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Chris Christie: Ebola Nurse Can Leave Newark Tent & Return Home For Quarantine
By
Jen Chung
Published Oct 27, 2014
Modified Oct 27, 2014
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Norman Siegel's office
By
Jen Chung
Published Oct 27, 2014
Modified Oct 27, 2014
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After mounting outrage over her treatment, the nurse who was placed into quarantine in a makeshift tent after returning from Sierra Leone is now allowed to leave Newark, NJ and return home to Maine. NJ Governor Chris Christie said that this depends on whether the CDC approves her departure, telling reporters, "I’m hopeful that this morning if all goes well we’ll be able to release her and send her back to Maine."
Hickox, working with Doctors Without Borders, had been treating Ebola patients in the West African country. While Christie described her on Saturday as "obviously ill," Hickox countered that with a first-person account published in the Dallas Morning News. She flew into the United States through Newark Airport on Friday and then went through the gauntlet:
Two other officials asked about my work in Sierra Leone. One of them was from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. They scribbled notes in the margins of their form, a form that appeared to be inadequate for the many details they are collecting.
I was tired, hungry and confused, but I tried to remain calm. My temperature was taken using a forehead scanner and it read a temperature of 98. I was feeling physically healthy but emotionally exhausted.
Three hours passed. No one seemed to be in charge. No one would tell me what was going on or what would happen to me.
I called my family to let them know that I was OK. I was hungry and thirsty and asked for something to eat and drink. I was given a granola bar and some water. I wondered what I had done wrong.
Four hours after I landed at the airport, an official approached me with a forehead scanner.
My cheeks were flushed, I was upset at being held with no explanation. The scanner recorded my temperature as 101.
The female officer looked smug. “You have a fever now,” she said.
I explained that an oral thermometer would be more accurate and that the forehead scanner was recording an elevated temperature because I was flushed and upset.
Hickox, 33, spoke out again yesterday, sharing photographs of her living quarters in the tent, "This is an extreme that is really unacceptable, and I feel like my basic human rights have been violated. To put me through this emotional and physical stress is completely unacceptable"
While Christie said over the weekend, "I'm sorry if in any way she was inconvenienced, but inconvenience that could occur from having folks that are symptomatic and ill out amongst the public is a much, much greater concern of mine. I hope she recovers quickly," Hickox wasn't having it. She said, "For him—a politician who's trusted and respected—to make a statement [that she was 'obviously ill'] that's categorically not true is just unacceptable and appalling."
Hickox has been committed to working in third world nations: "She eventually worked for Doctors Without Borders in Myanmar for two years. She managed three rural clinics that served about 100,000 people near the border of Bangladesh, the group said in an online post about her time there. She later worked for them in Sudan and Nigeria."
Christie shared, via Twitter, the NJ State Department of Health's statements, "Since testing negative for Ebola early Saturday morning, the patient being monitored in isolation has thankfully been symptom free for the last 24 hrs. After being evaluated by CDC & her clinicians the patient is being discharged... After consulting with her, she has requested transport to Maine... that transport will be arranged via a private carrier not via mass transit or commercial aircraft." The NJ health department added, "While in isolation, every effort was made to insure that she remained comfortable with access to a computer, cell phone, reading material and nourishment of choice."
One of Hickox's attorneys, Steven Hyman, told the NY Times, "It appears that they’re intending to release her but I have not yet been able to confirm it. I’m waiting to hear back from the attorney general. At this point, she is being subject to political machinations. My understanding is that the medical people is fine and should be released. Now it’s just the political ramifications... Her life is in the hands of Governor Christie."
Tagged
ebola
ebola tent
governor christie
kaci hickox
quarantine
Jen Chung
Jen Chung is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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