Ebola Virus Infections and Deaths: Plane Evacuated in Madrid Over Suspected Ebola case
A new suspected case of Ebola has sprouted in Spain, when a passenger was taken off of an Air France plane Thursday.
Reuters reported the plane was evacuated by authorities in Madrid when a passenger began shaking.
The plane, which arrived from Lagos via Paris, will be disinfected, and the return trip of the flight was canceled.
The passenger was taken to Madrid's Carlos III Hospital in an ambulance, which based on televised images was flanked by a police motorcade, Reuters reported.
The driver of the ambulance was wearing full protective suit and goggles, as were the officials and emergency personnel who had surrounded the plane parked on the tarmac.
"There were police cars, there was an ambulance .. there was also the fire brigade and people in white suits," passenger Bronween Bashford, who had been waiting to board the plane in Madrid, told Reuters. "There was a lot of activity out on the tarmac."
The hospital where the passenger, whose identity is unknown, was taken is the same one where the most recent Ebola case, a nurse, is currently being held in stable condition.
Teresa Romero, the nurse, was diagnosed with the virus last week, and remains seriously ill, after caring for two infected priests - who were repatriated from West Africa and later died.
At least 15 others, including Romero's husband, are under observation for the virus.
The Spanish government has increased its vigilance and response to reports of Ebola since the first case of the priest - which was also the first case to be treated on the European continent.
Health officials have been training workers and promised an increase in training in the event of a mass outbreak.
But that hasn't stopped criticism of Spain's hospitals, and questions over if they are prepared for a crisis on a large scale, as well as calls for the resignation of Health Minister Ana Mato, Reuters reported.
Almost 4,500 people have died from the virus, most of them in the affected West African nations of Senegal, Nigeria, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.
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