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CNN NEWSROOM

New: Up To 80 People Being Monitored For Ebola; Secret Service Gets New Interim Boss; Fear Spreads in Dallas; CDC Alerts Travelers about Ebola

Aired October 2, 2014 - 10:00   ET

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


(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Happening now in the NEWSROOM, Ebola in America.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're hoping and praying that Eric survives the night.

COSTELLO: The family of patient Thomas Eric Duncan prays for his survival as questions swirl around who he came into contact with.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Every contact where he might have had direct physical contact with somebody.

COSTELLO: Dallas this morning on edge and nervous.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm scared. I'm worried for my son and my daughter and me.

COSTELLO: Parents keeping their children from class and new concerns about why the hospital released the patient without screening him.

DR. TOM FRIEDEN, CDC DIRECTOR: It was a mistake. They dropped the ball.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When we deal with a tough situation like this, we've got to be perfect. In this case, they weren't.

COSTELLO: This morning separating fact from fiction. What you need to know as Ebola hits home.

Let's talk live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me. We begin this hour with breaking news as one man fights for his life, health workers ratchet up the number of people he potentially exposed to Ebola. A short time ago the old number quadrupled to 80 people.

Also this morning, fear is spreading among Dallas parents with this news, the infected man was in close contact with five children and they attend four different schools. Also new this morning, local and state health officials issue a legal order to four close family members of Duncan to stay home in isolation or face arrest.

Critical days lost. We know the hospital missed its chance to get him off the street two days earlier. How prepared are other hospitals as Ebola threatens to become one of our biggest health concerns in years.

Our chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta is at CDC Headquarters in Atlanta. Seema Yasmin is a staff writer at the "Dallas Morning News" and a medical doctor, and Rene Marsh is at Dulles Airport outside of Washington.

But I want to begin with you, Sanjay, these four close family members of Mr. Duncan who have been ordered to stay inside their home, and if they leave before October 19th, they could be placed under arrest. Why would authorities require this?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, they want to keep a close eye on them. The concern is that they had direct contact with Mr. Duncan, could they develop symptoms themselves.

At first, they said, look, it's OK, go about your business. We just want to make sure you take your temperature twice a day. We have to be able to monitor you that way.

But for whatever reason, either because they weren't complying with that or they were not able to reliably get those temperatures, they say we'll put you in a location where we can find you whenever we need you.

It's their home. They went through steps of bringing them their food if they need food. So they're trying to make it so that these people really stay in one location.

A lot of this is happening because of this patient, Mr. Duncan, and not getting tested and admitted right away. Want to give you a little background on what happened there -- Carol.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GUPTA (voice-over): In this hospital, Thomas Eric Duncan, the first patient diagnosed with Ebola in the United States, is fighting for his life.

JOSEPHUS WEEKS, NEPHEW OF EBOLA PATIENT, THOMAS ERIC DUNCAN: We just hoping and praying that Eric survives the night and we got our hopes up for him.

GUPTA: Doctors say he's now in serious but stable condition. Duncan is a Liberian national and he traveled for the first time ever to the United States to visit his family in Dallas.

"The New York Times" reports that he may have become infected on September 15th, when he helped carry a pregnant woman who died from Ebola to the hospital. September 19th, Duncan flies from Liberia to Brussels, Belgium showing no obvious Ebola symptoms or fever during airport screening. From there, he boards United Airlines Flight 951, en route to Washington- Dulles, connecting to another United Flight 822 to Dallas.

September 20th, he arrives in Dallas and heads to this apartment complex to visit family. Four days later, he starts developing symptoms. He walks into this Dallas emergency room on the 25th of September, vomiting and with a fever.

He tells the nurse he had traveled from Africa, but is sent home with antibiotics and does not undergo an Ebola screening. September 28th, his condition worsens, he returns to the hospital by ambulance and is placed in isolation.

The next day, a family friend calls the CDC complaining that the hospital isn't moving quickly enough with his test results. By Tuesday, the 30th, the lab results confirm, the patient has Ebola.

The hospital admits it was a failure to communicate among hospital staff that led to the patient's release after his initial visit.

DR. MARK LESTER, EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT OF TEXAS HEALTH RESOURCES: He volunteered that he had traveled from Africa in response to the nurse operating the checklist and asking that question. Regretfully, that information was not fully communicated throughout the full team.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GUPTA (on camera): One thing I do want to point out, Carol, with regard to these three airplane flights that Mr. Duncan took, first from Liberia to Brussels, then to Dulles Airport in Virginia and then to Dallas, I talked to the CDC authorities here including Dr. Frieden, who is the head of the CDC.

And he said, look, there's no risk to any of the passengers on those planes, in the airports because Mr. Duncan wasn't sick. I asked him to clarify. He said zero percent chance of a transmission there. They're not going back to try to find those passengers because they think there's no need to. They're not at risk.

