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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Second Nurse Tests Positive for Ebola; Political Spouses; CDC Interviewing Passengers Who Flew With Patient

Aired October 15, 2014 - 16:00   ET

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

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Nurses in Dallas who treated the first U.S. Ebola patient, they say they didn't break and protocols. They say there weren't any protocols.

I'm Jake Tapper. This is THE LEAD.

The national lead, now a second Dallas nurse who cared for Thomas Duncan is battling deadly Ebola, as her colleagues are blowing the whistle on the hospital, saying an Ebola patient was left out in the open amongst other patients for hours.

And it gets worse. After treating Thomas Duncan and the day before her Ebola diagnosis, this second Dallas nurse with Ebola was on a plane from Ohio. And if you were one of the 130 people on board with her, the CDC wants to talk to you.

The politics lead. Before they pick their running mates, they have to run it by their life mates -- how political spouses can change the course of this country with their veto power.

Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to THE LEAD.

We are going to with some breaking news. It feels as though new details are coming in by the minute on the Ebola outbreak in this country. The second nurse to contract Ebola will soon be on a flight to a new hospital. More on that in a moment.

But, first, the fact that Ebola is spreading and the going to appears to be several steps behind in the battle to stop it, well, that's also taking its toll on your retirement account. The stock market tumbled off a cliff today.

We have our medical and money experts standing by to walk us through al the news.

We are going to begin with CNN Money's Alison Kosik. She's live at the New York Stock Exchange.

Alison, the Dow was down at one point today nearly 460 points. Where are we now? Alison Kosik, can you hear me?

ALISON KOSIK, CNN MONEY CORRESPONDENT: I can now, Jake.

What an improvement, the Dow only dropping, I say that lightly, only dropping 173 points, but after that drop of 460, yes, it is an improvement. It really was a brutal day. Here's something else to chew on. Look at this. The S&P 500 this year, all of its gains, they were up 9 percent for the year and at one point today they were wiped out, but at the end of the day they gained a little of that back.

So, yes, Ebola concerns were factoring in and they were in the background today, but definitely not the whole story here on Wall Street. What you're seeing happen are stocks rebooting. There's a new landscape. Economies in the Eurozone are slowing down with countries including Germany trying to fight off a third recession in six years.

You have got deflationary worries. And I'm not just talking about in Europe. I'm talking about here in the U.S., too, after an inflation report disappointed. And finally, data that describes the health of the U.S. economy coming in mediocre, retail sales down for September, right on the cusp of the holiday shopping season. you know what? You take these reports and this information individually, not really much of a concern to see this kind of sell-off, but what happened here was there was a snowball effect where any negative information was amplified -- Jake.

TAPPER: Alison Kosik at the New York Stock Exchange, thank you so much.

Now to breaking news in our national lead. She was exposed and then she got on an airplane. A second nurse that treated American patient zero Thomas Duncan, she is now battling the Ebola virus in the same hospital where she worked, Texas Health Presbyterian in Dallas.

We now know her name is Amber Vinson. We have learned that she was in Ohio to prepare for her upcoming wedding. And the day before she was diagnosed, she returned to Dallas on a flight from Cleveland on Frontier Airlines Flight 1143. The plane was taken out of service, but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention wants to hear from you if you were also on that flight.

And now Vinson will be taking another flight, this time in total isolation. Today, the CDC said Vinson will be moved from the Dallas hospital to Emory University Hospital in Atlanta, Georgia. That's one of four American hospitals that has the high-level biocontainment units which have successfully treated other Ebola patients.

CNN senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen is live outside the hospital in Dallas.

Elizabeth, what do we know about this new patient, Amber Vinson? The CDC offered some new details about her contact with that patient from Liberia, Thomas Duncan.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Right.

They mentioned that she took care of Duncan between September 28 and September 30. And, Jake, the reason why those dates are important, those were the first three days that Mr. Duncan was in the hospital and before he had an official Ebola diagnosis. So we know that they had problems with their protective gear when they

knew they were dealing with a patient with Ebola. You have on wonder what kind of protective gear were they using when they didn't even know for sure that he had Ebola?

And also at the news conference, it was revealed that some of their skin was exposed while they were taking care of Duncan, that these nurses, some of their skin was exposed -- Jake.

TAPPER: Elizabeth, if she was around Duncan while he was displaying some of his nastiest symptoms, why did she fly? Had she not been told by the CDC or the hospital that she wasn't supposed to get on an airplane?

COHEN: I have reached out for answers on this and it is not clear. Dr. Frieden at the CDC said at the press conference, look, she was not supposed to get on commercial aircraft because she had controls -- there were controls on her movement.

