is already at emory university hospital in atlanta down the street from cdc headquarters. where dr. kent brantly and nancy writebol were treat eed successfully. a doctor who was flown in last month from sierra leone. meantime, nbc camera man ashoka mukpo is recovering at the university of nebraska medical center in omaha. the same high-tech facility that helped dr. richard sakra recover. there's a fourth similar unit in montana. the facilities have never had a person to person infection like we are seeing in dallas. >> knowing what i know, i would try anything and everything to refuse to go there to be treated. i would feel at risk by going there. if i don't actually have ebola, i may contract it there. >> and today, four more u.s. airports in addition to jfk are beginning that extra screening for passengers who traveled to the states from west africa. they impacts about 150 people a

day. that is roughly 13,000 foreign visa holders living in liberia, sierra leone, and guinea. any person possibly exposed to ebola should not board a commercial flight. they're calling it controlled movement. this after the cdc slammed that second nurse for boarding a flight with a low-grade fever. her temperature was 99.5, below the cdc's threshold. that is why she called them before boarding that flight. they said, go ahead. seven people in ohio are now in voluntary quarantine with no ebola symptoms after being in contact with vincent. this hour, dallas county officials are holding a special meeting. they're expected to declare a local emergency that could include special housing for those 75 different hospital workers who are being monitored. we start, though, on the hill with luke russert. and you've been watching this since noon all along with us. give us some of the highlights. >> reporter: well, abby, in a

hearing just under three hours, you saw quite an appearance, shall we say of folks who made it back from the campaign trail to actually participate in that hearing. cory gardner, two people with senate campaigns did appear. the main thing was how political it got. that seems to have been the partisan fault line here between republicans and democrats. calling for that travel ban, going after dr. frieden as to why they have not enforced it or brought it forward or considered it. and why -- whether or not he's advised the white house to take it under consideration. listen to his answers from the gop. >> borders can be porous. we won't be able to check them for fever when they leave, when they arrive. we won't be able to do as we do currently to take a detailed

history to see if they were exposed when they arrive. when they arrive, we wouldn't be able to impose quarantine as we now can if they have high-risk contact. we wouldn't be able to obtain detailed locating information which we do now, including not only name and date of birth, but e-mail addresses, cell phone numbers, address, addresses of friends so that we could identify and locate them. we wouldn't be able to provide all of that information as we do now to state and local health departments so they can monitor them under supervision. we wouldn't be able to impose controlled release, conditional release on them. >> so there you hear dr. frieden giving the reasons as to why a travel ban would not be conducive to protect the united states. saying it would prohibit his agency's ability to monitor who exactly is coming into the country, what their symptoms are. that was backed up by the commissioner of the customs and border control. saying, if we were to go down

that path, people would find other ways to sneak into the country. other points i found interesting within the hearing, nih said they really only had two beds they were able to have the biocontainment necessary to treat ebola. they're, of course, going to get nurse pham later today. and lastly, though, seems that from the conversations that these folks have with these members of congress in that hearing that we are at the beginning of the beginning of how this will work within the united states. the u.s. has to be on heightened alert. this is still very much a problem in western africa. there's this idea that we have it somewhat under control, but the cdc head saying that we expect the possibility of there being more cases to be certainly something that we could keep an eye on. and there's no real clear sense of when this threat ends, or at least comes down a little bit from the level it is right now. so not exactly reassuring at the end of the day. >> all right. luke russert uncovering all of

this on capitol hill. thank you for that. we want to head right to the white house. the president has canceled another day of his schedule to monitor and oversee the situation here. i want to get to kristen welker. what can you tell us about what you're hearing from the white house as they look over a hearing that luke was telling us. focused a lot on the punitive criticism that there should be some sort of better travel ban. that that is the way out for us. >> well, the white house continues to express confidence in the director of the cdc and also continues to insist that they are not considering a travel ban. press secretary josh earnest got tough questions about that, as well. the administration believes putting a travel ban in place would only inhibit the u.s.'s ability to fight ebola in west africa and aid in the efforts to contain the disease and make it more difficult to screen people. the message you're getting from the white house from the cdc is that the u.s. is prepared to

