An official with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that the agency is expanding its Ebola investigation to include passengers on a Friday flight from Dallas to Cleveland with the nurse who was diagnosed with the disease after returning home to Texas. Officials already had been contacting passengers on a flight that Amber Vinson, 29, took Monday on her way back to Dallas from a weekend trip visiting family. Vinson is the second Dallas nurse diagnosed with the disease.
Dr. Chris Braden of the CDC said health officials couldn't rule out that Vinson may "have had the start of her illness on Friday." Officials previously stressed that Vinson didn't show symptoms during her Ohio visit.
People infected with Ebola aren't contagious until they start showing symptoms, such as fever, body aches or stomach pain, and then the disease is only transmitted through direct contact with bodily fluid. Still, Frontier Airlines said it is notifying passengers who either were on Vinson's flights or on later trips using the same plane, telling them to contact the CDC if they were concerned.