COSTELLO: All right, Sanjay Gupta at the CDC, thanks so much. I know you'll wait right there. At the bottom of the hour, Dr. Gupta will answer your Ebola questions. Tweet them to us using #Ebolaqanda. Of course, we'll get to as many of your questions as possible.

Presbyterian Hospital officials now admit they've made a dreadful mistake when they sent Eric Duncan home with antibiotics. Apparently a nurse did not communicate, Duncan told her he'd been in Liberia when doctors diagnosed him with some sort of stomach ailment.

The truth is, a lack of effective communication is not unusual in hospitals. Truth be told, many hospitals are simply not prepared to handle cases of Ebola.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) GAVIN MACGREGOR-SKINNER, ELIZABETH R. GRIFFIN FOUNDATION: We have a lot of hospitals that aren't prepared and really probably don't even want patients. What we've seen, we've seen that hospitals now are downloading paper-based guidance plans from the internet and are now working out how to do the management.

How to do the implementation and how is the how -- how to make these things happen to ensure if they do, unfortunately get an Ebola patient, everybody in the hospital is going to be safe.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: This is the paper-based guidelines from the CDC. It's five pages long. Is it enough? Joining me now is Seema Yasmin, a staff writer at the "Dallas Morning News," but also a medical doctor who worked as a disease detective. Welcome, Seema.

DR. SEEMAN YASMIN, STAFF WRITER, "DALLAS MORNING NEWS": Thank you.

COSTELLO: Why do you think more hospitals -- why didn't more hospitals react when two American doctors came home for treatment in Atlanta? Why didn't these hospitals, hospitals all across the country have their own protocols put into place?

YASMIN: Carol, we're actually hearing from local hospitals right here in Texas that they did respond. Once they heard there could be imported cases of Ebola in Texas or the U.S., they're telling us over the last three or four weeks they've had questions built in to that automatic medical record system in the emergency room.

So those questions would prompt any health care worker, a nurse or a doctor, to ask anyone who walks into the ED, have you had a temperature, do you have any of these signs or symptoms and crucially, have you traveled to West Africa?

So some hospitals really are prepared. Sadly we're hearing from this other local hospital, Presbyterian, where the Ebola patient currently is that the ball was dropped on Thursday night after 10:00 when he was trying to receive care there, they sent him home with antibiotics. That's troubling local residents.

COSTELLO: Well, it is troubling because there was a communication problem between the doctors and the nurses. Let's face it, we've all experienced that if we've spent any time in the hospital at all. The thing is we can't afford a communications problem at this particular moment in time, is there a solution?

YASMIN: Absolutely. The solution is to improve that communication, to make sure that hierarchy doesn't get in the way of effective clear communication between all members of the health care team, not just nurses and doctors, but all the other people that were involved in patient care.

That really needs to improve right now. We need to make sure that all U.S. doctors are asking patients about travel, have you been to West Africa recently? Have you had any of these signs and symptoms? Make sure that crucial information is transmitted to everybody in the health care team.

COSTELLO: Is one of the problems that so many different people care for patients? I've been in the hospital and somebody will show up and I'll say, who are you? Is that one of the problems?

YASMIN: It's one of the strengths as well, Carol, of our health care system is that we do have so many different people with different skills that make sure that all aspects of the patient are cared for and supported, that that communication is absolutely key.

We need to make sure that a rigid hierarchy, so doctors perhaps at the top of the chain, that doesn't mean that people are too scared to talk to them or too scared to challenge them or ask questions. We need to make sure everybody on the health care team is respected and all their voices are heard.

COSTELLO: A lot of people are asking about ZMap, Eric Duncan won't be getting the drug because the company that makes the drug has run out of supplies. Why is it taking so long to make this drug?

YASMIN: That's because it can very technical issue. I can take a very long time to ramp this production up. Oftentimes what we see is something that works great in the lab and a frustrating process, sometimes it takes years sadly before we see it in the clinic.

It takes a long time to figure out how to make this on a mass scale. It's just very different to producing a few batches in the lab versus producing thousands and thousands that could actually be used to treat patients.

COSTELLO: We should make it clear that Nancy Writebol was treated with ZMap and she told Anderson Cooper that she didn't know whether it was effective in her recovery or not.

YASMIN: Absolutely. These experimental drugs are just that, experimental. They haven't gone through the protocols that drugs usually go through. That means the few patients that have received them, we don't know. Was it the drug that actually made them better or were they going to become better on their own anyway?

COSTELLO: Seema Yasmin, thanks for joining me. I appreciate it.

YASMIN: Thank you.