deal with this and that the chances of an outbreak here in the united states are very small. take a listen to what josh earnest had to say. >> we continue to believe that the -- that the risk of a widespread outbreak in the united states is exceedingly low. that said, the cdc has taken very seriously their responsibility at the direction of the president of the united states, to communicate in a detailed fashion with hospitals all across the country about what precautions and what measures they should put in place in advance in the unlikely event, just based on the odds that they have to care for an ebola patient. what the cdc is focusing on right now is making sure that the best possible advice about protocols are being communicated to medical professionals all across the country. >> now, as you mentioned at the top, president obama did cancel a second day of travel today to deal with this crisis. it underscores the sense of

urgency here at the white house and also, it gives you the sense the white house is acknowledging there needs to be a more robust federal response. president obama yesterday met with his cabinet secretaries, announced that s.w.a.t. teams would be dispatched within 24 hours of a patient being diagnosed wit ed with ebola. he'll be reaching out to members of congress as well as foreign leaders. the administration trying to reassure americans while at the same time make sure the cases are being dealt with properly and making sure the mistakes that have been broadly acknowledged don't get repeated. back to you guys. >> kristen welker at the white house, thank you so much as always. let's head to dallas and nbc's craig melvin. i know the cdc, they've been looking into exactly how these two nurses on the front lines there were infected. have they found anything so far? >> no. as we just heard during that hearing, they're trying to figure out precisely how these nurses were exposed.

we know that both of them did spend obviously some time caring for thomas duncan. both of them came in contact with his body fluids. we also know that both of them spent time caring for him on the 28th and 29th and the 30th. and those are the three days that they believe that the nurses became infected. let's talk about nina pham here specifically. we found out during that hearing that her condition is stable, reasonably well is the language that was used there by the head of the nih. we know she was going to be transferred from here in dallas to the nih later today. at this point, we don't know precisely when that's going to happen. i can tell you, she's not left here. i also just got a statement from texas health presbyterian a short time ago on the transfer, the transferring of nina pham. and keep in mind with nina pham leaving, once she's gone, there won't be any ebola victims at this particular hospital. so i'll just read you a part of

the statement we just got from the hospital. we believe that transferring nina to the national institutes of health is the right decision with the medical professionals. sidelined for continuous monitoring, it is in the best interest of the hospital employees, nurses, physicians and their community to give the hospital an opportunity to prepare for whatever comes next. and that language is important because it sort of echoes the sentiment i got this morning from the county executive who basically said they would prefer not having more than one ebola patient in this hospital at a time. they essentially want to make room. should they get more patients here in dallas over the next few days, and we've heard from a number of folks there's a high probability that is something that's going to happen. should that happen, they want to be able to have space for them here. and they only have three beds here. they have three beds, we're told, three beds that can

accommodate someone infected with ebola. we know about the beds at nih, in nebraska, and emory. right now, only ten isolation units in this country that the cdc has said if it's necessary, obviously, some other rooms can be outfitted. but that is something that i don't think a lot of folks probably knew before, maybe 24 hours ago, guys. >> all right, craig melvin in dallas. thank you very much for that report. many of the questions this afternoon at the hearing focused on the response in dallas where two nurses who treated that deceased patient, thomas eric duncan have come down with the virus. the head of the hospital admitted this afternoon that medical personnel had no actual ebola training before duncan was admitted. one of the nurses, amber vincent was cleared by the cdc to fly this past weekend after she self-reported a low-grade fever. many americans can't stop wondering if dallas is an isolated incident or if other

hospitals in the u.s. are doomed for the same fate if they're presented with an ebola case. right now, there are just four medical centers in america fully equipped to handle a patient with a total of just ten beds, two of those currently occupied. let's turn our coverage now to the former president of the national foundation for infectious diseases. dr. william shaft at vanderbilt university and mary o'neil, a professor of health policy and dean at columbia university's school of nursing. emory has treated several ebola patients with none of their health care workers catching the virus themselves. what are they doing right? and what -- and the things they are doing right can they be replicated at other places? >> well, i think the things they're doing right can be replicated. but a word about all these four biocontainment centers. they were specially funded by the united states government. they have a nice accommodate in

