The
nurse forcibly quarantined in New Jersey after she came home from
treating Ebola patients in West Africa was released from the hospital
Monday. Kaci Hickox has been held against her will in a tent inside a
wing of a New Jersey medical center since she was taken off a flight,
flushed and distraught, Friday.
Hickox has hired a lawyer and spoken out publicly against her quarantine.
“Since testing negative
for Ebola on early Saturday morning, the patient being monitored in
isolation at University Hospital in Newark has thankfully been symptom
free for the last 24 hours,” New Jersey health department officials said
in a statement. “As a result, and after being evaluated in coordination
with the CDC and the treating clinicians at University Hospital, the
patient is being discharged.”
The case quickly escalated over the weekend, with Hickox protesting from her confinement and scientists including Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, saying there was no medical basis to hold her. The White House
even weighed in, pressing New York and New Jersey to reverse their
decisions to quarantine all returning medical workers who have treated
Ebola patients.
Hickox will be allowed
to take private transport home to Maine. “Since the patient had direct
exposure to individuals suffering from the Ebola Virus in one of the
three West African nations, she is subject to a mandatory New Jersey
quarantine order," the statement read.
“Health officials in
Maine have been notified of her arrangements and will make a
determination under their own laws on her treatment when she arrives.”
State and federal
officials have been under enormous pressure from the public to do
something to protect people from Ebola ever since Thomas Eric Duncan was diagnosed with the virus in Dallas and died earlier this month.
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