Ebola virus disease in the United Kingdom

On 29 December 2014, Pauline Cafferkey, a Scottish aid worker who had just returned to Glasgow from Sierra Leone via Casablanca Airport and London Heathrow Airport, was diagnosed with Ebola virus disease at Glasgow's Gartnavel General Hospital.[1][12][13] She had been working at an Ebola treatment centre in Kerry Town in Sierra Leone,[12] and it is thought she contracted the virus as a result of wearing a visor instead of goggles.[14]

After initial treatment in Glasgow, she was transferred to the specialist high-level isolation unit at the Royal Free Hospital in London for longer-term treatment.[12][15] Contact tracing was carried out on the other passengers who had traveled on the flight from London to Glasgow with her.[15] In January 2015, she experienced a period of critical illness,[16] and underwent intensive medical treatment.[17] She was eventually declared to be free of infection, and released from hospital.[18]

In October 2015, Cafferkey was diagnosed with late complications caused by the Ebola virus hitherto considered unusual, and readmitted to the Royal Free Hospital. The virus had remained in her cerebrospinal fluid and was feared to be in her central nervous system.[19] Her doctors stated that she had been critically ill due to neurological complications from meningitis, and that she had been treated using a highly experimental anti-viral agent.[20][21][22] On 12 November the Royal Free Hospital said that Cafferkey had made a full recovery and was no longer infectious.[23]

In February 2016, Cafferkey was again readmitted to the Royal Free Hospital due to further complication from her previous infection.[24] Later that month she was declared not to be infectious and discharged.[25] In October 2016, she was again admitted to hospital, and was being monitored by the infectious diseases unit at Glasgow's Queen Elizabeth University Hospital.[26] Tests for the Ebola virus were negative.[27]

In 2014, due to the fact that Cafferkey had passed through border controls and travelled on a domestic flight from Heathrow to Glasgow, criticism was levelled at screening protocols at UK points of entry, which mainly consisted of taking a person's temperature and asking a series of questions.[28]

In 2016, proceedings were initiated against Cafferkey by the Nursing and Midwifery Council alleging that she had allowed an incorrect temperature to be recorded during the screening process upon returning to the UK from Sierra Leone in 2014. Following a hearing in September 2016, the charges against her were dismissed after the disciplinary panel was told that she had been impaired by illness at the time.[29]