The latest on the Ebola crisis

With numerous stories about the worldwide Ebola outbreak affecting the U.S. and dozens of countries overseas, here's the most recent news about the disease:

Doctor tests positive for Ebola in NYC

A health care worker who recently had been to West Africa tested positive for the Ebola virus in New York City Thursday, CBS New York has confirmed.

The man, identified as Dr. Craig Spencer, 31, who worked with the aid group Doctors Without Borders, had quarantined himself after coming down with a fever and abdominal pains and was later transported to Bellevue Hospital, one of eight hospitals in New York State with specialized Ebola units.

The CDC confirmed it is sending a team to New York to deal with the case. The agency will conduct follow up tests to confirm the initial test results, the Associated Press reported.

Spencer, who works in emergency medicine at Columbia-Presbyterian Hospital, is believed to have treated Ebola patients in Guinea, the station reports.

Spencer called 911 after quarantining himself and was taken from his apartment in Upper Manhattan, WCBS reported. An EMS crew, wearing specialized suits, picked him up at around noon.

New York health officials will also be tracing the patient's contacts to determine if there is any additional risk, the hospital said.

Mali confirms first case of Ebola

Mali officials say the West African country has confirmed its first case of Ebola.

Health minister Ousmane Kone announced on state-run television that the patient was a 2-year-old girl who had come from neighboring Guinea. The child was brought to a hospital in the Malian town of Kayes on Wednesday, and her blood sample tested positive for the virus.

Mali becomes the sixth West African country to report an Ebola case - though nearly all the cases and deaths have occurred in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

Senegal and Nigeria had imported cases though both have now been declared Ebola-free.

New Orleans-area man being monitored for signs of Ebola

The Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals said a man who recently visited an Ebola-affected country is being monitored for symptoms of the disease, CBS News affiliate WWL reports. "The individual is at low risk for Ebola, but we are monitoring him...out of an abundance of caution,"said spokesperson Olivia Watkins.

She said the Centers for Disease Control alerted state health officials to the individual's return. Watkins said she could not provide specific details on his travels because of privacy laws, but did say his last day of monitoring is Nov. 5.

Family: Doctors don't detect Ebola in nurse's body

Doctors no longer detect Ebola in a Texas nurse who flew to Ohio and back before she was diagnosed with the virus, her family said Wednesday.

Officials at Emory University Hospital and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention couldn't detect Ebola in Amber Vinson as of Tuesday evening, her family said in a statement released through a media consultant. Doctors usually do two tests a day apart before saying they can't detect the virus. It's unclear how many tests Vinson has had.

Vinson's mother, Debra Berry, spoke to her Wednesday, and Vinson has been approved for transfer from isolation, the statement said.

Patients avoiding Dallas hospital where virus hit

The Dallas hospital where a man diagnosed with Ebola died and two nurses were infected with the virus has seen patients flee the hospital, with a more than 50 percent decline in visits to its emergency room since the crisis began.

Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas said in financial statements Wednesday that its revenue fell 25 percent in the first 20 days of October, a period that began shortly after Thomas Eric Duncan was admitted into the hospital with Ebola.

Visits to its emergency room were down 53 percent during that time, and its daily patient census fell 21 percent. Operating-room surgeries were also down 25 percent.

Poll: Many doubt hospitals can handle Ebola

Nearly a quarter of Americans are very confident the U.S. health care system could prevent Ebola from spreading widely, and 40 percent are moderately confident, according to an Associated Press-GfK poll.

But nearly half don't think their local hospital could safely treat an Ebola case, and 31 percent are only moderately confident that it could.

After all, Duncan at first was mistakenly sent home by a Dallas emergency room, only to return far sicker a few days later. Then, two nurses caring for him somehow became infected.

Asked how the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention handled those cases, 42 percent of people disapprove and 22 percent approve.

More travelers being watched for symptoms

As many as 10 people in the Seattle area and Connecticut, many of whom arrived recently from West Africa, are the latest in the United States being watched for Ebola symptoms.

