Vomiting Woman At Pentagon Sparks Ebola Alert
The Department of Defense incident comes as Mexican authorities refuse to let a US cruise ship dock amid a passenger ebola scare.
Pentagon force protection officers imposed infectious disease protocols
By Sky News US Team
The Pentagon shut down a building entrance and part of a car park after a woman was sick and told police she was in Liberia two weeks ago.
Hazmat-suited crews from Arlington, Virginia, descended on the scene as the woman was taken to hospital as a possible ebola case.
She began vomiting after she got off a shuttle bus that was taking guests to a high-level Marine Corps ceremony.
The other passengers were released and advised to take their temperatures twice daily for the next 21 days, which is ebola's incubation period.
Pentagon spokesman Lt Col Tom Crosson said all pedestrian and vehicle traffic was stopped in the vast car park, out of an abundance of caution.
Department of Defense force protection officers imposed infectious disease protocols.
The scare underlines the heightened state of alert in the US over the haemorrhagic fever, which has now killed more than 4,500 people in West Africa.
The Obama administration has been scrambling to contain ebola since two Dallas nurses caught it after treating the first patient diagnosed with the virus in the US
The White House on Friday picked Ron Klain, a lawyer and former vice-presidential chief of staff, to be its ebola czar.
Meanwhile, a US cruise ship could not get permission to dock in Cozumel, Mexico, because it has a passenger under quarantine in another ebola scare.
A day earlier, Belize refused to allow US officials to evacuate the woman - who is isolated in a cabin with her husband - from the Carnival Magic via a coastal airport.
The Obama administration said the unidentified lab supervisor had handled specimens 19 days ago from a Liberian man who died of the disease in Dallas.
The Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital worker did not have direct contact with Thomas Eric Duncan and was showing no symptoms of ebola, said the State Department.
Carnival Cruise Lines, which operates the vessel, said it was due to return to its home port of Galveston, Texas, on Sunday morning as originally scheduled.
The woman joined the cruise from Galveston last Sunday, before federal health officials updated requirements for active monitoring of anyone exposed to the virus.
She has been self-monitoring with daily temperature checks since 6 October, before she boarded the vessel.
But she has not reported a fever or illness, said the State Department.
US health officials meanwhile expanded their search for people who may have been exposed to Amber Vinson - one of the nurses who caught ebola after treating the Liberian man.
The Centers for Disease Control is now looking for passengers on a flight the 29-year-old made to Cleveland, Ohio, in addition to those on her Monday return trip to Texas.
The other nurse, Nina Pham, 26, was in a fair and stable condition at a federal facility in Maryland, US health officials said on Friday.
Nina Pham Ebola Nurse Speaks From Hospital Bed Texas Health Dallas (VIDEO)
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