>> i think it's fine to have a website. >> reporter: keeping up a website for a law that he opposes, that's a contradiction, one that grimes jumped on. >> the fictional fantasy land that mcconnell is in, it doesn't show the statistics here in the state. >> three weeks to go. dana bash, thank you so much. that's it for "the lead." i now turn you over to wolf blitzer in "the situation room." wolf. a u.s. nurse being treated for a deadly disease sends a message but health officials still don't know how she became infected. i'll talk to the cdc director thomas frieden. massive explosions as isis surrounds another iraqi military base and president obama meets with defense chiefs from 22 nations to discuss how to stop the jihadist onslaught.

and the missing student mystery of hannah graham. we'll have all of the details. we're following two major stories, explosions and gunfire as isis gains more ground inside syria and iraq while president obama talks strategy for the war on the terrorists with military leaders from the 22 nations in the u.s.-led coalition. also, aggressive new steps by federal health officials to prevent the spread of ebola in the united states. the centers for disease control is going to have a team on the ground within hours when an ebola case is diagnosed in the united states. the director of the cdc, thomas frieden, is standing by. we'll talk to him and our other guests. cnn's victor blackwell is on the ground in dallas. what is are you hearing from

there? >> reporter: tom frieden, director of the cdc, said that the agency did not respond aggressively enough once thomas eric duncan tested positive. they are beefing up that response now. also, they are monitoring more than 70 health care workers who also had contact with duncan. the centers for disease control says it's working with health officials to determine who could have been exposed to ebola with nina pham before she was diagnosed on sunday. those contacts will be monitored. >> before he was hospitalized, had exposures or potential exposures to 48 people. second, once he was hospitalized, there were at least 76 people who might have come into contact with him or his blood and who are being

monitored now. >> many of those at risk up until now had been self-monitoring. now they will be tested twice daily for fever and a change in conditions. pham received a blood transfusion today. she received it from ebola survivor dr. kent brantly. his blood is packed with anti-bodies that could save the nurse's life. she graduated with a nursing degree in 2010 and became certified as a critical care nurse two months ago. fellow nurses say pham was particularly cautious. >> knowing nina, she's one of the most meticulous, thorough and effective nurses. i learned so much of that from her. >> reporter: in nebraska, ashoko mukpo continues to show signs of improvement, posting to facebook, there have been some dark and profoundly frightening moments in this deal. i won't ever know when i slipped

up and contracted the virus. i had been taking precautions but obviously they weren't enough. and for the first time since we learned that this nurse contracted ebola from thomas eric duncan, we are hearing from nina pham. the hospital, texas health presbyterian released this statement. she said, "i'm doing well and want to thank everyone for their kind wishes and prayers. i am blessed to be cared for by the best team of doctors and nurses in the world here at texas health presbyterian hospital, dallas." again, her official status is clinically stable. wolf? >> let's hope she completely, completely recovers. president obama spoke about the growing concern of ebola in the united states and in the case of the next as it nurse, nina pham. >> we are surging resources into dallas to examine what exactly has happened that ended up

infecting the nurse there. obviously are thoughts and prayers are with her. >> let's bring in cnn's anderson cooper. he's working the story for us as well. is the hospital in dallas, based on everything that you're hearing from the experts there, now fully prepared, fully equipped to deal with ebola? >> reporter: i don't think anybody can say that they are fully prepared, fully equipped to deal with it. certainly they were not before. the director of the cdc, as you know and you're going to be talking to him shortly, came forward today and you heard president obama say they are surging personnel into this hospital. they are changing protocols in this hospital. more oversight of the nurses and the doctors. they are going to have somebody watching to make sure people getting in and out of the protective gear, that that is all none done properly. but it certainly seems to indicate that there were problems before. the fact that one nurse has

tested positive and certainly the fact, wolf, even when you look at when thomas eric duncan first came here and brought them to the hospital, they told the hospital that he had recently come from liberia. put those all together and it certainly seems in this case, in this hospital and raises questions about other hospitals how prepared they are to really deal with ebola in the united states. >> anderson, we'll be anchoring "ac 360" at 8:00 p.m. from dallas. anderson, thank you very much. let's dig deeper with the centers for disease control and prevention, dr. thomas frieden. thanks very much for joining us. i know you have a lot going on right now. let's start with nina pham. she says she's doing well. she received a blood transfusion from dr. kent brantly who survived ebola, as you know. is that the most promising

treatment right now, to get these blood transfusions, maybe to get some antibodies working in there? >> well, we don't know what's going to work in terms of different experimental treatments. our focus now is making sure that we do everything possible to have her care be both safe ee effective. safe, making sure that people caring for her don't themselves get exposed and effective, there's a lot that can be done with someone with ebola that is not experimental. there's a lot of fluid management and balancing and monitoring their health. >> what about the experimental drug that's been out there? is she going to be getting that drug as well? >> you'd really have to refer to the hospital and her or her family in terms of any treatments she may or may not receive but we know that good medical care can really reduce the risk of bad outcomes. >> so we don't really know if the blood transfusions work.

