14 DAY TRIAL // This past October 23, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio hosted a press conference and announced that a 33-year-old man currently kept in isolation at the Bellevue Hospital Center had tested positive for Ebola.
It is understood that this latest Ebola patient in the US is a doctor and that he contracted the deadly virus while looking after Ebola patients in Guinea. The man visited this country as part of a Doctors Without Borders program.
The details of this latest Ebola case in the US
Speaking at the press conference hosted by Mayor Bill de Blasio, Dr. Mary Travis Bassett, New York City public health commissioner, explained that the 33-year-old man had completed his work in Guinea less than two weeks before, on October 12.
He left West Africa a couple of days later, on October 14, and finally landed at the JFK International Airport in New York City on October 17. At that time, he was not showing any Ebola symptoms.
Information shared with the public says the man started feeling ill this past Thursday. More precisely, it was sometime between 10 a.m. and 11 a.m. that he became feverish. He was immediately rushed to the Bellevue Hospital and put in insolation.
Specialists say that the only people who had close contact with the unidentified 33-year-old man before he was admitted were his fiancée, two of his friends, and a cab driver. These people are now being closely monitored.
What's more, Live Science tells us that, shortly after this man was diagnosed, The Gutter bowling alley in Williamsburg that he visited before he started feeling ill was closed as a precaution.
Nothing to worry about, Mayor de Blasio says
Addressing the people who attended yesterday's press conference, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio stressed that there was no need for people to worry. He pointed out that the Ebola virus did not spread all that easily and that the city was well equipped to handle the situation.
“We want to state at the outset – there is no reason for New Yorkers to be alarmed. Ebola is an extremely hard disease to contract. It is transmitted only through contact with an infected person’s blood or other bodily fluids – not through casual contact,” he said.
Furthermore, “New Yorkers who have not been exposed to an infected person’s bodily fluids are not at all at risk. And we want to emphasize that New York City has the world’s strongest public health system, the world’s leading medical experts, and the world’s most advanced medical equipment.”
In an attempt to prevent the spread of the virus, medical experts are now busy tracking down the people who might have come into contact with the 33-year-old man before he was hospitalized. Should any of these individuals be found to be at risk, health officials are ready to quarantine them.