architecture. so they're especially well-prepared to take care of these patients. we at vanderbilt have been training our own personnel in the emergency room and our intensive care units and if such a person came to our doors, we'd feel we could take care of them effectively and safely. it would require a lot of attention, but we think we can do that. and i'm sure there are many other hospitals across the country who feel the same way. >> well, mary, with regard to the training and the preparation, matt lauer had a pretty remarkable interview with a nurse from texas health presbyterian about how unprepared they were for this crisis. let's take a listen. >> i would imagine when you have a possible ebola patient walking into an emergency room given all the attention that had been paid to the ebola crisis and the fear of it coming into the united states that it would be some kind of code red that there be a lockdown that emergency

protocols would be put immediately into place. is that what you experienced? >> well, first, i think we've all been watching too much tv. because we never talked about ebola and we probably should have. >> you never talked about it prior to mr. duncan arriving? >> no. we never had a discussion. gave us an optional seminar to go to. just informational, not hands on. and it wasn't even suggested we go. it wasn't, you know, something they said, you know, you really should try to make it. it was, i believe, only offered once if not twice. we never were told what to look for. and i just don't think that any facility in this country's prepared for that at this time. >> does that surprise you what she's saying there? she's saying basically they had little to no preparation. one informational session, they never discussed what they would

do if an ebola patient arrived there? does that surprise you? >> well, i think we have to understand there are hundreds and thousands of different kinds of risks that come before the nurses in these hospitals across our country. ebola was one that made the huge headlines and made a huge difference in the way we look at infection disease prevention in our e.r.s and icus in particular. but we didn't prepare for everything in detail, for every patient that comes into our e.r.s or icus. there are precautions, universal precautions that must be instituted in every hospital, every e.r., every icu. but we can't be prepared specifically if hundreds of thousands -- >> you say it's too high of a bar to expect every hospital in the country to be thoroughly prepared with ebola. we should be looking to the

facilities -- >> for the detailed and extensive care, yes, but every single hospital has to be prepared to understand what kind of patient can come through the door with kinds of risks that it presents to the personnel caring for them. i think the most important thing we have to remember looking at is this -- as it rolls out, it is going to be the nurses that will be the first line of defense. if anyone in an e.r., icu, or regular primary care center where someone might go with symptoms, it's the nurse that's going to do the intake history, touch them, going to take their blood pressure, their temperature, help them into the unit where they're going to be examined. it's the nurse who is going to see the undifferentiated patient first. he or she is going to be able to tell the next person to come in, the therapist, what might be going on. but when the patient's first seen by a nurse, there isn't any

prior warning. >> yeah. >> of course we're going to see if there are further instances of ebola showing up in health care personnel. we shouldn't be surprised if it's nurses. it's not because of lack of training. it's not because of lack of prevention. it's because they're the first line of defense. and that patient coming through the door -- >> and just to underscore the point you're making, though. when you say that, are you saying at some level the second guessing going on is perhaps misinterpreting this incident? saying that, well, obviously the nurse did something wrong or the health system's doing something wrong if anybody caught it. are you saying we're overdoing it? >> i think we have to be very, very careful that anything that comes out of an e.r. encounter can be inflammatory. anything. patients can be missed for all kinds of things in the e.r. encounters, not just ebola. and is there a sense of urgency

in the training of our nurses and physicians about being able to understand anything that comes before them could be something they're not expecting? in that they have to look at nuanced observations and careful procedures? what happened with the ebola is, to me, not a lack of training or discipline. it's just that we weren't ready for this kind of highly infected patient to show up unannounced in an e.r. and to be cared for in the best way possible. >> right. and i think we might have been told something different, doctor. i want to get to that, i want to listen to what lisa monaco had to say about this a couple weeks ago on october 3rd. >> and we now have this isolated case in texas. but we have a public health infrastructure and medical professionals throughout this country who are capable of dealing with cases if they present themselves. and as dr. frieden has said, we are very confident we can stop this and other cases in its

tracks. >> isn't this why many people are feeling anxious right now? we're told one thing and seems time and time again the next thing we know there's a headline proving that wrong. what should we be thinking at this moment? >> well, i think there have been glitches, but there are good spots, too. actually, the public health part, finding all those contacts, monitoring them carefully. that's going very, very well and by the book. and that will provide reassurance that this is not going to be an infection that spreads widely in the united states. the dallas event actually was a wake-up call for every hospital in the country. those who hadn't begun training certainly are. and we are reinforcing our training that we have done. so the events are evolving, but we're responding to them. i'm still very confident that the hospitals in this country can assess patients coming to the emergency rooms very,

