Oct 21, 2014

EoT: Ebola: Strippers and Neiman Marcus

A roundup of news, columns and features about the state, from media around the world.

According to the New York Daily News, two male strippers from Texas have been placed in voluntary quarantine after sitting near an Ebola victim on a Frontier Airlines flight from Cleveland to Dallas on Monday night.

The two men called the CDC hotline after they learned that they may have been “overexposed” after sitting within three feet of Amber Vinson, a Dallas nurse who helped to care for the first Ebola patient to die in the U.S.

Stripper Axl Goode said he and colleague Taylor Cole were on hold for 81 minutes before CDC officials responded.

“Do Not Touch” was the Daily News headline on the story.

Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital has taken hits to its reputation because of repeated fumbles over its treatment of Ebola patients.

The New York Times reports that Presbyterian long has been considered the gold standard for health care in Dallas. Suzanne Worthing, waiting for her husband to have a procedure at the hospital, told the Times, “It has always been considered the Neiman Marcus of hospitals, because a lot of wealthy people came here. Now we wonder if it’s going to become the J. C. Penney.”

CNBC reports that at least two students from Nigeria who applied to a Texas college were told they wouldn’t be admitted over Ebola concerns.

Kamorudeen Abidogun, a Texas man originally from Nigeria, said Navarro College, a two-year community school 60 miles from Dallas, sent rejection letters addressed to two of his relatives from Nigeria who had applied there. They were using Abidogun’s Richmond home as their mailing address.

The letter read, “With sincere regret, I must report that Navarro College is not able to offer you acceptance for the Spring 2015 term. Unfortunately, Navarro College is not accepting international students from countries with confirmed Ebola cases.”

CNBC.com published photos of the letters, carrying the signature of Navarro College’s international programs director, Elizabeth Pillans.

Dewayne Gragg, Navarro’s vice president for Access and Accountability, later told CNBC.com that some applicants had been misinformed about the reasons for rejection.

“As part of our new honor’s program, the college restructured the international department to include focused recruitment from certain countries each year. Our focus for 2014-15 is on China and Indonesia,” Gragg said in an email.