Lawrence Togbah, left, Moses Bryant, center, and Abraham Saye try to protect themselves from Ebola by covering their hands, feet and torso with plastic bags. They did not have proper protective gear like gloves or masks. (Michel du Cille/The Washington Post)

The WASHINGTON POST      OCT. 1, 2014

By Lenny Bernstein

MONROVIA, Liberia — I was goofing around with a small group of young children outside their home on a muddy, cratered road in the New Kru Town slum here. I made a scary face and the kids skittered, giggling, behind a low wall at the front of their shanty. Then they peeked out, hoping for more.

Finally the boldest of the lot, a little girl perhaps 5 years old, approached and stuck out her hand. “Shake!” she offered excitedly.

“No touching,” I responded, keeping my hands at my sides, trying to hide my sadness. “No touching.”

You don’t touch anyone in Liberia. Not kids, not adults, not other Westerners, not the colleagues you arrived with. It is the rule of rules, because while everyone able is taking precautions, you just can’t be sure where the invisible, lethal Ebola virus might be. Once the virus is on your fingers, it would be frighteningly easy to rub an eye and infect yourself.

A patient was diagnosed with Ebola on Sept. 30 at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas.(Photo: Mike Stone, Getty Images)

THE WASHINGTON POST

By Mark Berman October 1 at 3:15 PM

The man in Texas who tested positive for Ebola told hospital officials he had traveled from West Africa when he sought treatment on Friday, but that information was not relayed to everyone treating him at that time, authorities said Wednesday.

As a result, the man was diagnosed with a “low-grade, common viral disease” and sent home that day, said Mark C. Lester, executive vice president of the health-care system that includes Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital, the Dallas facility treating the Ebola patient.

“Regretfully, that information was not fully communicated throughout the full team,” Lester said during a news conference Wednesday. “As a result, the full import of that information wasn’t factored into the clinical decision-making.”

Updated with link to CDC statement (below)

The WASHINGTON post September 30 at 5:29 PM

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has confirmed the first case of Ebola that's been diagnosed in the United States.

The Texas Department of Health Services said in a statement that the patient is at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas. The patient -- "an adult with a recent history of travel to West Africa" -- was admitted into an isolation unit at the hospital Sunday after developing Ebola-like symptoms "days after returning to Texas from West Africa."

The test, the Texas health department said, was conducted at the state public health laboratory in Austin and later confirmed by the CDC.

The state health lab got the ability to test for Ebola only last month, according to Carrie Williams, a spokeswoman with the Texas Department of State Health Services.

Link to full story

Thomson Reuters Foundation

By Stella Dawson

Mon Sep 29, 2014 

WASHINGTON - The rainy season in West Africa is compounding difficulties in getting supplies delivered and new treatment centers built as donors rush to isolate people infected with the deadly Ebola virus and stop its rapid spread, U.S. officials said.

Nancy Powell, newly appointed as the U.S. State Department's envoy to coordinate its Ebola response, said the top priority is to isolate as many people as quickly as possible. But that faces significant logistical hurdles.

"Infrastructure challenges in the rainy season is one of the biggest difficulties. And you add the rain and getting materials out of the capital and it is very difficult," Powell said in a news briefing last week.

The July to September rainy season is coming toward its end, but October is known for heavy thunderstorms that can drench the region and turn roads to mud.

Eric Talbert, executive director of Emergency USA which has opened a 22-bed Ebola treatment center in Goderich, outside the capital of Freetown in Sierra Leone, said the downpours complicate getting supplies along unpaved single track roads that are washed out by the heavy rains..