A Sierra Leone surgeon will be admitted to the Nebraska Medical Center for treatment of Ebola, the Centers for Disease Control confirmed Thursday.
The doctor, who’s also a legal permanent resident of the United States, is expected to arrive this weekend, most likely on Saturday.
Officials at the Nebraska Medical Center would only say late Thursday that a patient with Ebola would soon be evaluated for possible treatment at the facility.
In a statement released Thursday night, the State Department said it has been in touch with the family of the Sierra Leone surgeon along with the CDC.
“His wife, who resides in Maryland, has asked the State Department to investigate whether he is well enough to be transported back to the University of Nebraska Medical Center for treatment,” the statement said.
The Omaha facility, which has already treated two patients with Ebola, is one of four centers in the United States that has been designated to handle those stricken with the deadly virus. Two Americans, Dr. Rick Sacra and Ashoka Mukpo, a freelance cameraman who worked for NBC, were treated there and released last month.
The CDC confirmed an earlier CNN report that the patient was headed to the Nebraska hospital.
It was not immediately clear if the doctor, who is married to a U.S. citizen and has children, was working in an Ebola treatment unit or some other type of hospital.
Last week, President Obama asked Congress for $6.2 billion in emergency funds to confront Ebola at its source in West Africa and to secure the United States against any possible spread.
Administration officials say $2 billion would be apportioned to the United States Agency for International Development and $2.4 billion would go to the Department of Health and Human Services. More than $1.5 billion would be for a contingency fund.
The Ebola money is the first request from Obama in the aftermath of an election that ushered in a Republican-controlled Congress, which is being seen as a repudiation of the president. The Ebola crisis has received bipartisan attention amid concerns over the potential of the disease to spread into the United States.
The White House is asking for prompt action, meaning it wants approval during the current lame duck session, while Democrats are still in control of the Senate.
Republicans have been especially critical of the administration’s domestic response, criticizing its coordination with states and questioning the security measures it has put in place. Still, less than a handful of cases have materialized in the United States. One patient who contracted the disease in Liberia died in Dallas, two nurses who treated him became infected but eventually recovered and one doctor who returned from West Africa where he was treating Ebola patients became sick and is now under care in a hospital in New York City.
The nearly $2 billion for USAID and $127 million for the Department of State would help carry out the U.S. anti-Ebola mission in West Africa. More than $2.4 billion would go HHS, but administration officials would not break down the request on the basis of what was to be used to fight the disease overseas and what was meant to boost defenses in the United States. The Pentagon would get about $112 million.
