VIDEO: Nurse who treated Ebola patient self-quarantines family

Published 4:30 pm Thursday, October 16, 2014

Two Texas school campuses will be closed for cleaning on Friday after a nurse who treated a person with the Ebola virus voluntarily quarantined herself and her children, despite showing no symptoms of the disease.

Ruth Cherry Intermediate and Davis Elementary, both part of the Royse City Independent School District about 30 miles northeast of Dallas, will undergo “deep-cleaning” on Friday and will not hold classes, according to RCISD Superintendent Kevin Worthy.

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“We are closing tomorrow,” Worthy said. “We have chosen to do this in order to clean the facilities and we can conduct a better cleaning if the campuses are closed. Both will reopen Monday.”

Briana Aguirre, a nurse with Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital, recently treated her friend and co-worker, Nina Pham, the second confirmed Ebola patient in Texas. Aguirre’s children attend the two schools, and though Aguirre has been classified as “low risk,” she volunteered to keep herself and her children home for an isolation period.

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“She has taken her kids out of school, although they currently have no symptoms,” Worthy said. “She has been very helpful during this whole thing.”

Worthy said all other facilities in the district will be cleaned Saturday as a precaution.

A letter sent home to RCISD parents Friday states that “as a symptom-free person, there is no risk to anyone in their household or to anyone in their household attending school.”

Aguirre was interviewed by “Today” anchor Matt Lauer on Thursday and confirmed she had taken care of Pham, one of two nurses to contract the virus while working on Thomas Eric Duncan, who was killed by the virus.

Aguirre said in the interview with Lauer that she was provided insufficient protective gear by the hospital, a claim echoed by a number of other nurses at the hospital, but refuted by the hospital.

This story provided by The Royse City Herald-Banner.