In a series that has had little in the way of good news over the past several weeks, there actually was something related to Ebola to be grateful for this week.
On Tuesday, Dr. Bruce Ribner of Emory University Hospital announced that nurse Amber Vinson was declared Ebola free and could now return home. CNN reports that Vinson was a part of a press conference where the announcement was made. In it she thanked God for her health and was, "grateful to be well."
Vinson was originally diagnosed and hospitalized on Oct. 15. Her contraction of the disease was concurrent with the first nurse to contract Ebola, Nina Pham. Pham was treated at a National Institutes of Health facility in Maryland and was declared free from the disease on Friday.
Vinson and Pham fell ill after treating Thomas Eric Duncan, the first U.S. citizen to be diagnosed with the virus after entering the country from West Africa.
Many feared that this disease was spreading faster in the U.S., especially after a five-year-old boy was admitted to New York's Bellevue Hospital with symptoms similar to Ebola. These symptoms included a 103-degree fever. Thankfully the fears were unfounded, as reported by Global Grind and the tests for the disease came back negative.
The boy, who has not been identified by name, will remain under monitoring to ensure that further symptoms do not surface. He will also be undergoing a number of follow-up tests, including respiratory virus testing.
With these two confirmed to be out of the woods for the disease, that leaves only one individual in the U.S. who still has the disease: Dr. Craig Spencer in New York. Daily Mail reports that Dr. Spencer remains in critical condition, but has showed signs of labored improvement as he continues to fight the Ebola he was diagnosed with on Oct. 23.
Dr. Ram Raju, president of New York health and hospitals corporation, said, "The patient looks better than he looked yesterday, but he remains in serious but stable conditions with the expected symptoms of the virus."
Despite these cases, the CDC and World Health Organization insist that the U.S. is still better equipped to handle the disease than West Africa, where much of the 4,900 fatalities of the virus have taken place. Thus far, only one individual has contracted the disease has died from it in the U.S., a statistic that supports this claim.
