NBC Journalist With Ebola To Be Flown To U.S. For Treatment
A journalist with NBC News working in Liberia has reportedly been diagnosed with Ebola and is being sent back to the U.S. for treatment, along with his whole reporting crew.
American freelance NBC journalist Ashoka Mukpo reportedly felt achy and tired this past Wednesday while documenting the Ebola crisis in Liberia's capital of Monrovia. He reportedly quarantined himself and Doctors Without Borders confirmed on Friday that he had been infected with the disease that includes symptoms of vomiting and diarrhea.
Mukpo's parents said on NBC's "Today" on Friday that the journalist would be transported back to the U.S. for treatment by the end of this week.
"Obviously he is scared and worried," father Dr. Mitchell Levy said on "Today."
Mukpo's mother, Diane, added that her son will be flown back to the U.S. on Sunday for treatment. "I think the enormous anxiety that I have as a mother or that we share as parents is the delay between now and him leaving on Sunday."
The journalist discussed the health plight in West Africa in a Facebook post last month, two weeks before he was diagnosed with Ebola. "Man oh man, I have seen some bad things in the last two weeks of my life," he wrote on Facebook while living in Liberia last month.
"How unpredictable and fraught with danger life can be. How in some parts of the world, basic levels of help and assistance that we take for granted completely don't exist for many people."
News of Mukpo's sickness comes after the first U.S. Ebola case was confirmed in Dallas, Texas this week. A hospital in Washington, D.C. also said Friday that it was investigating a possible Ebola case.
