Shropshire doctor on Ebola flight
A doctor from Shropshire today revealed how he sat next to Britain's second Ebola victim as they shared a flight back to Britain.
Dr Martin Deahl, from Newport, was one of 30 NHS medics to be deployed by the Government in Sierra Leone, which is at the centre of an outbreak that has infected 20,000 people and killed 7,000.
He flew back to Heathrow via Casablanca on Sunday night, sitting next to a colleague from Glasgow.
Dr Deahl then took a private taxi back to his home in Shropshire while his colleague flew to Glasgow Airport.
She was admitted to hospital early yesterday morning after feeling unwell.
Last night she was diagnosed with Ebola.
Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt last night chaired a meeting of the Government's emergency Cobra committee to discuss the issue.
Both Scottish and British governments were said to be working together to tackle the outbreak.
A female healthcare worker who has been diagnosed with Ebola after returning from Sierra Leone was in a stable condition in hospital in Glasgow. She was admitted after feeling feverish and was placed into isolation in the Brownlee Unit for Infectious Diseases at the city's Gartnavel Hospital at 7.50am.
Health officials have traced the 71 other people who were on the British Airways flight from London to Glasgow with the woman, including Shropshire doctor Martin Deahl,.
The patient is thought to have had contact with only one other person in Scotland apart from the other passengers on the flight and hospital staff.
She was in isolation at Glasgow's Gartnavel Hospital and will be transferred to specialist high level isolation in London.
Dr Deahl, 58, said he was shocked.
"I was sitting next to her on the plane when we flew back on Sunday night and she seemed fine. I will be amazed if one of my colleagues has caught Ebola as we were all so cautious and careful out there.
"You can only catch Ebola if you come into contact with bodily fluids such as blood, spit or urine, which we were extra careful about not doing," he said.
"But I am absolutely fine. I am just so shocked and heartbroken to hear that anyone from our team has had this happen after such a difficult Christmas out there."
He added: "Everybody on the flight seemed so well and in good spirits. I was detained at Heathrow for half an hour and checked as a precaution and released."
Dr Deahl said Public Health England had called him twice to ask for his temperature, as anyone with a high reading would be placed into isolation as a precaution.
But he said he was fine, and wished his colleague a "speedy recovery".