it's too early. is that right? >> we don't know. we do know that good medical care, checking fluid and electrolytes, replacing those, taking care of someone well, that makes a really big difference and we know that care can be provided safely. that's why we've surged staff, more than 20 staff into texas working with the hospital directly and we've done three things to make sure that care is safe in the hospital. the first is have a site manager there, making sure that they are overseeing everything that is done. more training, retraining. we've brought a couple nurses from emory with eboho worked wia patients there. so you get all of the care that is needed but not any more people that need to go into that space. >> do you yet know or does anyone know how nina pham contracted ebola? >> we don't know and we may never know. but we do know that we've identified a number of things that can be improved in terms of the process of putting on,

taking off personal protective equipment, what's done in the center and we've got staff now hands on working on all of those issues continuously improving so that care can reduce to a minimum the chance that anyone would become infected there. >> i take it, based on what has happened over the last couple of weeks, especially with nina pham, this 26-year-old nurse, the cdc is revising their protocol for protective equipment. is that right? >> we're looking at every aspect of care. but the fact that there want infection of a health care worker is simply unacceptable. so we've announced that starting today, for any hospital anywhere in the u.s., if they have a confirmed case of ebola, we will send a team to the ground to be there with them for every aspect of the care, from infection control to treatment to environmental decontamination, to waste management, to training of staff. i wish we had done that earlier in dallas and we're there now. it's the first case of ebola in

this country. so we've all been learning from that experience. >> how many people are now being monitored? >> currently, there really are several different groups. everyone exposed to mr. duncan, that was 48 people, and all of them have now gone through the highest risk period. there are already two-thirds of the way through their monitoring period. we're hopeful we will not see any cases for those individuals. for the nurse in the hospital, one individual was exposed to her and that monitoring is continuing. and as you mentioned, for the others who were provided care to the index patient, there are 76 who potentially may have been exposed and all of them will be monitored as well. >> when you say monitored, these 76 people, what does that mean? >> every day, someone takes their temperature and they take their temperature and they are informed to immediately come in if they have any symptoms

whatsoever, even minor symptoms, so we can catch it early if they have ebola. that means we'll have some false alarms, we'll have people come in who have no significant health problem but that's okay. we want to get them in immediately, isolated, so if it turns out that they have ebola, they will improve their outcome and eliminate the risk if they would make other people -- in fekt other people or make them sick. >> the cdc response team that you're sending to dallas, is it already there, on the way? if not, when will it get there? >> it is there. we were there the first day. we focused on contract tracing, public health management, tracking what was happening with that first case and the laboratory testing and a series of other aspects. and those have been going well. we have some expertise there in hospital management and infection control and that's what we've beefed up further. we have some of the top experts in the world on how to take care of ebola and how to do it

safely. they are there now on the ground in dallas working side-by-side with the staff at the hospital to make sure that that care is as safe and effective as possible. >> so you're confident nina pham should stay at that dallas hospital and not be air lifted to the university of nebraska or emory hospital? they can do the job in dallas, do you believe? >> we are going to look at that situation every day. we are going to do whatever is necessary to provide the best possible care for her and those caring for her. >> so you're leaving open the possibility that she could be air lifted out of there? >> right now we're comfortable with the level of care being given. we'll reassess that. one of the things that we've really learned about ebola over the past months is that the situation does change often. so rather than say we're definitely going to do it this way, we look, what's really happening on the ground? what will really make a difference to help people and protect the public?

and that's what we're going to do. >> there's enormous concern out there. we're going to take a quick break, dr. frieden. stay with us. we have a lot more questions. as you know, there's enormous concern out there. we'll be right back. hey, i heard you guys can help me with frog protection? yeah, we help with fraud protection.