The Seattle Times reports, and CBS Seattle affiliate KIRO-TV confirms, that a nurse in the Seattle area is being monitored and is voluntarily restricting her movements to minimize any possible risk to others.

In West Haven, Connecticut, health officials have quarantined a family of six, all of whose members arrived in the U.S. on Oct. 18 from one of the Ebola-affected countries in West Africa, Mayor Edward M. O'Brien's office says.

The New York Times quotes a spokesman for Connecticut's Public Health Department, William Gerrish, as saying three Yale University students are also being monitored and have been told to stay home.

Dozens threaten to break quarantine over food

Dozens of people quarantined for Ebola monitoring in western Liberia are threatening to break out of isolation because they have no food, the West African nation's state radio reported Thursday.

Forty-three people were put in quarantine after four people died of Ebola in Jenewonda, a town in an impoverished corner of Grand Cape Mount County near the Sierra Leone border, the Liberia Broadcasting System said.

It quoted those quarantined as saying that the U.N. World Food Program apparently has stopped providing food to people affected by Ebola in the area. But a World Food Program spokesman said they hadn't been distributing food there.

The WFP logistics unit is delivering food to that community Thursday, spokesman Alexis Masciarelli said in an email to The Associated Press.

After alarm, Lebanese man tests negative for Ebola

A Lebanese man who arrived in Beirut from West Africa believing he may have Ebola was reassured by doctors that he is disease free but was still taken into a hospital quarantine on Thursday as a practice run to check the country's preparedness, a health official said.

The case initially raised concerns because it was announced by the health minister, Wael Abu Faour, who said earlier in the day that Lebanon had quarantined a man suspected of having Ebola. The announcement came after days of warnings by the government that the country was at a high risk of exposure to the disease.

It had also raised concerns because the man arrived from an unspecified West African country three days ago, and reported himself to hospital with what he thought were symptoms of Ebola.

But an initial interview with the man showed that he was unlikely to have contracted Ebola, said physician Pierre Abi Hanna, specialist in infectious diseases at the Rafik Hariri hospital.

Spain survivor: Why did they kill my dog?

The husband of the Spanish nursing assistant who beat Ebola says his wife now knows that authorities killed their dog Excalibur while she was in the hospital and is questioning that decision.

In an interview published Thursday by the Spanish newspaper El Pais, Javier Limon says he finally told Teresa Romero after she tested negative for Ebola this week that their mixed breed dog was euthanized two days after her Oct. 6 hospitalization.

Limon said "she is asking herself why they killed the dog, who wasn't to blame for anything."

Rwanda cancels screenings for U.S., Spain

Rwanda's minister of health is reversing a decision she made to require visitors who had been in the U.S. or Spain during the previous 22 days to report their medical condition to Rwandan authorities daily.

Dr. Agnes Binagwaho said on Twitter late Wednesday that the decision to screen travelers from the U.S. and Spain was solely her decision and not the government's. She apologized for any inconvenience.

A posting on President Paul Kagame's Twitter account said the measures instituted by Binagwaho weren't necessary and that his health minister sometimes acts first and thinks later.

North Korea steps up effort to prevent Ebola entry

North Korea has stepped up measures to prevent the spread of the Ebola virus into the reclusive country, state media reported Thursday, while a travel agent that specializes in North Korean tours said it has been informed that Pyongyang may ban foreign tourists from visiting.

Koryo Tours posted an announcement on its Twitter and Facebook accounts saying it has been told that no foreign tourists would be allowed into North Korea beginning Friday. It said it was not clear how long the ban would last and did not provide further details. Officials in Pyongyang had no immediate comment.

A Koryo company official said the measures did not appear to be a blanket ban on travel to North Korea, adding that business and government visits would be allowed to continue. He said Koryo Tours was also hoping to go ahead with a tour scheduled to begin on Saturday.

"The situation seems to still be in flux, and while the early news from our partners in Pyongyang was that all tourists would be barred from entering (North Korea) we are still hopeful of taking in three groups we have scheduled to travel for the rest of 2014," said Nick Bonner, the company's co-founder.

North Korea also closed its borders in 2003 during the scare over SARS.