Oklahoma Has Ebola Plan In Place
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OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) - There are no cases of Ebola in Oklahoma but emergency response plans are in place in case a person is diagnosed with the deadly virus, state health officials said Monday.
State health and public safety officials joined Gov. Mary Fallin to discuss how the state would respond if someone in Oklahoma should be diagnosed with Ebola. A health care worker at a hospital in Dallas where an Ebola victim was treated before his death was diagnosed with the disease over the weekend.
"This is a new challenge for us. Ebola certainly has been a scare to our nation," Fallin said. "We're taking this very seriously."
Oklahoma's health commissioner, Dr. Terry Cline, said his agency has been working with hospitals and other health care providers to develop response plans for a variety of emergencies.
"It's very, very important that we know we have a well-oiled machine," Cline said.
The Oklahoma Department of Health issued its first informational alert about the Ebola virus to hospitals on July 29 — two months before a man who had arrived in the U.S. from Liberia was placed in isolation in Texas because of suspected Ebola. He died on Wednesday.
"We are working with the hospitals," Cline said. "At this time, there is no Ebola case in the state of Oklahoma. We hope that remains to be the case."
State health officials stressed that Liberia is one of the three West African countries most affected by the Ebola epidemic, which has killed more than 4,000 people, according to the World Health Organization. The others are Sierra Leone and Guinea.
Fallin said Ebola is not as contagious as more common viruses such as influenza. Ebola spreads through close contact with a sick person's bodily fluids, such as blood, sweat, vomit, feces, urine, saliva or semen.
(© Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
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