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to deal with ebola? >> every hospital in the country needs to be ready to diagnose ebola. someone could come in, a responder from the u.s. who has come back, really important. if someone has a fever or other signs of infection, ask, where have you been in the last 21 days? have you been in west africa, new guinea, liberia or see aier leonne. the moment it's suspected, consult with the local health department, the state health department, consult with us. we have surged testing facilities around the u.s. if it's confirmed, we'll be there to do it with you. >> as of right now, and correct me if i'm wrong, dr. frieden, only a handful, three, four, five hospitals in the united states are fully prepared, we put a few of them up on the screen right there -- fully

equipped to deal with ebola, emory university, university of nebraska in omaha, nih and st. patrick hospital in montana. >> those are facilities that have special biocontainment units that would be suitable if we had a new pat thouhogen and know how it spreads. you could care for a patient with that there. that's very different from ebola. we know how to stop the spread of ebola. but it's not easy. it requires meticulous attention to detail. it require as site manager, training, follow up, you know, you can use different forms of personal protective equipment but it's not the case that you can only care for ebola safely there. >> how serious was the violation by nbc news' dr. nancy

snyderman, the violation of her mandatory quarantine. did she potentially put anyone at risk? >> for someone who's a contact or potentially a contact, the most important thing is to monitor your temperature every day and if you have a fever or you have any symptoms at all, go immediately in, calling ahead to say, i've been exposed. i might be sick, i'm coming in for assessment. that's what we want contacts to do and that's the most important thing to protect the public. just look at two numbers. how many people mr. -- the first index patient in dallas exposed, potentially 48, how many people the second patient, the nurse exposed, one. that's the kind of trend we want to see so that we don't have people exposed if there are future cases so we stop the transmission. that's how ebola works. >> so did she put anyone at

risk? >> if she was not sick, she was not putting others at risk. >> dr. frieden, good luck to you and to all of the men and women of the centers for disease control. we appreciate what you're doing. >> thank you. coming up, a strategy meeting for the war on isis. we have details of president obama's high level huddle with top leaders, military leaders for almost two dozen countries into plus, isis forces surrounding another iraqi military base. they are making new advances despite the stepped-up u.s.-led air strikes. ♪ who's going to do it? who's going to make it happen? discover a new energy source. turn ocean waves into power. design cars that capture their emissions. build bridges that fix themselves.

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british fighters are trying to hold on against isis terrorists in the key syrian town of kobani. the united states stepped up its air strikes in and around kobani slowing the advances of isis at least a bit but the jihadists have been gaining ground in kobani and in the area as well as in iraq where they are surrounding an iraqi military base. defense chiefs from nearly two doz dozen nations have been meeting with president obama about how to move forward. let's go live to our senior white house correspondent jim acosta. he's got the very latest. jim? >> wolf, pretty candid language as they wrap up a meeting with joint chiefs chairman dempsey and others around the world. this is coming as isis is gaining ground but aides to the president say the u.s.-led coalition will not be adopting a new strategy to degrade and

destroy isis. josh earnest insisted the president's approach is, quote, succeeding but the president during his remarks to the defense chiefs cautioned that air strikes would lead to a quick victory. >> this is going to be a long-term campaign. we're still in stages. as any military effort, there will be days of progress and there are going to be periods of setback. but our coalition is united behind this long-term effort. >> now, the president did talk about some of the successes the coalition has had early on in the fighting against isis but also conceded that he is, quote, deeply concerned about the security situation in the syrian town of kobani. white house officials admit they are at a disadvantage in the battle against isis in syria and that there is no coalition ground force in that country to take the fight to the terror group. air strikes, as you know, were ramped up against isis around kobani but the white house said this is not the beginning of

some new escalation against isis but still reserve the right to do just that if they are not having the desired result, wolf. >> jim askos scosta, thanks ver. the jihadists are pressing forward on several fronts. let's bring in our pentagon correspondent barbara starr. she's got more. barbara? >> wolf, with isis continuing on the march just outside of baghdad, there is growing concern at the pentagon that iraqi forces may not be able to save themselves. massive explosions in northwestern syria. activists say these are tunnels full of explosives being detonated by militants as clashes broke out between regime and opposition forces, just the latest in escalating violence against syria and iraq. around the besieged city of

kobani, on the syria/turkey border, 21 coalition air strikes, the largest number of strikes since operations began. finally, stepping up attacks against isis positions to protect the town. but the white house still cautioning air strikes can only have so much impact in kobani. >> that impact is constrained by the fact that there aren't forces on the ground that can follow up on those air strikes to end that siege. >> reporter: pentagon officials say don't expect a change in strategy. they have long warned u.s. air power can only do so much. >> i also want to emphasize that no one is under any illusions. under any illusions that air strikes alone will destroy isil. >> reporter: the western approach to baghdad, anbar, may be running out of time. isis has surrounded and is preparing to attack one of

iraq's largest air bases, according to security forces. if they succeed, isis will have a new cache of weapons. this comes as martin dempsey holds the largest meeting at the coalition to date. 22 nations sending their chiefs to washington to review the fight against isis. the u.s. has used apache helicopters and gun ships at low altitude to virtually strain isis forces but isis continues to regroup and train for battle. raising the question once again, is there a solution? >> it is looking more and more like chairman dempsey is going to have to go back to the president and ask the president to authorize the introduction of u.s. combat forces into iraq. >> but, you know, there was no indication, there is no indication that president obama would approve ground forces into iraq air strikes may never have been the full answer but the