Well, when I look it up, it seems like, as long as you're wearing protective gear, you don't have controlled movement. If you're wearing protective gear as a health care worker, you're a contact, but you're allowed to move around.

So, it's not clear what instructions would have been given to her. You would think the authorities would have known that she was getting on a plane. You would think they would have certainly known that she was getting on a plane to come home. It is unclear. Did she defy their orders or did they not give her orders? It's really unclear.

TAPPER: Elizabeth, today, the CDC said 50 health care workers were in Duncan's room. Given this list of complaints that we have heard about the conditions there, can we expect more cases in the coming days?

COHEN: You know, Dr. Frieden at the CDC said that it would certainly not be surprising. It would not be unexpected if we saw more, because, Jake, I think this can't be emphasized enough. And you and I have talked about this.

These nurses, it appears they didn't do anything wrong by themselves. It's not like they sort of broke protocol or did something wrong. This could be a systemic problem. That's certainly what it sounds like, that this hospital was not instructing them to do this in the right way, perhaps.

And so if that's the case, then certainly we may have more cases.

TAPPER: Elizabeth Cohen in Dallas, thank you so much.

Let's go no to CNN chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta.

Now, Sanjay, good to see you.

Ebola patient Amber Vinson is coming your way to Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. Is this a sign that the CDC has lost confidence in that Dallas hospital? DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: It could be a

little bit, Jake, and that's very disappointing.

I'll tell you, for some time, we have been talking about the fact that any hospital in the country should be able to take care of a patient with Ebola because the isolation procedures really aren't that challenging. You don't need a big sophisticated center like an Emory, but, to your point, I think that maybe this is a little bit of a surrender to some extent.

It's not so much the treatment, I don't think, Jake. There is no specific treatment for Ebola. You manage someone's fluids. You replace those fluids as necessary. We know the nurse Nina Pham got a blood transfusion. That is a possible treatment, could be given anywhere. It was given in Dallas. It could be given at Emory.

But this seems to be, Jake, as I listened to Dr. Frieden closely and he said Amber Vinson is ill and sounds like she's more ill than Nina Pham and that was part of her reason to go to Emory. What does that mean, exactly?

How do you interpret that? Well, one could say, well, the treatment will be better at Emory. Perhaps, but again there is no specific treatment. It's a more that a more ill person is more likely to be contagious as well and they're just not -- don't seem to be sure that they can contain this in Dallas. And that's why she may be going to Emory.

And I say that's disappointing because they have been able to contain this in places like rural Central Africa, in tent villages in the middle of nowhere that I have seen. And yet at a big, gleaming hospital in Dallas, there is a bit of a surrender going on here.

TAPPER: And, Sanjay, we did just hear from Texas Health that Nina Pham, the first nurse in Dallas to contract Ebola, she is now in good condition, they say. Do you think that her condition is a factor in why she's staying in Dallas as opposed to being flown to Emory like this new patient, Amber Vinson?

GUPTA: I think it could certainly be.

And keep in mind, again, that someone becomes more contagious as they become more sick. So, if Amber Vinson is being transferred because she is more sick and because they are worried specifically about the fact that she is also more contagious, then that speaks to the fact that they may not be sure that they can contain Ebola in one of their patients.

And they worry that it will go to their other health care workers like it already has. With Nina Pham, she is not as sick, less likely to be as contagious, so maybe they think they have a better shot at containing the virus in that case.

So, again, the treatment part is obviously very important, but this isn't like they have some sort of special potion or special magic wand at Emory that they don't have in Dallas. This seems to be more an issue about containment than treatment, Jake.

TAPPER: Although it does seem as though, Sanjay, that at Emory they know to not get their staff infected.

GUPTA: That's the point. That's exactly the point.

But, again, they don't have like some special drug that you couldn't get elsewhere that they are going to offer at Emory. They just implement the procedures and protocols that frankly can be implemented in Central Africa pretty well. They can implement those better at Emory than it appears that Dallas can. Or at last that's what the story seems to be about.

TAPPER: All right, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thank you so much, as always.

President Obama abruptly cleared his schedule today, postponing campaign trips to New Jersey and Connecticut, to deal with the fact that Ebola continues to spread inside the United States.

Now, you might recall what President Obama said about Ebola one month ago tomorrow when he was visiting the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: In the unlikely event that someone with Ebola does reach our shores, we have taken new measures so that we're prepared here at home.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: That's quite obviously a remark that in retrospect does not hold up to events.