very -- you know the question, where have you traveled is absolutely powerful in setting the stage and the public health response has been excellent so far. >> and that's a piece of this that is important and can get lost as -- and i want to broaden it a little bit. when you look at cdc numbers on all sorts of risks and infections, they looked between 1976 and 2006, a death from the flu. and they range from 3,000 to 49,000 deaths per year from the flu, which we know you can vaccinate, only about 46% of people got flu vaccinations last year. speak to us about where ebola fits in to the larger types of threats we face that we can treat in the united states? >> it's very, very difficult to overstate the importance of prevention and get the public's attention to taking their flu shots, for instance. when you look at how many

thousands died last year we're almost sure we're not going to get those kind of numbers with ebola in this country. people are far more interested in the high-profile kinds of things that could happen to them. and they're not as likely to follow up on the vaccinations for things that can be terribly disturbing in their health outcomes. i think it's important to know that not only nurses are on the front line of our public health prevention as well as acute care, they're the first people to see patients, the first ones to make a decision about them. we have to pay attention to making sure these individuals, these nurses are given every opportunity to take advantage of the prevention, to not be overworked or understaffed in order to prepare themselves to taking care of patients. and this is the time for the public to really think about nursing and how important they are, and to protect them. and by doing so, they're going to protect themselves.

>> that's a great reminder. the nurses are the ones on the front lines at the end of the day. thank you very much for being here. we appreciate your time. >> thank you. now, as we mentioned at the top of the show, talk of travel bans at today's hearing. and shocker, it's been a bit partisan. we'll debrief the politics of all of this, breaking news in "the cycle" continues after this. >> i think there are two major lessons. first, to prevent it at the source. if we had had the basic public health system in place in these three countries a year ago to find it, stop it and prevent it, it would be over already. and second, within our country, to continue to support hospital preparedness, community preparedness and fundamentally, the public health measures find, stop and prevent health threats. l tomorrows a reality for over 19 million people. [ alex ] transamerica helped provide a lifetime of retirement income. so i can focus on what matters most. [ female announcer ] everyone has a moment when tomorrow becomes real. transamerica.

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we continue with breaking news here on the heels of today's house hearing on ebola. both sides of the aisle agree

more needs to be done to stop its spread. the how we do is a classic function of your political world view. we're going to get right to that with michael shear at "time." how are you? >> doing well. how are you? >> i'm all right. you see a lot of people who don't know a lot about medicine. you could say neither do all of us up here, which is why you try to listen to some of the experts in the cdc. on the politics and the policy of this, though. it seems that small government critics of the president have a problem here because if you want more cdc funding, that's more government. if you want a travel ban, the government's going to enforce that. if you want a quarantine that is dealt with across state lines, well, that's the flovt federal government, as well. there aren't a lot of solutions here that don't involve a national federal approach to this, which sort of leads you back to the truism that there aren't a lot of libertarians in the ebola wards. >> i think even the libertarians and the ebola wars would argue the federal government is there to protect the country in times

of emergency. i don't think the rand pauls of the world will not be voting to fund the cdc response to this. even though they would argue there's lots of places to cut elsewhere in the cdc. i think you're right, democrats have pointed out and i think there's a clear argument here, and have been arguing for years that these cuts that have happened in recent years have had a real impact on their ability to prepare for not just ebola, but the next thing. and if you talk to a lot of the people at the agencies, the thing they fear most is not a disease like ebola, it's a pandemic flu, an aerial -- a virus that can be transmitted through the air, which was spread more rapidly. and there still is a lot of concern around something like that happening. >> yeah. there's a lot of folks on the libertarian side that aren't for universal health care. you need some sort of emergency response. we're giving our free health care to protect everyone else. >> yeah, it is a little bit uncomfortable.

