WALSH: Well, I mean, Turkey has been involved in the Syrian war for three years. People talk about, are they going to assist the Syrian moderate opposition? Well, they have been doing that for three years. They've been in the Istanbul hotel circuit, assisting them to have meetings, to build a political opposition, they've allowed over a million refugees on to their territory.

This isn't a new fight for them. What they want to do, it seems from statements, is not necessarily be led by a Washington plan.

Washington, let's be honest has been all over the place for the past three years about who it wants to assist, what level of assistance it wants to provide, if any at all.

The key thing for them I think is to see an outcome or direction which satisfies them, because they have to live with the established circumstances of what comes out of this civil war for decades to come. They've had a long-term problem with the Kurds fighting on this side of the border here. They are enemies, frankly, so they're not going to pile and assist necessarily this fight. They, of course, want to see Syrians they are comfortable with take the superior hand in this battle, definitely.

But at the end of the day, they're very clear in anchor that they want to see Assad out of power inside Damascus before they're willing to commit more resources to fighting or assisting what's happening on the side of the border next to me, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Ben, back to Baghdad. What's the feeling on the ground there today about ISIS getting so close?

WEDEMAN: People here are fairly confident that there won't be a frontal assault on the capital. Their real worry and it's very well- founded is the series of car bombings that seems to be going on and on, every day there is at least one bombing. The other night Saturday fight, there are two bombings that left more than 40 people dead.

So, the worry is really what's going on inside Baghdad, because there are pockets of Sunnis among whom there are sympathizers, if not active members of ISIS as well. But looking beyond that, many people are concerned with the situation in Anbar province, which abuts the capital. We'd just learned that yet another Iraqi army base was overrun today, northwest of the town of Hit.

We're getting conflicting reports about what happened afterwards. Some reports saying that the Iraqi burned their equipment and ammunition that they couldn't take with them. Other reports say yet again ISIS was able to get their hands on this very precious American supplied, the hardware and ammunition.

So, it's a very mixed picture. But people are nervous as I said about bombs in Baghdad. But they are looking just to the west and increasingly considered about the possible fall of Anbar province, which at this point is 80 percent under the control of ISIS and that remaining under Iraqi army control is very tenuous at best.

CAMEROTA: It sure sounds like it, particularly given that bringing news that you just shared with us about the key base being taken over by ISIS.

Barbara Starr, Ben Wedeman, Nick Paton Walsh -- thank you so much for being there on the frontlines and giving us all the information this morning. Great to see you.

Let's go over to Chris.

CUOMO: All right, Alisyn.

Oscar Pistorius is going to find his fate and soon. How much time is he going to get for culpable homicide? We're going to take live to the courthouse.

And a network news team becomes the story, thrown into quarantine after the cameraman tested positive for Ebola. But another one of them has reportedly been spotted driving around New Jersey. What's going on?

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CAMEROTA: Welcome back.

There is a new tropical storm that is threatening the Caribbean this morning. Gonzalo could become a hurricane this week, just after tropical storm Faye knocked out power for thousands in Bermuda.

So, let's get to meteorologist Alexandra Steele. She's in for Indra Petersons.

Hi, Alexandra.

ALEXANDRA STEELE, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Hi, Alisyn. You know, you are exactly right. The expectation is to become a hurricane either tonight or tomorrow.

It's not very quiet in the Atlantic. But this is our seventh named storm, tropical storm Gonzalo. Here it is. And you can see kind of the center of circulation, a little bit kind of toward the northern section of this in western.

But what we got right now are hurricane watches posted. So, expecting conditions in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, already feeling some rain in Guadalupe, and also Antigua, Barbuda. We're going to see it move across the Leeward Islands tonight, and then again, potentially tonight or tomorrow will become a hurricane, and then we're going to watch it move north and then move northeastward and head out to sea.

But again, hurricane conditions expected within the next 24 hours. Whether you are watching off Puerto Rico or the U.S. or Virgin Islands. So, I'd certainly be mindful to that.

All right. Also, hey, locally what we got, active weather to boot. Showers, thunderstorms, the potential today for quite a severe weather outbreak, a moderate risk for some. Kind of the setup just perfect here.