It’s ‘Not Impossible’ Others in US Could Contract Ebola, CDC Head Says

This undated photograph shows a CDC scientist pipetting specimens in the Biosafety Level 4 Influenza Laboratory, Atlanta, GA. (James Gathany/CDC)(ATLANTA) — The country’s top medical official who has vowed to stop Ebola “in its tracks” in the U.S., conceded Wednesday that it’s “not impossible” that others will contract the disease.

Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said an extensive tracking process is underway in the wake of the first Ebola diagnosis in the United States, with special focus on the patient’s family and health staff.

“We have a seven-person team in Dallas working with the local health department and the hospital, and we will be identifying everyone who may have come in contact with him and then monitoring them for 21 days,” Frieden said.

Frieden believes the disease will be “stopped in its tracks” in this country.

The unidentified man’s safety, along with the well-being of the medical people treating him, is a primary focus, Frieden said. Since his diagnosis, the patient’s condition was listed as critical. On Wednesday, the hospital upgraded his condition to serious.

“What we need to do first in this particular instance is do everything possible to help this individual who’s really fighting for their life, and then make sure that we’re doing that, that we don’t have other people exposed in the hospital, identify all those contacts and monitor them for 21 days. It’s not impossible that one or two of them would develop symptoms and then they would need to be isolated,” he said.

Frieden said he’s confident that passengers who flew on the same plane as the patient did not contract the disease.

“That was four or five days before he had his first symptoms and with Ebola, you’re not contagious until you have symptoms,” he said.

Although American Ebola patients have been treated in the United States prior to this diagnosis, they all contracted Ebola in West Africa. Ebola has killed 2,917 people and infected 3,346 others since the outbreak began in March.

Follow @ABCNewsRadio
Copyright 2014 ABC News Radio