COSTELLO: In the meantime, the CDC is ramping up efforts to alert air travelers about Ebola. The goal to make every person traveling from a country infected with the virus to be aware of the signs and symptoms. How are they doing that?

Well, let's bring in CNN's aviation and government regulation correspondent, Rene Marsh. She is at Dulles International Airport this morning. Good morning.

RENE MARSH, CNN AVIATION AND GOVERNMENT REGULATION CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. Well, Dulles here, we know that this passenger flew from Belgium to Washington Dulles on an eight-hour flight, United Airlines Flight 951 and had a three-hour layover at Washington Dulles before getting on that second United Airlines flight.

So what is the process and what is the procedure when people are traveling from Ebola-impacted countries here to the United States. It's the Customs and Border Patrol officers who are on the front lines.

We are told that they have been trained by the CDC to look for specific symptoms related to Ebola. When you arrive and get off of that plane, it is the Customs and Border Patrol officer who is supposed to ask you questions about your whereabouts, what kind of contact did you have with individuals during your travel.

They're also supposed to be scanning you for very visible signs that you are essentially sick. But I do want to point out, it is CBP's job to flag potentially sick passengers. They don't diagnose. If something catches their or see a red flag, they turn that over to CDC.

We know that there are CDC reps at the majority of international airports. We also know that there is a flier that is now being handed out to passengers who are flying from overseas, specifically from countries impacted by Ebola.

We have a graphic of that. Essentially this flier, it details what the symptoms of Ebola -- what those symptoms are, what the incubation period is, what you should do if you are concerned that perhaps you came in contact with this disease.

On the bottom of that, it also has instructions for doctors. You take that card to your doctor and it instructs the doctor what steps they need to take. We know that CBP had those flyers posted in August, but now they seem to be getting a little more aggressive. They are physically handing these flyers to passengers as they get off the plane -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Just to reiterate, Mr. Duncan showed no symptoms of Ebola when he boarded those United Airlines flights. Still some people might be a little concerned about those planes. Where are those planes?

MARSH: We do know that the planes are back in service. One of those United Airlines flights is, at this point will be flying from Frankfurt back here to Dulles at around 7:30 tonight.

The second United Airlines flight, we know it will be flying from Denver to Orlando to Chicago and then to Albany today. As you point out, the CDC has been very clear. There is zero risk to passengers who were on board both of those flights.

And also we want to point out, this incident happened as far as this man being on these two flights, September 20th. We're now in October. So plenty of time for these crews to clean these planes. These planes have been cleaned several times since September 20th.

So they just want to make sure that people understand, if you were on that flight, again from the CDC, no risk to you.

COSTELLO: Rene Marsh reporting live from Dulles International Airport. Thanks so much.

And make sure you stay with us. Remember later this hour, Dr. Gupta will answer your Ebola questions. Tweet them to us at CNN using the hashtag #Ebolaq&a. I'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: One day after Secret Service Director Julia Pierson resigned her post, the agency has a new interim boss. This is former special agent, Joseph Clancy. He'll be tasked with fixing some of the Secret Service's recent security failings.

Embarrassing slip ups like the one that allowed an armed fence jumper to break into the White House and storm into the east room. But picking up the pieces from Pierson's tenure could be harder than it sounds.

Let's bring in CNN White House correspondent, Michelle Kosinski. Good morning.

MICHELLE KOSINSKI, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: He has a big job ahead of him. Just a few months ago, we were going through this same kind of course with the VA. Remember the whistle blowers? In this case coming from inside the Secret Service.

Then there was a bipartisan outrage, the entrenched culture within the agency and now we have the resignation. Julie Pierson was appointed by the president to turn the Secret Service around. Now a year and a half later it's time to try again.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KOSINSKI (voice-over): While White House fence jumper, Omar Gonzalez, was pleading not guilty to federal crimes for storming the mansion armed with a knife.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Go back, everybody into the park.

KOSINSKI: It's not even clear if he's aware of the fallout he leaves behind. Julie Pierson now resigned as director of the Secret Service. Her answerless answers to an angry House committee this week only riled Congress even more.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is the president of the United States informed?

JULIA PIERSON, DIRECTOR, SECRET SERVICE: I would assume the president of the United States is informed. I don't know.

KOSINSKI: Details came from whistle blowers that she didn't even mention. Now we know one of those newly revealed incidents, a security guard with a gun in an elevator with the president two weeks ago in Atlanta. A situation that hadn't been cleared by Secret Service and violated protocol, the White House wasn't even told about it until just before it became unpleasantly public Tuesday.

JOSH EARNEST, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Director Pierson offered her resignation because she believed it was in the best interest of the agency to which she's dedicated her career.

KOSINSKI: Pierson called it painful to leave after three decades with the Secret Service. Now the interim director, Joseph Clancy is a long-timer who headed the presidential protection division and retired three yearso.