they haven't talked about how calling for an ebola czar, for example, doesn't really fit with the small government philosophy. but michael, the big partisan divide in those hearings today was over whether or not there should be a travel ban. i want to take a listen to a little bit of a flavor of that with democrat henry waxman and fred-upton. >> we need a plan to treat those who are sick, to train health care workers, to safely provide care and to stop the spread of this disease here at home and at its source in africa. this includes travel restrictions or bans from that region beginning today. >> sealing people off in africa is not going to keep them from traveling. they'll travel to brussels as one of the people did and then into the united states. >> is this a sort of partisan divide that's making its way into the midterm campaign here? >> i think it's fair to say this is not an issue that naturally lends itself to partisan divisions just because everybody wants to stop this, everybody wants to do what they can right

now to deal with it. so you end up finding these smaller issues on which they can make their stand. what republicans want to do especially now a few weeks out from an election is make the case that the -- the obama administration is not doing enough, is not doing what it should do, and the obama administration is depending by all accounts on the best scientists in the field right now who are saying that, actually, doing that would be worse even though it's a little difficult to explain. let me explain why it's worse. and that's probably going to be buried a couple weeks out from an election, where you already have things like ebola being used on the stump. >> michael, you know, you watch this, and it seems like a stage for some folks to trot out their isolationism, or another chance to attack the president and his administration. the partisanization of the ebola conversation makes me want to pull my hair out. i don't know if it makes you

want to pull your hair out, too. >> you kind of feel sometimes watching these hearings, the whole thing is being put on for the pleasure of jon stewart and the daily show. he's hired a lobbyist and convened them all so he will be able to make fun of it tonight and tomorrow night. >> i hope that's what it is, michael. >> i haven't found the evidence. there's no smoking gun i've found. >> michael, you mentioned the elections being a few weeks away. i think it's important to talk about the mood of the country right now. the fact that if you look at any recent poll, the majority of the american people are feeling unprotected, not feeling safe, all under a democratic controlled government. and you think about the midterms, obviously, voter turnout is important. but many of those voters are going to vote based on the mood they have at that time. given it's only three weeks away, isn't this troubling for democrats? >> it is. and also because midterm elections tend to be decided not just on who people vote for but on turnout. who is motivated to coming to the polls. and there's an arctic to be made that the whole set of fear issues from isis to ebola could

motivate republican voters more than it motivates democratic voters. we don't know if that's the case. we'll have to wait and see. i think the other issue at play here was we're still in the middle of a decade of lost authority. people don't have trust in organizations of authority, the government, the media, you know, of hospitals to actually be able to do the things they need to do. and you've seen questions of competence come up several times over the last week where we get assurances that something is being taken care of properly and then the system fails and they have to do more assurances. i think it's probably good for the president not to be on the campaign trail right now or raising money for optic reasons. but it's also problematic that every few days he has to come out and give essentially the same statement about ebola he gave before, giving more assurances after the last assurances didn't play out the way he assured us it would be. >> yeah. and that's some of the politics of that, but also the political ethics for folks who want to

take it seriously. if there's an interesting thread in the hearings, it would be trying to balance some of these collective security concerns with individual rights. i mean, any time you talk about a mass travel ban or a mass quarantine. that's a fairly extreme measure. and the political philosophy question would typically be, do the needs of the society there, as we understand them or as the security experts can advise us outweigh the individual rights at stake? because people generally in our free society get to go where they want travel, where they want, do what they want even though we accept some measure of risk throughout our daily lives. >> with a few small exceptions, that hasn't been an issue yet in this case. there's an argument to be made it won't be with ebola. there are scenarios where you have a bigger pandemic of some sort, and you do have to do a mass quarantine, not just the 20 people they talked to over the last few days. but an entire region of a city. in which the issues become

incredibly complex. right now, most of the quarantines happening on the state level. the states have been inviting the cdc. president obama's not now saying to texas, you must accept our help and this hospital's being taken over by the national guard or by the military. but there are rules in place that do get incredibly tricky. >> yeah. and those lead to even bigger questions. thanks for joining us today. now, the president is poised to send more troops to the epicenter of the outbreak in africa. we'll speak to a former u.s. ambassador to the region who also served on the national security council in both the bush and clinton administration.