Someone with Ebola did reach U.S. shores and that person infected at least two people and it remains an open question as to how prepared we are here at home.

CNN's Jim Acosta joins us now live from the White House.

Jim, was there talk about an Ebola czar on Capitol Hill. More important than whether or not there is a czar appointed, who is coordinating the national federal response?

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jake, right now, we should point out the president is meeting with Cabinet officials and we may be hearing from the president shortly on the Ebola response.

But up until now, Jake, we have been led to believe that Lisa Monaco, the president's counterterrorism and homeland security adviser, was coordinating the government's response. They have been saying they don't need an Ebola czar. That would just be another layer of bureaucracy.

Now White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest is saying, well, if they need new staffing and resources, they will make that call as it comes. But when I pressed Josh Earnest about Lisa Monaco's role, he didn't exactly say that she is in charge of the overall response and declined to say who is. Here's what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSH EARNEST, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: She's not responsible for coordinating the activities of the international community as they interact with local governments in West Africa. USAID is involved in that effort. They have an area of expertise. She's not diagnosing people in the field.

(CROSSTALK)

ACOSTA: You're interrupting me because you feel like you have a point to make, but you understand my question.

(CROSSTALK)

EARNEST: Well, no, I think the point that I have to make is directly relevant.

ACOSTA: You seem to be reluctant to say who is in charge of the federal response to Ebola.

EARNEST: Jim, I think that I'm reciting very clearly to you who specifically is responsible for which activities when it comes to this government's tenacious response to Ebola.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And eventually Earnest went on to say, Jake, that the president is in charge of the response, which should go without saying.

TAPPER: OK.

I guess the big question is, we had the CDC acknowledge that they wish they had done things differently. Does the White House acknowledge, do they believe that CDC in any way dropped the ball here?

ACOSTA: I think what Josh Earnest said -- and he said it very carefully during this briefing, Jake -- you're accustomed to the way these words are parsed -- he said that Dr. Frieden has acknowledged that there have been shortcomings in the patient care down in Dallas, and that resulted in other people being infected.

And so at this point, they do see the process down in Dallas as being somewhat flawed. And Josh Earnest said the president is concerned about it and perhaps we will hear the president address that when the tape comes out of that meeting in just a few minutes.

TAPPER: All right, Jim Acosta at the White House, as always, thank you so much.

ACOSTA: You bet. TAPPER: She had a temperature of 99.5, and the Centers for Disease Control admits she never should have traveled on a commercial airline.

Still, Amber Vinson boarded a flight home the day before she was diagnosed with Ebola. So, what now for those other 132 other passengers on Frontier Airlines Flight 1143? Stay with us. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper.

The national lead -- now, imagining discover -- imagine discovering that you were one of the 132 passengers onboard that Frontier Airlines flight to Dallas that also had in it the latest U.S. Ebola patient who just hours afterwards was diagnosed with the deadly disease. Just imagine that. The CDC says it is now reaching out to everyone who was on this plane with Amber Vinson and acknowledging that she should never have traveled to begin with because she had had extensive contact with the Ebola patient Duncan who died last week.

Joining me now live from Reagan National Airport is CNN aviation correspondent Rene Marsh.

Rene, I guess, the big question right now is, do we know whether this nurse Amber Vinson had even been told to not fly on commercial airlines?

RENE MARSH, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jake, here is what we do know. We know that the CDC came out today and said this woman should not have stepped foot on a plane. We also know that the CDC says that their guidelines say that there should be limited travel if you are considered possibly exposed to Ebola. That's what we do know.

However, the CDC was very unclear in their explanation as to whether there is an individual whose responsibility it is to make sure that someone who is being observed does not board a plane. At this point, there is no indication that a system like that was set up to prevent this person from flying, but now, the CDC says they're going to change that.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARSH (voice-over): The CDC is contacting all of the passengers who shared flights with 29-year-old Amber Vinson, the Dallas nurse now infected with Ebola. Vinson took Frontier Airline flights -- first from Dallas to Cleveland, and then back to Dallas. She didn't show symptoms at that time. But in a telephone briefing today, CDC Director Tom Frieden said she never should have stepped foot on a plane.

DR. TOM FRIEDEN, CDC DIRECTOR: Although she did not report any symptoms and she did not meet the fever threshold of 100.4, she did report at that time that she took her temperature and found it to be 99.5. So, by both of those criteria, she should not have been on that plane. MARSH: Vinson developed symptoms the day after her October 13th

flight to Dallas, raising the question, were any of the other 132 passengers at risk?

FRIEDEN: We are going and will always put in extra margins of safety and therefore, I will be reaching out to all of the passengers and crew of that flight.

