Worker who handled Ebola samples quarantined on cruise ship

WASHINGTON, Oct. 17 (UPI) —

A Dallas healthcare worker who handled specimens of an Ebola patient is self-quarantined on a Caribbean cruise ship, the U.S. State Dept. said Friday in a statement.

The unidentified worker left Galveston, Texas, on a cruise Oct. 12 and was only recently informed of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention requirement for active monitoring, the statement said. She had no contact with the patient, Thomas Eric Duncan, but with lab samples.

The monitoring protocols were established after two nurses at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, where Duncan was admitted and later died, tested positive for the Ebola virus.

Carnival Cruise Line acknowledged the situation in a statement Friday, saying the isolated person is considered at "very low risk" of contracting the virus.

"We are in close contact with the CDC and at this time it has been determined that the appropriate course of action is to simply keep the guest in isolation on board," the Carnival statement said.

"The employee has been self-monitoring, including daily temperature checks, since October 6, and has not had a fever or demonstrated any symptoms of illness…We are working with the cruise line to safely bring them back to the United States out of an abundance of caution," the State Dept. statement said.