u.s. certainly had expected the iraqis to at least fight and fight more and better than they currently are. wolf? >> that iraqi military which was trained by the united states, funded by the united states, armed by the united states largely mia missing in action right now, refusing to defend their own country and that's a disgrace. barbara, thanks very much. while the u.s. has tried to encourage turkey, a powerful nato member, to join the fight against isis, turkey had a different target in mind today. joining us now, the former prime minister of the kurdistan regional government, a former deputy prime minister of iraq as well. thanks for joining us. all of a sudden today we hear turkey is launching air strikes, not against isis but against kurds inside turkey, this offshoot of what is called the ppk workers party. they are accused of being terrorists but there's been a

cease-fire for almost two years. what is going on right now? >> it's rather disconcerting and disappointing. there was one bright spot of hope in that region and that was the peace process that was going on in turkey. this air strike, i hope does not mean it's the end of the peace process because the stability of the region is isis. these terrorists solving the kurdish issue is the way to go forward militarily, attacks against the kurds is not the way. it's only diverting attention from the real issue, namely, taking on isis and terrorizing the entire east. >> has the turkish government explained why they are attacking kurdish fighter inside turkey right now? >> what is happening is rather dangerous. i would say reckless and it is going to cause significant repercussions to those trying to bring the region together in any stance against isis. >> all of us who have covered

the kurds over the years, and i have over many years, we know the peshmerga and they are not armed. they can't deal with isis which has tanks, armored personnel carriers, mortars. they have basically rifles. >> indeed. and one of the problems that we do have is the lack of equipment, lack of adequate weapons. >> the u.s. is supplying you but that isn't getting through because the iraqi government is preventing it from getting into the hands of peshmerga. >> over the past month there has been shipments of weapons but it's not enough to deal -- >> excuse me. sophisticated weapons? battle tanks, stuff like that? >> not at all. abrams battle tanks were delivered to the iraqi military and sophisticated weapons were delivered to the iraqi military and unfortunately like you said,

the weaponry ended up in the hands of isis. >> i understand. because if you take a look at what isis has, they have sophisticated weaponry, largely u.s. weaponry captured from iraqi military refusing to fight to defend their own country. why can't the u.s. deliver weapons directly to the kurds? why does the u.s. have to go through baghdad? >> the united states is bound with explanation given to us, is bound by the sovereignty of the iraqi state talking to the government in baghdad. that is undeniably is slowing down the delivery of these shipments but i hope we can fix this for once and for all and at the end of the day, kurdistan has emerged as a reliable party of the united states and competent party of the united states and the neighbors countries in the fight against isil. you talked about kobani and the white house spokesman was talking about lack of ground

troops. you have watched from the cnn the heroic fighters, the men and women who are putting up great resistance against these terrorists. these people deserve support. you have boots on the ground, you have allies on the ground. air power alone will not do it. that is right. but we have people in the region, the communities in the region, the kurds, they have interest on taking on isis and should be supported in power. >> when will kurdistan be an independent nation? >> every kurd dreams of independence. it's their right to have their own independence state. despite our commitment to the integrity, the way this part of the world is going, i think it will be impossible to convince the kurds to stay with the present arrangement. we need a decent government in baghdad, across the middle east, a settlement of burden dish

fights and respect for human rights. but the name of the game is shining the kurds away and letting them be slaughtered by isis or these air strikes, those who advocate the delivery of that on kurdistan is growing only stronger. >> there's not a lot of time that you have right now. very quickly, because we're out of time, is there a deadline when you're going to walk away from iraq? >> i don't want to talk about that. this is a terrorist group terrorizing everybody. it's in our interest to work with other iraqis and others to take on this group. wolf, one of tthe problems that see, the scope of the problem is not fully understood. we are talking about an unprecedented threat. if you remember, every stages of the iraq war, we dealt with insurgents and then al qaeda and now we're dealing with isis which is a mutant of this

terrorist organization. i hope we deal with this problem in a fundamental way, military component is vital. we need to help those people who are willing to put up a fight but at the same time deal with the fundamental issues of politics, broken politics that gives advice to these terrorists once again. >> thanks for joining us. i hope, i hope there won't be a massacre of the kurds in syria because unfortunately -- >> that will bring it to -- >> the world stands by and allows that -- >> that should not be allowed. isis should not be allowed that victory. kobani must not fall in the hands of isis. ramadi and those other places that have been besieged by isis should not be allowed to fall. >> good luck to you and all of the kurdish people. mitch mcconnell and alison lundergan grimes had a debate

last night and alison lundergan grimes said which way she voted is a privacy. the search for hannah graham takes on a different dimension. we're learning new details of a change in strategy. plus, the mystery surrounding the north korean leader kim jong-un. even "saturday night live" is weighing in. >> sir, you're limping. >> what? who said that? [ crying ] >> i told you, i broke my ankle while dunking over michael jordan. this is what happened! [ male announcer ] it's a warning.

