Fox News Anchor Blasts Ebola Media Sensationalism; Tells Viewers 'We Do Not Have an Outbreak in the US'
A news anchor on Fox delivered a powerful message this week amid the three Ebola cases in the United States and the consequent fear mongering.
Shepard Smith offered a three-minute run down of facts about Ebola, urging viewers to resist panic while referring to the fear-provoking content in the media as "very irresponsible."
"Here are the facts: A man contracted Ebola overseas," Smith started, referring to Thomas Eric Duncan. "Tragically he was dying in a Texas hospital. He was at his most contagious while showing the most severe symptoms- that's how Ebola works."
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Smith goes on to chronicle that a healthcare worker, 26-year-old Nina Pham, who cared for Duncan at the Dallas hospital and also contracted Ebola.
"She is doing well she says," Smith added. "Skyping with her family from isolation just yesterday saying she is blessed to have so much support and so much great medical care."
However, the CDC warned that Pham will not be the only health care worker to contract Ebola after coming to the aid of Duncan, and most recently, a second nurse was diagnosed with the deadly disease. The second nurse and third Ebola patient in the U.S., 29-year-old Joy Vinson, actually boarded a plane from Cleveland to Dallas on Monday, and CDC officials had approved her for the flight since her temperature was below the threshold for CDC protocols. Nevertheless, Smith assured Fox News viewers that Vinson was not yet contagious and that she is now being treated at Emery Hospital in Atlanta.
"Now, before she showed symptoms, she flew on Frontier Airlines… As we all now know, if you do not show symptoms, you are not contagious," Smith repeated. "She did not show symptoms, according to the doctors. Still, medical professionals are contacting everyone who was on that plane to make sure that each person is okay."
Furthermore, the CDC says that the chances of Ebola spreading to other travelers on the Frontier Airlines flight are very slim. Smith goes on to remind viewers that politics and an upcoming election have effected the coverage of the Ebola cases.
"We do not have an outbreak of Ebola in the United States, nowhere," the news anchor stated. "We do have two health care workers who contracted the disease from a dying man. They are isolated. There is no information to suggest that the virus has spread to anyone in the general population in America- not one person."
Smith also referred to the reports suggesting that politicians and medical professionals are lying about the likelihood of an Ebola outbreak in the U.S. as "completely without basis and fact."
"Being afraid at all is the wrong thing to do," the anchor continued before acknowledging a more present threat to the health of Americans today- the flu.
Smith is not the only public figure addressing Ebola fears today. Gov. Rick Perry asked President Barack Obama to implement a travel ban from countries hit the hardest by Ebola on Friday afternoon.
"Air travel is in fact how this disease crosses borders," he said, according to WFAA. "And it's certainly how it got to Texas in the first place."
Perry said he also requested to have Ebola cases fast-tracked to facilities better able to deal with the disease. Congressional Republicans are too urging the Obama administration to impose a travel ban on West African countries at the epicenter of the Ebola outbreak.
