Second Texas Nurse Diagnosed with Ebola Virus

A second Texas nurse, who treated the first patient diagnosed with Ebola in the United States, has tested positive for the virus.

The nurse, identified as 29-year-old Amber Joy Vinson , was immediately isolated after she  reported a fever on Tuesday, the state health department said.

However, Vinson, who worked at the Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, travelled by plane from Cleveland, Ohio to Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport on Monday, officials said.  The nurse had also travelled from Dallas to Cleveland by flight on Friday.

According to government officials, Vinson knew that her colleague Nina Pham had been diagnosed with Ebola. She also had a slightly elevated temperature of 99.5 degrees.

CDC spokesman David Daigle said that Vinson told a CDC official before she boarded the plane to Dallas that her temperature was below 100.4 degrees and that she had no symptoms, reports the Associated Press.

However, the official who was responsible for observing Vinson, allowed her to fly.

Thomas Frieden, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that Vinson should not have travelled in a commercial flight even though she had reported the fever on Tuesday, the day she returned to Dallas.

Noting that it was unlikely that others on the plane were at risk as the nurse was not vomiting or bleeding, Frieden said that from here on, all other people who were involved in Duncan's care will be allowed to travel only in a controlled environment. He also cited rules that allow charter flights or travel by car but ruled out public transportation.

The CDC is alerting the 132 passengers who were aboard the Frontier Airlines Flight from Cleveland to Dallas-Fort Worth on Monday because of the short time interval between the evening flight and first report of illness the following morning, reports AP.

Meanwhile, Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings said that the nurse lived alone and had no pets.

He said that city's fire and rescue department has started disinfecting the common areas of the new patient's apartment and outside the building. They have also informed the patient's neighbors, he said.

"The only way that we are going to beat this is person by person, moment by moment, detail by detail," Rawlings said. "We want to deal with facts, not fear ... It may get worse before it gets better, but it will get better," he added, reports The Guardian.

The diagnosis of the  second infection comes a day after the largest nurses' union in the U.S. protested  that their colleagues who treated Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan worked for days without proper protective gear and had to face frequent changes in protocols.