Ebola case confirmed in Glasgow hospital

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A healthcare worker who has just returned from West Africa has been diagnosed with Ebola and is being treated in hospital in Glasgow.



The woman, who arrived from Sierra Leone on Sunday night, is in isolation at Glasgow's Gartnavel Hospital.

All possible contacts with the case are being investigated, including on flights to Scotland via Heathrow.

The woman will be transferred to specialist high level isolation in London as soon as possible.

At a news conference in Glasgow, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon stressed that the risk to the general public was very low.

She added that the patient was thought to have had contact with only one other person since arriving in the city, but that all passengers on the flights the woman took will be traced.

Alisdair MacConachie, of NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, said the woman was "not showing any great clinical concern".

NHS Scotland said infectious diseases procedures had been put into effect at the Brownlee Unit for Infectious Diseases at Gartnavel.

The patient returned to Scotland from Sierra Leone late on Sunday via Casablanca and London Heathrow, arriving into Glasgow Airport on a British Airways flight at about 23:30.

While public health experts have emphasised that the risks are negligible, a telephone helpline has been set up for anyone who was on the BA 1478 Heathrow to Glasgow flight. The number is: 08000 858531

The patient was admitted to hospital early in the morning after feeling unwell and was placed into isolation at 07.50.

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Ebola nurse 'should not have left Heathrow', says chief medical officer

A nurse being treated for Ebola after returning from West Africa should not have been allowed to leave Heathrow airport after displaying symptoms of the disease, health officials have admitted.

Pauline Cafferkey complained of a temperature after leaving a screening area and was retested, but allowed to fly onwards to Glasgow.

Officials are still trying to trace more than 100 passengers on two flights taken by Miss Cafferkey - from Casablanca to Heathrow and then Heathrow to Glasgow. They include some of the people sat in the closest seats to the nurse, who is being treated by experts at the Royal Free Hospital in London.

The nurse was tested in total seven times after landed at Heathrow airport within the space of two hours - once as part of a routine screening, and six more times after complaining of a high temperature around an hour later.

She was allowed to fly after no unusual temperature was detected, Professor Paul Cosford, Director for Health Protection and Medical Director of PHE, told a press conference in London.

Prof Dame Sally Davies, the Chief Medical Officer, said there were questions over whether officials should have been “more precautionary” before allowing her to leave the airport.

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Ebola victim Pauline Cafferkey's colleague criticises 'shambolic' screening

A medical collague of Pauline Cafferkey, who is being treated for Ebola, claims screening procedures at Heathrow were "shambolic" and "chaotic" on the their arrival at the airport.

Dr Martin Deahl, 58, from Newport, Shropshire, also said he was surprised the returning team were allowed to go home on public transport after landing in London on Sunday night.

Mr Deahl had been sitting next to Miss Cafferkey, 39, on their return to the UK after a month treating Ebola patients in Sierra Leone.

Miss Cafferkey is being treated for the deadly virus at a specialist centre in north London having been transferred from a hospital in Glasgow.

Dr Deahl said: "Pauline seemed fine, fit and healthy [on the flight]. When we arrived into Heathrow Airport at 5pm Sunday night I can only describe the situation as chaotic.

"I had a slightly high temperature of 37.5C and was put in an isolation room but my temperature went down. It was slightly raised because I had a thick coat on.

"The precautions and checks at the airport were shambolic. They ran out of testing kits and didn't seem to know what they were doing."

He added: "The bigger story is the advice coming from Public Health England. We were classed as being a level three risk which is a high risk.

"The advice was that we should not take public transport to travel anywhere more than an hour away yet we all did after arriving into Heathrow Airport.

"We were then all told to go home and many of us did on public transport. I took a taxi back to Shropshire but some took flights to Scotland while others went on cramped tube trains."

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Doctors sent home nurse with ebola FOUR days before she was put back into isolation unit



Doctors treating British nurse Pauline Cafferkey 'missed a big opportunity' to spot she had fallen ill with Ebola for a second time after dismissing her symptoms as a virus, her family claim.

Toni Cafferkey said it was 'absolutely diabolical' the way her sister, who originally contracted Ebola while volunteering in Sierra Leone last year, had been treated since falling ill again with the potentially-fatal disease.

Pauline, 39, was admitted to an isolation unit at the Royal Free Hospital in London on Thursday night – four days after being sent home by doctors who diagnosed her with a virus.

Her sister today revealed that Pauline had gone to an out-of-hours GP clinic at Victoria Hospital in Glasgow on Monday night but the doctor who assessed her diagnosed a virus and sent her home.

She said Pauline spent all of Tuesday 'very ill' before taking herself to the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow, where she was admitted for tests before being flown by RAF to the Royal Free on Thursday.

Toni said the Cafferkey family now feel 'let down' by the treatment, fearing the early dismissal of her sister's symptoms may have a long-term effect.

She told the Sunday Mail: 'At that point me and my family believe they missed a big opportunity to give the right diagnosis and we feel she was let down. Instead of being taken into hospital, she spent the whole of Tuesday very ill.

'I think it is absolutely diabolical the way she has been treated. We don't know if the delays diagnosing Pauline have had an adverse effect on her health, but we intend to find out. It has not been good enough.

'We think there have been major failings and we just want her to pull through. This kind of recurrence seems to be rare but we don't yet know enough about it.'

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde confirmed that Pauline attended the New Victoria Hospital GP out-of-hours service on Monday.

A spokesman said: 'Her management and the clinical decisions taken based on the symptoms she was displaying at the time were entirely appropriate.

'All appropriate infection control procedures were carried out as part of this episode of care.'