Africa

THE GUARDIAN                              Oct. 18, 2014

WASHINGTON- President Barack Obama on Saturday urged Americans not to succumb to hysteria about Ebola, even as he warned that addressing the deadly virus would require citizens, government leaders and the media to all pitch in.

in his weekly address, Obama also pushed back against calls for the US to institute a travel ban. Lawmakers have called it a commonsense step to prevent more people with Ebola from entering the US, but Obama said such a ban would only hamper aid efforts and screening measures.

“Trying to seal off an entire region of the world – if that were even possible – could actually make the situation worse,” the president said.

Growing US concern about Ebola and the three cases diagnosed so far in Dallas prompted Obama on Friday to tap a former top White House adviser to be his point person on Ebola. Striking a careful balance, Obama said there was no “outbreak” or “epidemic” of Ebola in the US, but said even one case was too many.

“This is a serious disease, but we can’t give in to hysteria or fear – because that only makes it harder to get people the accurate information they need,” Obama said. “We have to be guided by the science.”

WASHINGTON — President Obama on Friday appointed Ron Klain, a former chief of staff for Vice Presidents Al Gore and Joseph R. Biden Jr., as Ebola “czar” to manage the government’s response to the deadly virus as anxiety grew over its possible spread, according to a White House official.

Ron Klain, a former chief of staff for Vice Presidents Al Gore and Joseph R. Biden Jr., in 2008. Credit Andrew H. Walker/Getty Images

NPR                           Oct. 16, 2014

WASHINGTON --A top government health official confirms that Nina Pham, the 26-year-old nurse who became infected with Ebola after treating a patient with the disease at a Dallas hospital, will be transferred to a high-level containment facility at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institutes of Health National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, said in testimony before a House committee that Pham will be admitted to the NIH tonight.

There she will will be given "state of the art care" in a high-level containment facility, he says.

Officials have said Pham's condition is good. Another nurse, Amber Vinson, who also cared for index patient Thomas Eric Duncan has also contracted the disease. Duncan died from the disease last week.

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http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/10/16/356594638/house-panel-hearing-to-examine-public-health-response-to-ebola-outbreak

NEW YORK TIMES                            OCT. 15, 2014
By MICHAEL D. SHEAR                              

President Obamaon Wednesday directed his aides to monitor the spread of Ebola in the United States “in a much more aggressive way,” but said the American people should remain confident in the government’s ability to prevent a widespread outbreak of the deadly disease.

After a two-hour meeting of cabinet-level officials who are in charge of the government’s response to the virus, Mr. Obama promised that a review of the recent Ebola cases in Dallas would determine what went wrong that allowed two nurses to be infected.

With a video link to Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, the head of the Centers for Disease Control, the president said he had ordered health officials to determine, “How we are going to make sure that something like this isn’t repeated.”