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home of the latest known patient to contract ebola. she's, of course, been moved from the texas hospital where she contracted the virus and is now being treated at emory university hospital in atlanta. nina pham will be moved to the national institute of health tonight. now, back in washington, it was an afternoon of grilling on the hill over the government's handling of the ebola crisis. to aid in the global response, the president is expected to sign an executive order at any time now to send additional troops to liberia. the national guard and reserve forces will help build treatment centers for ebola patients. and our next guest says the world can and should do more to stem this pandemic. and she would know a thing or two about this. robin sanders served as u.s. ambassador to several countries in west africa. she was ambassador to nigeria during the first outbreak of ebola and the congo. thank you so much. >> thank you. >> for being with us. we can talk all day about what

we could and should've done sooner. but we are here now. what should the u.s. and the world be doing? what would be most helpful? >> well, i think the main thing is to ensure that civil aviation authorities around the world, including bringing in the international group, so you have coordinated procedures around the world. a lot of the traffic from -- flight traffic from west africa is not direct traffic. really only three direct flights. people coming through europe, amsterdam, brussels, london, a number of other places. are we coordinated enough? are the procedures standard enough that we are checking people the same way through all of those transit points before they get to our port of entry? the other area that has been really bothering me and a lesson learned from nigeria is nigeria's also checking the ports and harbors. and i have not yet heard we have standard procedures for people coming in through our ports and our harbors. and i would add that we probably need to add that to the mix of things we're looking at. >> you reference nigeria which has had a very positive experience.

all right, we're going to talk more about that later. but talk a little bit about some of the cultural factors in guinea, sierra leone, liberia that have led to the outbreak getting out of control there. >> well, i think there are some lessons to be learned from the congo scenario. and i haven't quite seen those transferred. one of the main things i learned in congo is there is a food security issue that's related to ebola. ebola is generally, traditionally has been a species jump disease. so i would like to know what was the animal carrier that's either new in west africa or that's being introduced into west africa that was the original carrier to patient zero who reportedly is the 2-year-old in guinea. and i have not seen enough discussion on -- about that because you may still be dealing with that contaminated food source, protein source in the region. so you may have things being spread from person to person. but is there a -- an animal

carrier. generally it's bats, primates, gorill gorillas, for instance, monkeys, sometimes rats. >> so you're talking about people who don't get enough to eat that are turning to these sort of things that people don't typically eat and getting sick. >> alternative protein sources. it could have been done that way. sometimes these animals are used in traditional procedures or rituals or what have you. so i go back to the source. what was the original source that changed this pandemic from normally happening in central africa that is now moved it into west africa. and i'd like to add. i've been trying to figure that out for myself. and one of the things i saw up here for the climate change was the change in the migration of bats from central africa into probably west africa and other places. so i was wondering, and i don't have any scientific things, but just looking at it as an analyst, you know, was that the trend. was there a change in the migration patterns of the

traditional carriers that got introduced into the west africa scenario? >> interesting question there. >> if we don't answer the fundamentals of what introduced that into this new environment where it's never been before, then we're going to have a cyclical issue. in congo, it's cyclical. >> people are learning more about these african countries. as a statistical matter. if you look at a country like liberia, while a loss of life is terrible, it's not a top statistical threat there either. you look at main cause of death, things like malaria, hiv, tuberculost tuberculos tuberculosis. some of these are fairly treatable. what do we know about these nations and the kind of problems they're facing, some of which relate to poverty and education? >> well, i wanted to backtrack on the examples that you've given. and i think one of the reasons that west africa was caught by surprise quite a bit is that the early symptoms of ebola are very

similar to malaria. and since this was not a traditional disease for west africa so that when people started having these early symptoms, people thought it was normal malaria. it's very seasonal there, as well. so, yes, your points are right on, you know, health systems and others. but i still go back to my fundamental query, which is what was the origination of the disease into a region where it has never been before? >> indeed. well, ambassador, you talked about nigeria and nigeria has been a success story. they have been a model, they haven't had a new case now in over a month. what have they done right that we could learn from and other west african nations could learn as well? >> to respond early. they coordinated their civil aviation authorities around the country, they reached out to community and traditional leaders and to religious leaders, and i think fundamentally, which we see as a challenge here in the u.s. context is their communication ability to get the word out, to