It's the culture within the agency that seems stubborn to change. One told us things like the alert system at the front door being turned off because White House ushers did like the occasional loud noise.

Points to what he calls a dangerous acquiescence at upper levels of the service. The desire to please the boss. He says few supervisors were willing to insist on things being tougher when they should have been and that infuriated officers below them. Leaving some now to turn whistle blowers finding willing ears in Congress.

REP. ELIJAH CUMMINGS, (D), MARYLAND: Agents in this agency said they were hesitant to raise security concerns with their supervisors. Ladies and gentlemen, something is awfully wrong with that picture.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOSINSKI: Other issues that are going to need to be addressed are staffing problems, low morale, and the need for more training. Again, this case highlights the power of the whistle-blower. But it just adds to the embarrassment because that was the way in which these problems all came to light -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Since Mr. Clancy is an insider, how likely is it that he'll get the job permanently?

KOSINSKI: Well, you know, that's a good question, because on the one hand you have a lot of people saying he really knows the agency. He knows the job. He was in charge of the presidential protection division before he retired in 2011.

We've been hearing accolades, like he's the right man, the perfect person for this position. At the same time, because he is a lifer in the secret service, if you want to put it that way, there are questions about how much he can really get into that culture.

So you can sort of see it from both ways. But he's definitely going to have to address these deep rooted problems and address them quickly -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Absolutely. Michelle Kosinski reporting live from the White House this morning.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, Dallas schools alert parents after learning five students came into contact with an Ebola patient.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: While an Ebola patient is being cared for at a Dallas hospital, some parents are scared to take their children to four city schools. Their fear sprung from a robo call. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CALLER: It has been confirmed that five students may have come in contact with an individual who's currently diagnosed with the Ebola virus.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: The school district says the five students are staying home and students at the schools those five attend are not in any imminent danger. As CNN's Gary Tuchman found out, the assurances from officials are not enough.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): We've learned this is where Thomas Eric Duncan was staying during his first trip to the United States, an apartment complex in North Dallas where authorities say the Liberian citizen may have had contact with five children.

Those five children says a Liberian community leader in Dallas, are the children of Duncan's girlfriend who Duncan was visiting. Stanley Gay says he has talked to Duncan's girlfriend.

STANLEY GAYE, LIBERIAN COMMUNITY ASSOCIATION OF DALLAS/FORT WORTH: They are home, doing well. The children as well are doing fine. Again, all she asks is for her prayers.

TUCHMAN: The five children go to four different schools in the neighborhood. The Sam Tasby Middle School is one of them. This woman heard at least one of those children who could have been exposed went to her son and daughter's school. She came early to pick her children up.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I just got scared because I thought that that kid came to the school and probably came in contact with him. I know it doesn't get contact by the air, but you never know.

TUCHMAN: All five of the children who may have had contact of the man diagnosed with Ebola are now staying out of school. Many of these parents were told those five children were in school on Monday and Tuesday. Marie Gallardo has a son and daughter in one of the four schools.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm scared. I'm worried for my son and my daughter and me.

TUCHMAN (on camera): More than 3,500 children are enrolled in these four schools, so there are a lot of concerned families. Nobody can offer any guarantees, but the school district has told parents the children are not in any imminent danger.

(voice-over): All four schools are being cleaned and sanitized over the next several days, but they will remain open. Students say they were given a piece of paper in school that explained the situation in English and Spanish.

(on camera): It says this morning we are made aware that a student in your school may have had contact with an individual who was recently diagnosed with the Ebola virus. Does that worry you? Were you scared?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, and I don't feel like going to school tomorrow.

TUCHMAN: I want to tell you and you mother you don't need to be scared. The person in your school doesn't have Ebola, they were just near someone who had it. So you don't have to worry, OK?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK.

TUCHMAN (voice-over): Daisy and Betsy are fourth graders who are twins.

(on camera): When you heard of the Ebola stuff, what did you think?

UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: We got scared.

TUCHMAN: You're twins and you talk at the same time. Are you OK now?

UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: Yes.

TUCHMAN: The students here didn't have Ebola, you know that, right?

UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: Yes.

TUCHMAN: Are you coming back to school tomorrow?

UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: Yes.

TUCHMAN (voice-over): Authorities say the schools will operate as normally as possible the rest of the week. Gary Tuchman, CNN, Dallas.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Still to come in the NEWSROOM, a trip to Sierra Leone resulted in an Ebola scare for one U.S. aid worker.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did you think about what it would be like if, in fact, you did test positive for Ebola?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It definitely went through my mind that I had come in contact with probably hundreds of people over the two weeks.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Eric Silverman talks to CNN about the night he was admitted to the New York City hospital and the days of anxiety that followed.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)