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Greyhound bus quarantined in Steamboat Springs after Ebola scare

STEAMBOAT SPRINGS — A Greyhound bus passing through Steamboat Springs on Sunday was briefly quarantined because of an Ebola virus scare.

The Denver Police Department contacted the Routt County Sheriff’s Office at about 2 p.m. Sunday asking that the bus be stopped. Officials thought there might have been a person on board who had had contact with a Denver Health patient who was being tested for the virus, according to Steamboat Springs Police Department Capt. Jerry Stabile.

The patient, a man who became sick after recently returning from the Congo, later tested negative for the deadly virus.

“They suspected someone on there might have been exposed,” Stabile said about the bus.

Police stopped the bus in front of McDonald’s and held it there for about 15 minutes before determining it was not the bus for which Denver police were looking, Stabile said.

The Denver Post reported the patient had been working as a medical missionary in an area of the Congo that recently had an outbreak of Ebola. The man had some symptoms of the virus, which include fever, muscle pain, fatigue, diarrhea, vomiting, stomach pain and unexplained hemorrhage.

Denver Health put the man in isolation until tests confirmed he did not have Ebola. Three members of an ambulance crew also were hospitalized, the Post reported. The man is in fair condition, but the cause of his symptoms has not yet been determined, according to the Post.

Denver Health is one of 10 hospitals in the United States that has been authorized by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to treat people with Ebola.

The CDC praised the Congo for recently ending the ninth Ebola outbreak that has occurred in the country since 1976. The outbreak began May 8. There were 54 cases and 33 deaths.

To reach Matt Stensland, call 970-871-4247, email mstensland@SteamboatToday.com or follow him on Twitter @SBTStensland.


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