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been for five weeks, kim jong-un appears. new photos appeared on north korean state media television. he seems to stride confidently with one very noticeable exception. >> he was limping before and now he's visibly using a cane. >> well, either he has residual pain and has discovered the cane is one way to ameliorate the pain or he has weakness. it's a pretty public statement of his infirmaty. >> kim had just missed the founding of the ruling workers party. it fueled reports of a possible coup, rumors of worsening health or personal problems and a zing from "saturday night live". >> sir, you're limping. >> what? who said that? [ crying ] >> i told you, i broke my ankle

while dunking over michael jordan. this is what happened! >> kim had obviously gained weight since taking power three years ago. there were widespread reports that he had ailments such as high blood pressure, diabetes, and gout. >> gout at a relatively early age suggests he has the type of gout that's harder to treat. >> reporter: a defector who treated kim's grandfather, the late dictator, he may have been giv given hormone shots to look that way. one analyst says looking like his revered grandfather will not help the kim jong-un. >> i think it was a manifestation and political. i think the execution,

alienating him has turned into being a disaster. >> reporter: former envoy says if the isolation continues, kim will possibly give up power. not necessarily in a coup but where top generals are pulling the strings, if that's not already happening. they continue to believe that kim is not under significant threat and that for now the country is operating normally. wolf? >> brian, thanks very much. still ahead, a change in strategy in the search for the missing virginia college student hannah graham. there's a new agency now in charge of the case. plus, the breaking news. the cdc sending out ebola response teams. one is now in dallas where the nurse infected with the virus is speaking out. we have details of her message to the world. bout what they get from alaska, they think salmon and energy. but the energy bp produces up here creates something else as well: jobs all over america. engineering and innovation jobs.

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the search for a missing university of virginia student is taking on a different dimension. a day after desperate pleas from the parents of hannah gram the city of charlottesville is has a new strategy. what is the latest, coy, what are you hearing about this search? >> wolf, it has been incorrectly reported by a number of virginia reporters here that the virginia department of emergency management is pulling out of the search for hannah graham. i spoke with the captain at the

charlottesville police department and can confirm that the city of emergency management is not pulling out of the search for hannah graham and they currently on stand-down. the search will begin again on thursday. we have some significant thunderstorms that are preparing to move through virginia over the next 48 hours. once those have passed through, the search will commence and it will enter an important second phase of the search and the virginia department of emergency management will continue to support the charlottesville police department with logistics and planning and mapping and whatever resources they need to find hannah and bring her home. >> if the authorities there suspect the suspect in this case jesse matthews, how do they get him to talk? >> i think at this point their best hope if they can bring murder charges in the harrington case that occurred five years ago attending a skernt in

charlottesville and if they can bargain with with him to save his own life if he leads them to her, if he is the one that took her and actually murdered her or abducted her and put her someplace. >> in other words, have a plea deal instead of getting the execution which is legal in virginia, you get life in prison, something like that. corey, let me ask you and, obviously, he is innocent until he is proven guilty. he is being held where you are in charlottesville. what are you hearing about any of these efforts to try to get him to talk if he knows, in fact, where she might be? >> i have not heard specifically of what is happening behind the scenes at the jail. of course, he is absolutely presumed innocent until he is proven guilty in a court of law with competent counsel. but look. jesse matthew was named, he was investigated as being the man responsible for two rapes at two different universities in 2002 and 2003.

that issue of sexual assault on university campuses is not about to go away any time soon. and there is a number of critical issues that play here that colleges and universities are going to have to figure out. should they be allowed to investigate themselves? or should they pass that off to somebody else? should young men coming in to join college communities should they undergo a specific type of training to identify red flags of behavior? these are all really important questions that this nation has to figure out. >> tom, when hannah graham's parents come out with an emotional statement that has an impact on this investigation, right? >> the impact is on everybody continuing to search and look for her and volunteers to come out and i think it would have zero impact on whoever took their daughter. >> let's hope we find out what is going on every over there and find out soon. appreciate both of you joining us. a dallas nurse 26 years old infected with ebola sends a message and federal authorities prepare to send a rapid response

