ROCKWALL COUNTY, Texas — The Rockwall County Office of Emergency Management announced today there are five individuals residing in Rockwall County who are being monitored for possible contact with the Ebola virus.
ROCKWALL COUNTY, Texas — The Rockwall County Office of Emergency Management announced today there are five individuals residing in Rockwall County who are being monitored for possible contact with the Ebola virus.
In addition to the five, the Royse City Independent School District announced an individual living with the boundaries of Davis Elementary School and Ruth Cherry Intermediate School has self-reported possible contact with the Ebola virus and has voluntarily chosen to quarantine herself and her family.
According to Royse City ISD, the individual and their family members are not showing Ebola symptoms and is considered a “low risk.” Rockwall County officials are also describing the five individuals being monitored as “low risk.”
One of the individuals being monitored by Rockwall County, the Texas Department of State Health Services, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), is a health care worker at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, Texas, which treated the Thomas Eric Duncan, the first patient in the United States diagnosed with Ebola.
The remaining four individuals being monitored were on a Frontier Airlines flight from Cleveland to Dallas with a patient who has since been diagnosed with Ebola. One of the travelers has two school-aged children. At this time, officials do not know which schools the children attend.
Royse City ISD has chosen to close Davis Elementary School and Ruth Cherry Intermediate School on Friday, October 17, 2014, to conduct “precautionary” cleaning.
“As a reminder the Ebola virus is not airborne and can not be transmitted unless a person comes in direct contact with bodily fluids of a symptomatic person,” stated the Rockwall County Office of Emergency Management in a press release. “None of the individuals in Rockwall County are exhibiting symptoms of the virus.”
The Shekinah Radiance Academy in Royse City has also elected to close their campus on Friday, October 17, 2014, to decontaminate the school, according to their website.
County officials have assured additional information will be provided as it becomes available.