know what they were dealing with. all of that happened rather quickly. and our context, i think we were behind the curve. i was feeling that also in july that we were really behind the curve on really communicating what the possibilities could be. >> right. >> we don't know how many people have died from this. we know that it's a much larger number than we think. some folks say it could be two or three times larger than the number we think. do you think that we will ever actually know how many people are dead, how many people have been infected? and how does it handicap our ability to deal with this crisis not knowing these actual numbers? >> well, i think that the numbers do play a role. i don't want to down play that, but i think because it was caught later in west africa, not knowing what it is that may have been people that were affected by ebola that we don't know they died of that cause. and if you look at even the case in dallas, mr. duncan, the warm that he helped apparently

according to everything i've read, he did not know that she was suffering from ebola. what we need to do, however, is focus on the hear and now, make sure we have enough clinics, enough trained health care workers, both there and here. doctors without borders, definitely want to give them a plug. they did a great job in congo. and maybe we need them to come and provide targeted training for some of our hospital centers, as well, particularly on decontamination when you're disrobing. >> well, ambassador, something nick christophe and others have been writing about, if we had invested on the front end, we could've saved a lot of money, more importantly, a lot of tragedy in west africa. do you think this ebola crisis will be a wake-up call to the u.s. and to the west that we need to invest on the front end in preventive measures here.

>> well, i think you have a lot of donors, including the united states that have been active in the health care system across the continent. i'm not sure that i would go as far as to say that in this -- hindsight is always 20/20. but for the first month or so that ebola was raging, nobody identified it in west africa as ebola. if it happens again, i think that will be the immediate response. people will know, okay, this is in our region, this is ebola. that might have helped, i don't know if it would have turned the tide to where we are today. yes, the health care systems in many of the countries are challenged. they've got a lot of ngo private sector assistance. and i think all of those things are important. i think as a collective wake-up call that, you know, you have this sense of universality of care across the united states. we clearly see that for something as new to our population as this, and to our health care providers who are, you know, tremendous, they do a terrific job, you really need to

have hands on training. you can't have, you know, links to look at and brochures to read. because you need the practical exercise of putting on this gear, taking it off and understanding what that feels like. one of the things that medicine or doctors without borders does well. they have this buddy system, i'm sure you've heard about that. the other thing is having a deep contamination procedure. i don't know if we're doing that. i do think that we can learn something from these organizations that have been there since the 1990s. responding to crises like ebola. >> yeah. and just a reminder, the president is sending in more troops to liberia. national guard troops and the reserve, so that is hopefully one step in the right direction. ambassad

ambassador, thank you very much for your insight and being with us today. still ahead, we'll circle back to the white house and capitol hill. stick with us. >> it's time for the "your business" entrepreneur of the week. greg is an independent brewer who started virtue cider three years ago, he's competing with major brewers in this rapidly growing beverage category. for more, watch "your business" at 7:30 on msnbc. >> visit openforum.com for ideas to help you grow your business. one thing i've learned is my philosophy is real simple american express open forum is an on-line community, that helps our members connect and share ideas to make smart business decisions. if you mess up, fess up. be your partners best partner. we built it for our members, but it's open for everyone. there's not one way to do something. no details too small. american express open forum. this is what membership is. this is what membership does.

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watching all afternoon. how is this playing? >> well, torre, you saw a lot of members of congress coming back for a hearing in the midst of s. they were not supposed to be in recess. they were supposed to be in recess and they were not supposed to be on the hill. this was unprecedented and it shows the severity of what ebola means to the united states. some things that jumped out in the meeting were a few. the politically contentious issue that divided the republicans and democrats is the idea of a travel ban. a lot of republicans saying there should be a travel ban from the west african countries and. we did that it would prohibit the united states from taking in more people infected with ebola. >> dr. frieden saying if we were to do that it would only encourage people to try to go to other countries where the ban would not be in place. it's bet hater that we keep the borders open and take the employ temperature of those people

coming in from west africa. that was number one. the doctor in texas, rather, that was originally responsible for treating mr. duncan, the ebola patient who died here in the united states, issuing an apology, being very forthright saying that in fact, the system had failed in texas. and we also heard something along the lines of that is when cdc director frieden when asked whether or not the second nurse infected with ebola should have gotten on the flight from texas to ohio saying she should not have gone on. it was a mistake by the cdc to say she was fine if she was underneath a certain temperature regarding fever. a few mistakes under here. >> we were expecting to hear more about was the administration lacking? why was the cdc lacking here and there? it turned into a battle into the travel ban that shows you that something like ebola can turn into politics on capitol hill. >> nothing too important to be