MARSH: In a statement to CNN, Frontier Airlines says they responded immediately upon notification from the CDC by removing the aircraft from service. The airline says the plane was cleaned the night it landed and again today, but it is still in use.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Frontier aircraft -- Frontier Airlines aircraft was decontaminated twice at a remote location of the airport. That plane has since -- in about 30 minutes, the plane will be put back into service. There will be a scheduled flight to Denver using that aircraft.

MARSH: One public health expert says this case is another example of a flawed system.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's staggering about this is that we've done so many tabletop exercises for novel pandemic flus and SARS and all of that and yet the first case of Ebola in real life, it doesn't work.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MARSH: So, again worth noting here, the issue here for the CDC is reaching out to all of those passengers who are onboard the flight. They say the risk is low, but still they want to follow and track these people. They gave out a 1-800-CDC number for anyone who was onboard this flight to contact them if they have any questions.

I tried that number. It's worth the wait time is 390 minutes. So, it's a pretty long wait for that phone call to the CDC.

Also, just coming in to us here at CNN, two lawmakers calling for a travel ban, renewing that call. Once again, we've been hearing that from a lot of lawmakers, stopping travel to the West African countries most impacted by this. But we've heard from the administration, last we heard from them that they are not considering that at this point, Jake.

TAPPER: All right. Rene Marsh, thanks so much.

Those two lawmakers, of course, Congressman Shuster and Senator Thune.

Thank you, Rene.

Coming up, stunning new allegations from the nurses who cared for Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan. They now say that he was left for hours with other patients in the hospital before being isolated. Are those patients now at risk as well?

Plus, time is running out and new polls can't be making Democrats feel any better (AUDIO GAP) midterms. Is there anything left that they can do to turn things around?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper.

Staying with our national lead -- let me read this quote to you. Quote, "There was no advanced preparedness on what to do with the patient. There was no protocol. There was no system. The nurses strongly feel unsupported, unprepared, lied to and deserted to handle the situation on their own."

That's the shocking statement from some unnamed registered nurses at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas given to the National Nurses United union.

The nurses allege that when Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan came to the hospital the second time under the suspicion that he may have Ebola, he, quote, "was left for several hour, not in isolation, in an area where other patients were present." The nurses also say, "There was no hands-on training on the use of personal protective equipment for Ebola, no mandate for nurses to attend training and when a nurse supervisor arrived and demanded that he be moved, Duncan be removed to an isolated isolation unit, the supervisor faced resistance from hospital officials."

Texas Health Resources responded to those claims in a statement saying, quote, "Patient and employee safety is our greatest priority. And we take compliance very seriously. We will continue to review and respond to any concerns raised by our nurses and all employees." Not really responsive at all.

Joining me now live is Pam Cipriani. She's president of the American Nurses Association.

Pam, I know this is a different organization. You didn't get the statement.

But if these allegations are true, that's just shocking. Why would these nurses be treated the way they're treated? Why would they not be given instruction and why were they not be told to wear the protective clothing that everyone at the CDC or at Emory University wears?

PAM CIPRIANI, PRESIDENT, AMERICAN NURSES ASSOCIATION: Well, I think all of our organizations know very clearly that we have to provide the personal protective equipment to nurses and all front-line care providers, physicians, anyone who will be in the path of taking care of such a patient. Similarly, it's very important that they have the tools and checklist to identify any potential patient up front.

We certainly know a lot more now than we did a couple of weeks ago, and so, I think we've really seen a ramping up of the attention to the use of these tools. I mean, the CDC is consistently revising them. We want to know more about what have they learned as they've examined the situation in Texas so that we can do everything possible to keep our staff and patients safe. TAPPER: When you look at the instructions that the CDC puts out and

you look at people who treat Ebola patients in West Africa, how they dress, there is a difference. There is a chasm. The CDC guidelines do not recommend a head cover. The CDC guidelines do not recommend two sets of gloves, only one set of gloves. The CDC guidelines do not represent covers for shoes or boots. It just seems as though even though we have been seeing this crisis across the ocean and slowly come and make its way here, it seems as though everyone is just caught as if we didn't know what was coming.

CIPRIANI: Well, when you look at the CDC guidelines, they are the basic guidelines for protective equipment and precautions. And those are the ones that you describe. But it also says if there is an escalation in the volume of secretions and that's typically vomit and other, blood, and things like that, then you do escalate to full covering. And I think what we're realizing now is that there may be no time to really evaluate when you move it to that higher level so we need to start at the higher level. So full protection, no area of skin should be exposed.