American Ebola Survivor Dr. Rick Sacra Returning to Africa
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iStock/Thinkstock(NEW YORK) — An American doctor who survived Ebola last fall announced Monday that he is returning to the heart of the worst Ebola outbreak in history: West Africa.
Dr. Rick Sacra, a family doctor from Massachusetts who contracted Ebola while treating patients in Liberia in September, announced that he is returning to Liberia later this week.
Dr. Sacra was discharged from Nebraska Medical Center Ebola-free on Sept. 26. He was later re-admitted with an upper respiratory infection and said he also had a complication called uveitis, or swelling of the eye. But he said he’s “95 percent” better.
Dr. Sacra is set to depart on Jan. 15, and will work at the ELWA hospital with the aid group SIM USA.
“I guess I’m less nervous about this trip because I know what I’m getting into a little more,” Dr. Sacra said at a news conference Monday morning at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. “The thing I was afraid of last time, I’ve had it, and I’m through it. Thank God.”
“Doctors say I’m immune, but I don’t plan to test that,” Dr. Sacra added.
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