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to help hospitals diagnose and safely treat the virus. desperate battle. explosions and gunfire echo across the syrian town that is a focal point with the war of is sis. we want to welcome our viewers around the united states and around the world. i'm wolf blitzer. you're in "the situation room." >> we are following breaking developments. a dallas hospital just gave us an update on the nurse who is fighting ebola. she is also breaking her silence saying thank you for the outpowering of concern. at the same time, there are now worries about ebola spreading, especially to health care workers. just a few hours ago, the cdc warned that every hospital in the country needs to know how to diagnose and safely treat ebola. president obama says the united states is surging resources into dallas, but he also says the world isn't doing enough to stop

the ebola virus. >> all of us are going to have to do more because unless we contain this at the source, this is going to continue to pose a threat to individual countries. >> the president spoke at a meeting with his anti-isis coalition and we are bringing in dramatic pictures from the front lines in the war with isis. our correspondents and news makers are standing by to go in-depth on all of the breaking news this hour. let's begin in dallas with our senior medical correspondent elizabeth cohen. she's got the very latest. elizabeth? >> reporter: wolf, i'm glad to say that nina pham's condition is upgraded to nurse and she contracted ebola while taking care of thomas eric duncan. this goes to show what can happen when a patient with ebola gets care quickly. she was admitted to the hospital within 90 minutes of first feeling ill and she got a blood

transfusion within two days of going into the hospital. >> announce new procedures today and i guess the question is what are those procedures? are they enough? will they work? >> reporter: cdc director was very candid in a press conference today saying, look, i wish we had sent a larger team from he very beginning two weeks ago. that larger team includes people who are going into this hospital and training doctors and nurses how to use good protective gear. now that happened, affect pham got infected and if it would have been number four it might have been prevented her infecti infection. >> i've been hearing, loud and clear from health care workers, from around the country, that they are worried, that they don't feel prepared to take care of a patient with ebola. >> now it's interesting.

he says what if many ebola cases in the u.s.? do they have enough teams to spread out. they say they should designate a few hospitals to be ehlo ba hospitals in the country and train and drill those teams rather than helping out people around the country but many think that is impractical. >> in other words, if one comes down with ehlo ba, air-lift that person to a hospital. >> that is what safe experts tell me what should happen. they say, look. what happened to press byterian. they sent the patient away and then the patient died and then a nurse got infected. that's not a great track record. >> we have a map. i'm going to show our viewers the map. really only four hospitals in the united states that are fully capable of dealing with ebola.

the national institutes of health in bethesda, maryland, outside of washington and emory university hospital in atlanta and university of nebraska medical center in omaha and st. patrick hospital in missoula, montana. >> reporter: while those are four designated hospitals for dealing with these biohazard use, there are other large hospitals that drill for biohazards and practice on taking on and putting on protective gear. while those four hospitals are protective, there are other hospitals have a chance with an ebola patient than a smaller hospital. >> for the first time we heard from nina pham, only 26 years old, the nurse that became infected with ebola while treating thomas eric duncan, the patient who died in dallas last

week. victor, tell our viewers what she is now saying. >> reporter: it's an upbeat statement from nina pham. we have the statement and put it up on the screen here. she says i'm doing well and want to thank everyone for their kind wishes and prayers. i am blessed by the support of family and friends and am blessed to be cared for by the best team of doctors and nurses in the world here at texas health presbyterian hospital here in dallas. no official prognosis from the cdc during their news conference today and no prognosis from the hospital here but this is of course, an upgrade from stable to good." i'm glad she is in good condition right now and hope shall says that way. victor, you also had a chance to speak with her family pastor. what did you hear? >> i took a drive about 35 miles west to ft. worth and spoke with the pastor whose name is jim coy. he is the leader of the parish

at our lady catholic church and the pham family has been members there more than a decade. initially he said they were frightened but now they are very calm and very religious people and believe god will take care of nina pham and here is what else he told us about their communication. how were the two communicating, mother and daughter right now? >> they can talk via skype and phone, so they know for sure what happens to one another and i think nina and her mom doing well and feel comfortable with, you know, the -- >> reporter: one other thing that the father shared with us, he said that he now has to educate the parish there, the congregation because he said there was a party scheduled in their multipurpose room and after the announcement to the connection to this church, the family cancelled that party saying they didn't want to be

involved in catching ebola. we know it can only be transmitted from the sick person through body fluid but he says that is the effort he has to undergo with the people there at that church in ft. worth. >> victor blackwell in dallas, thank you. the cdc says every hospital in the united states needs to be ready to diagnose ebola and their workers need to be trained in how to treat patients without spreading the virus. joining us now three guests, tropical medical specialist and cnn medical analyst dr. zahn and a cdc detective who writes for "the dallas morning news." and a doctor of a university what is working on an ebola vaccine. thank you all for joining us. dr. jasmine, you're in dallas. are the medical workers there safe? >> we are hearing so much concern from local residents about this question, wolf. the sad thing is that with one nurse having become infected there is always the chance that

