CLEVELAND, Ohio – Hospitals around Ohio are advising residents to tell doctors on their next visit if they’ve traveled to West Africa, where the Ebola virus is believed to have killed thousands.
EXTRA: Learn more about Ebola
Hospitals in Ohio and around the country have been outlining plans as officials in Dallas deal with the first Ebola patient diagnosed in the U.S. The man recently traveled from Liberia to Dallas.
The Cleveland Clinic says the risk of having an Ebola patient in northeast Ohio is very low. But it says it has a plan in place that includes a thorough review of travel history.
One rural hospital in the western Ohio city of Coldwater has signs at main entrances telling patients they should tell staff members if they’ve traveled to West Africa recently.
Officials at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas say the man diagnosed with Ebola was sent home the first time he went to the hospital because information that he had just come from Africa was not widely shared. Now health officials are trying to track down anyone who came in contact with him, including the ambulance crew that took him to the hospital and a handful of school children.
Britain and Sierra Leone are appealing for more help to slow the biggest ever Ebola outbreak — and are expected to announce at a London conference today plans to build up to 1,000 makeshift Ebola clinics in Sierra Leone.
World Health Organization spokeswoman Dr. Margaret Harris said “If we don’t do anything, we’ll just be watching people die.”
Sierra Leone is one of the hardest-hit countries in West Africa’s Ebola outbreak, which has killed more than 3,300 people.