Dr. Ali Khan, left, Dean of the College of Public Health at the Nebraska Medical Center speaks during a news conference in Omaha, Neb., Friday, Oct. 3, 2014, to discuss Ebola patient, journalist Ashoka Mukpo, who is expected to arrive from Liberia at the Medical Center on Monday. AP/The Omaha World-Herald/Ryan Soderlin
WASHINGTON – Doctors in Nebraska are set for the Monday arrival of Ashoka Mukpo, an NBC television cameraman who contracted Ebola in Liberia, the hospital where he will be treated said.
The Nebraska Medical Center on Sunday tweeted “Patient to arrive tomorrow,” without specifying an exact time.
Earlier, the hospital had announced on Twitter that it had “received a call from the US State Department letting us know that we will be receiving a second Ebola patient. Possibly on Monday morning. Our 40+ member team with the Biocontainment Unit is ready.”
The hospital has already treated Rick Sacra, a doctor who overcame the virus and was given the experimental drug TKM-Ebola.
Mukpo, 33, is the fourth American to contract Ebola in Liberia and had worked on humanitarian projects in Liberia for several years.
The Nebraska hospital is among just a handful able to handle Ebola patients at this time.
By far the most deadly Ebola outbreak on record, the disease has spread to five West African countries since the start of the year, infecting more than 7,000 people and killing about half of them.
The virus, spread through bodily fluids, can only be transmitted when a patient is experiencing symptoms –severe fever, vomiting, diarrhea and in some cases massive internal hemorrhaging and external bleeding.
The alarming rate at which the contagion is spreading has triggered international action to help battle the outbreak.
On Friday, the US military announced that it expects to ramp up the number of troops deployed to Liberia to 4,000 from a planned 3,000-strong force to help fight the outbreak.