other health care workers in that setting may have also been exposed because we haven't identified one particular thing that she did, that could have exposed her to the virus, that means we have to cross the net really wide and others could be at risk. i also have to speak to this issue about these four biocontainment units. there are only four of them and combined, they have fewer than 20 beds. i spoke to one of them this morning at the nebraska biocontainment unit and they said, we have ten beds but ebola is a difficult condition to treat and we would not be comfortable having more than two or three patients with ebola here. this really speaks to the fact that every hospital has to be prepared, has to be ready to deal with e bow ma patients. >> but, doctor, that could take a long time to prepare these hospitals, god forbid there was a pandemic or epidemic or a huge number of cases in the united states. >> that's possible but let's look at new york city as a case example, wolf. they started preparing on july 28th. very shortly after cdc issued an

alert and got together between the health department and local hospitals and said let's work together on this and let's have conference calls and meet in person and how we are dealing with the situation. other places really need to look at that as an example of starting early on to prepare in case there is a case of ebola. >> you're working, doctor, to develop an ebola vaccine. how close are you and your team? >> we are developing antibodies as a passive vaccine and a therapy. we are working on a different strain than in west africa. i would say with we are three to five years out having something that could be put into human beings. >> three to five years out? >> which is very -- >> to deal with a virus in west africa, is that what you're saying? >> well, no. what we are working is

therapeutics for the other strains of ebola. we are part of the con -- go ahead. >> i'm sorry for interrupting but why hasn't there been a vaccine discovered yet? people have known about ebola since the '70s. >> well, there are experimental vaccines that do work in monkeys. they just haven't been tested on a large number of people yet. actually, my close colleague in the united states military, dr. john dye, has been involved with that for many years. so i do think we will have a very good vaccine soon. >> soon. you think within a few years? is that your definition of soon? >> yes. they started testing, i believe, this year. >> let's hope they can speed this up because clearly that is a huge problem globally.

doctor, is there any evidence that the ebola is being slowed down in any way in west africa? >> clearly a large number of cases are still not being reported and we are still not testing everyone. it does seem, from what the with w.h.o., has been saying the last couple of days in certain areas it's been rolled back. we have a decrease in the total number of cases but we are still seeing new regions of rural africa being affected which is really, really concerning. by no means under control and it's really important to say that the nurses here are front line, whatever airport screening we do, whatever preparedness we got, we will see more ebola in the u.s. unless we roll it back. >> the world health organization says now 9,000 cases in africa. more than 4,000 people are already dead and it seems every two or three weeks, to be doubling. is that accurate? >> that's what seems to be happening at the moment, so we are seeing what you would call

exponential growth. it is doing something like doubling and that is where we get this terrifying 1.4 million people dead. that is the worst case projection. i think we are now beginning to see the first hint of something like an adequate international response. the u.s. has absolutely led the way. we have had the first kind of large corporate public statements over the weekend talking about the chocolate industry and its effects and the first few celebrities really getting on board. david beckham for unicef. i think we will see a ground as well -- swel both of money available and organizations committing. this is a huge southwestern. we don't know any more cases of ebola in the united states to have this severely affect us. the chocolate is kind of a catchy example, chocolate crisis of people sit up and pay attention. close airports and huge effects on the economy not to mention if we don't look after the nurses,

and we have every reason to be working hard in west africa. >> i hope the world gets its act together and deals with with it. we have a lot more to discuss. i want you all to stand by. many questions coming into "the situation room." we will be right back. [ female announcer ] we help make secure financial tomorrows a reality

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we are following the breaking news on ebola. dallas hospital upgrading the condition of the nurse infected from the virus with stable to good. that is obviously good news. president obama today said the world still isn't doing enough to stop ebola from spreading. we are back with our panel of doctors. dr. yasmin, the world health

organization said today the ebola death rate has risen from 70% and up from 50%. is ebola more deadly than we thought? >> this is a deadly disease ever since we discovered it in 1976. the death rate is 50% to 90%. it's contingent on other human beings and what kind of response we have to outbreaks like this. certainly the death rate can be lowered if we don't have any delays in diagnosis and don't have any delays in treating people. we need to do that as quickly as possible so i disagree with what the doctor said earlier about perhaps we are seeing an adequate response. i don't think that looking back on this in years to come, we will ever be able to say anything about this response was adequate and that is why we are seeing this increase in the death rates. >> doctor, let me have you respond. go ahead. >> i completely agree with yasmin. the point i was making we are

