Atlanta's Emory University Hospital to receive patient infected with Ebola

The patient is expected to arrive ‘within the next several days’, the university said in a statement

Lauren Gambino 

The disease, which has no known cure, has reportedly killed at least 700 people during the current outbreak. Photograph: Frederick Murphy/CDC/PA

Emory University Hospital in Atlanta is set to receive a patient infected with the deadly Ebola disease currently sweeping through swaths of west Africa.

The patient is expected to arrive “within the next several days”, the university said in a statement. The exact date of arrival is not yet known. The university did not give the patient’s name.

“Emory University Hospital has a specially built isolation unit set up in collaboration with the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] to treat patients who are exposed to certain serious infectious diseases. It is physically separate from other patient areas and has unique equipment and infrastructure that provide an extraordinarily high level of clinical isolation,” the university said.

Reuters is reporting that the patient is one of the two American humanitarian aid workers infected with Ebola while responding to the outbreak in Liberia. Dr Kent Brantly of Texas and Nancy Writebol, a missionary from North Carolina, have both showed signs of improvement, but remain in serious condition.

The disease, which has no known cure, has reportedly killed at least 700 people during the current outbreak, in which there have been more than 1,000 confirmed, probable or suspected infections.

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/jul/31/atlanta-emory-university-hospital-ebola-patient