partisan. luke russert covering the hill and thank you so much as always and now back to the white house and nbc's kristin welker. any word on when the president is expected to issue that executive order? >> i was told it is going to be issued before the end of the day and that executive order would authorize the national guard troops to go over to liberia to help set up 17 treatment centers that the united states wants to have in place to deal with this crisis. here's what's already in place, guys. 565 u.s. troops now in liberia. in all, 4,000 u.s. troops will be sent to west africa to deal with the crisis there. the goal by mid-november is to have seven mobile testing labs set up and seven treatment centers and additional training facilities. we know that more than 4,000 lives have been taken in west africa due to this disease and there is a monetary toll. according to the world bank. it's going to cost the region

$32.6 billion by the end of 2015. prdz sa president obama said the key is to stop the disease from spreading in west africa. that's why you're seeing such a robust response on the part of the united states. president obama met, of course, with his cabinet secretaries yesterday and he tried to reassure the public and expressed his covenance in the way on deal with ebola here in the united states. take a listen to what he had to say. >> what we've been doing here today is reviewing exactly what's happened in dallas and how we're going to make sure that something like this is not repeated, and that we are monitoring, supervising, overseeing in a much more aggressive way exactly what's taken place in dallas initially and making sure that the lessons learned are then transmitted to hospitals and clinics all across the country. >> president obama acknowledged that there needed to be a more

robust, a more aggressive response on the part of the federal government and he announced that s.w.a.t. teams would now be dispatched within 24 hours of a patient getting diagnosed with ebola. we are told that he is going to meet again today with his cabinet secretaries, with his team that has been charged with dealing with this issue. he's also reaching out to members of congress as well as foreign leaders as they continue to monitor this here, and i just want to make one more point. president obama canceled a second day of planned campaign stops which underscores the urgency here and it's very rare for him to cancel a trip. it underscores the urgency here and luke mentioned the urgency that exists from capitol hill and maybes came back from recess. >> a follow-up on that and is this likely going to have an impact on the schedule in the days to come. we were talking about the mid term a few weeks away and i'm assuming this will likely change some of that. >> it certainly could.

it is, again, very rare for him to cancel travel. . he tries to avoid it at all costs, in part, if you talk to white house officials because he doesn't want to send the message that there is some type of crisis going on. having said that, due to the nature of the ebola situation here, the fact that you had a second health care worker who was diagnosed with the disease yesterday, president obama made the determination to cancel his travel as they approach his schedule day to day, i think it's going to be fluid and that's the way to think about it and you indeed might see some of his trips canceled or postponed. that is within the realm of possibility and we haven't gotten any announcements of future travel being canceled that the point. >> kristen welker, luke russert, thank you very much for that report. we'll be back with a final word right after this. >> have you had that conversation? >> we've had discussions on the issue of travel to and from west africa. >> and have you all ruled it out some. >> i can't speak for the white

house. >> you could speak for the c dishing c. if you were in those conversations, maybe they had their conversations without you, but it if you were involved in conversations with the white house about a travel ban did they rule it out? are they still considering it? >> from the cdc's perspective, we will consider anything. >> so are you going to answer the question about your conversations with the white house? >> we -- >> is the the white house considering a travel ban? >> i can't speak part white house. that's right. it's just that i'm worried about you know "hidden things..." ok, why's that? no hidden fees, from the bank where no branches equals great rates. come from all walks of life. if you have high blood sugar, ask your doctor about farxiga. it's a different kind of medicine that works by removing some sugar from your body. along with diet and exercise, farxiga helps lower blood sugar in adults

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response to ebola. it is thursday, 16th, this is "now. >> people are frightened about getting ebola. ♪ ♪ >> unfortunately, in our initial treatment of mr. duncan we made mistakes and we are deeply sorry. >> one of my main concerns, dr. frieden is do we know yet how the the two health care wokkers in dallas contracted the virus? the investigation is ongoing. we've identified some possible causes. >> so we don't know? >> we don't know. >> i get that. we don't know. >> this is a wake-up call for ameri america. we cannot nih funding to stagnate any longer. if you make personal contact with bodily fluids why is an airliner at the airport scrubbed four times. >> i understand that people are very concerned about ebola. it's a scary disease.