seeing something like what need to be done. we are seeing, for the first time, large scale military deployment of resources but no question at all. basically one private organization has sheltered the burden of almost the care. doctors without borders. no, she is absolutely correct in that and i think we will look back on this as a total catastrophe. we should be learning massive lessons about global health. >> where is the rest of the world? we know the u.s. is deploying about 4,000 troops to go over there to liberia and deal with this issue. where is the rest of the world, dr. labell? >> i know in israeli they are also sending a team i believe to liberia and guinea to help out also. what i think we are seeing is that to sum it up in brief, this is the 9/11 of the infectious disease world and i think the world is ill prepared to understand the magnitude of a

disease like this. a deadly disease like this on an unprepared population, so i think the world has not responded in the way it needs to. we need a massive outpowering of aid and support for the people of west africa to really stem this deadly disease. >> is it fair, dr. yasmin, we really don't know much about ebola? >> that is fair to say, wolf. we have only discovered this in 1976, had about 20 or so outbreaks since then but we have to question why don't we know more about this disease? is it because of the people it affects or the countries it affects and why have we seen such big cuts in medical research funding the past few years and now scrambling for a vaccine. they are looking for a vaccine and developing one since 2001. had they not had the consistent cuts in funding we may have been years ahead and may have had an ebola vaccine to use right now. >> let me ask dr. labell. do you agree with dr. yasmin on

th that? >> i agree. the funding is not there. i don't think there are not verologists. i think we need to do more in terms of the infectious disease community as a whole. we just need to put a lot more resources into infectious disease. we lost a lot of capacity over the ages because we thought we congress converted ma-- conquer many diseases but we haven't. >> i was going to ask the doctor, there is a real nightmare scenario out there that this virus could evolve into more dangerous capacity, right? >> i think it's very reasonable to ask whether it's already evolved. i mean, it does seem to be a strain that is more transmittable between people than previous strains. there are other factors as well. i think this is a product of poverty and neglect of that region.

we do wonder already if this is a new kind of strain. i think the idea it may become airborne which a few weeks ago looked like a ridiculous question. no virus has ever changed its mode of transmission before. in the context of nurses with personal protective gear on getting infected and with the high numbers of infected health care workers we have seen in africa, at least worrying about large droplet infections seems to be reasonable to be concerned about right now. what you should be worried about is the inability of the global system to control a disease that should be relatively straightforward to control. we are seeing a total inadequacy of our ability to manage this disease. >> doctor, you're in dallas and expert on infectious diseases. what caused this 26-year-old young nurse to be infected with ebola? >> wolf, in my previous experience of investigating infectious outbreaks in hospitals, sometimes you never find the answer to that question. and that is concerning,

particularly in this instant because we haven't found that one incident that caused the infection, it means we have to cross that net really wide and means other health care workers may have made a similar mistake, if a mistake was made or been under the same situations and they could potentially become victims of the very virus they are trying to treat. >> dr. lobel, do you believe it is possible more ebola cases in the united states? >> i'm pretty certain there will be because as the number rises in west africa, there will be spillover and it's not because people are not trying. it's just things happen and it's very difficult to keep everything out of the united states. but we do need better screening certainly at the airports which i think is inadequate at the present time. >> the screening of airports. doctor, weigh in quickly on that. more screening needs to be done to keep people out of the united states? is that what you believe as well? >> i think it's very important

screening people to stop them from getting on planes if they are at risk having of having ebola. with what when he don't know in that closed environment is people to get infected on the plane and don't need people worried about that either. screening when you get off a plane is massively time consuming and we know from other epidemics it doesn't catch many people and in those situations it didn't catch anyone. i cannot see how we will stop having more cases in the u.s. unless we roll this back and the others two have said very, very clearly, we are not doing nearly enough. people should be giving their own money and supporting the government efforts very, very strongly. >> doctors, thanks very much. excellent information. unfortunately, it's a horrible, horrible situation that we are covering right now and we will stay in close touch with all of you. ahead, planning a long-term strategy to defeat isis but as president obama huddles with key members of his global coalition.

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explosions rock the syrian boa board town of kobani. the jihadists are advancing in syria as well as in iraq where stuart sources now say they have surrounded an iraqi air base. president obama met with coalition defense leaders today, made it clear it will be a very difficult fight. we have full coverage beginning with our chief national security responsibility jim suito.

>> reporter: they believe they have strategic momentum and isis is the most pressing terror threat it is not the only one. the president has convened a coalition of some 60 countries and 22 of them represented today but so far no visible virkts when you look at iraq, another iraqi base coming under attack and cobanny holding, but only tenuously. >> reporter: leaning down from coalition war planes, precision-guided weapons, 23 air strikes over iraq and syria yesterday and today. the busiest campaign so far as it conveniented 22 military chiefs from 22 countries at joint base andrews, president obama learned of a tough fi