inside story of how dr. kent brantly, the first ebola patient good night, everybody. >> i woke up that morning and really i just felt a little off. >> reporter: for most of us that might mean the flu. not him. in the back of your mind was there the possibility? >> there was always the possibility. >> reporter: the possibility of being infected with one of the world's deadliest viruses. >> he said, "kent, bud, i've got your test result. i'm really sorry to tell you it's positive." >> reporter: tonight an exclusive interview with dr. kent brantly, the first ebola patient ever treated -- and cured -- on american soil. >> i've never had a terminal illness before. i've never faced death. >> reporter: he'd risked his life, going to africa to heal the sick. now he was the one who needed help. >> how am i going to tell amber? >> reporter: his wife and family were thousands of miles away.

>> i knew how it ends. >> reporter: but his faith was as close as ever. >> i said, "god, i know you can save me. i know you can." >> reporter: we'll take you inside the race to save his life. >> it was a freight train coming down the railroad track. >> reporter: on an exclusive tour of the "hot zone." and meet the people who risked their lives to save his. >> the number one thing on my list was to walk out of that room, and give my wife a hug. >> reporter: an nbc news exclusive. "saving dr. brantly: the inside story of a medical miracle." 3 f2 exclusiva de nbc, salvando luckiest men alive and dr. kent brantly probably thinks there are two things for you -- no that. -- for that. a devout christian and a physician, he's a man of both.

he was serving as a missionary doctor in liberia when he became infected. dr. brantly and the brave medical team that helped to save his life, tell for the first time the extraordinary story of how he was cured. ï ¿>> reporter: there was a time during those days in liberia when you were really sick, that doctors didn't think you would make it through one of those nights. were you aware of that? >> yeah. >> reporter: did they talk to you about it? >> i don't think they ever said, "kent, i think you're about to die." but i felt like i was about to die. >> reporter: kent brantly was fighting for his life because he was committed to saving the lives of others. he's forever grateful to the heroic doctors and nurses who went to extremes to save him. and most of all to god serving others has always been his life's mission an expression of his faith. talk to me about faith. talk to me about the role it plays in your life.

>> faith is central to my life. i've grown up with strong christian, godly parents, who were the children of strong christian, godly parents and -- >> reporter: so, it's in your dna? >> yeah. >> reporter: growing up in the indianapolis area, he was a 17-year-old student at a christian academy when he went on his first mission as an aid worker to kenya. in the years to come, there was no stopping him. correct me if i'm wrong, but there was tanzania, haiti, uganda, nicaragua. what am i leaving out? >> guatemala, el salvador. >> reporter: one of those trips inspired him to choose a career in medicine. >> i went on a mission trip for a couple of weeks to honduras and spent some time with a medical missionary. and i said, "i think i can do this." >> reporter: in honduras, kent met a nursing student named amber carol.

they married in 2008 as kent was finishing his medical degree. there's this great picture of your wedding day. what was going through your mind on that day? >> i was just overfilled with joy. he's the man i knew from when i met him that i wanted to spend the rest of my life with kent brantly. >> reporter: in october 2013, the brantlys, now the parents of ruby, 5, and stephen, 3, began a two year mission in monrovia, liberia, run by the evangelical christian aid group "samaritan's purse." they say life there was good at first. >> we had so much fun. we lived real near the ocean. >> reporter: the brantly family developed new friends to go along with their new life. among them, nancy writebol, an american missionary aid worker. >> nancy was like a grandmother to our children. nancy writebol had worked with a lot of missionary doctors. but even among heroes, kent brantly stood out. >> kent is a wonderful.

he's brilliant. he is a bril yapt -- brilliant young doctor, and passionate. >> reporter: then, in march, everything changed. the brantly family was at a picnic with friends. >> and somebody sat down beside me and said, "hey, did you hear? did you hear the news about ebola in guinea? they had an ebola outbreak right next to the liberian border. >> reporter: an ebola outbreak. perhaps the most frightening phrase in modern medicine. a deadly virus spread by bodily fluids. at least 3500 cases have been reported in west africa. including about 2000 deaths. by early april the first cases surfaced in northern liberia. now it's real. now it's close. and how did that change your mindset and the mindset of everybody around you? >> we all were on high alert. >> reporter: although they lacked advance facilities to confront the threat of ebola, kent and his colleagues did what they could to prepare for the worst. >> our isolation unit was set up in the hospital chapel, so a

small building. we had hand-washing stations with bleach solution everywhere. and we had all of our personal protective equipment that was provided by samaritan's purse on the outside of that unit, and -- >> reporter: what is that made up of? >> heavy-duty rubber boots, head-to-toe suit, two pairs of surgical gloves that we duct taped around our wrists, a pair of goggles to cover our eyes and nose, and a heavy rubber apron to cover all of that as another layer of protection. >> reporter: then, on june 11th, ebola arrived at kent brantly's tiny hospital clinic in the person of a young woman named teresa. >> she was about 30. 27 maybe. >> reporter: and how sick was she when you first saw her? >> very, very sick. she actually came in an ambulance with her uncle, who was also sick with ebola. it took us about two hours to get everything ready, to mobilize everyone. and during that two hours, her

uncle died in the ambulance. so we went from having two ebola patients to having one. >> reporter: i would imagine the moment you opened your door of your hospital to that first patient, everything changes. >> it did. there's a lot of fear around ebola. all of us have to admit that. and as i went up to the patient with my liberian colleague, i knew that was a critical moment for how the rest of our treatment of ebola patients would go. >> reporter: you walked up to that patient though in full protection. >> in full protective equipment. and i bent down, and i held out my hand to her, and i said, "teresa, my name is dr. brantly. we're here to take care of you. we're gonna take very good care of you. nice to meet you." and that allowed my liberian colleague to also overcome that fear and say, "okay, this is a person. this is not a disease. this is a person." >> reporter: within days, teresa was dead.

one by one patients streamed into the hospital and died. >> reporter: for the first month and a half, we had one survivor. >> reporter: out of how many patients? >> maybe 45. >> reporter: it was hard on the missionaries' families as well. >> sitting at home, i was fine. it was when he would call and say, "i'm on my way home," that i would start thinking, "oh, is it safe for him to do that?" but i knew if he felt that it was safe for him to do that, then it was. he would come to the door and i'd just send him straight to the shower, "change your clothes you can't touch anybody until you detox." >> reporter: so by july 20th, when the family was scheduled to fly to texas for a wedding, amber welcomed the break. but once again, kent chose to put others ahead of himself. and amber and the kids got on that plane and you didn't. why didn't you go? >> with the workload that we had at that time, i couldn't afford to be gone for three weeks.

i was going to follow them nine days later and be gone for a week and a half and be back. >> reporter: i would imagine amber and the children leaving had to be a very emotional moment. >> you know we didn't think that this is goodbye for the last time or we could face tragedy between now and the next time we see each other. we'd been living in this for a month and half now, and everything was fine, and we expected things to continue as they were. so i had no clue that was coming was coming. >> reporter: coming up -- his clinic would soon have another new patient. dr. brantly himself. but he and amber wouldn't know for sure whether it was ebola for a very long 72-hours. what was that period of time like? >> i was really nervous. i kind of just drifted through the days.

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>> reporter: it was a living nightmare. hundreds of people dying from a vicious ebola outbreak marching across liberia and west africa. at the epicenter dr. kent brantly, who stayed behind when his family went on a vacation back to the united states. he saw ebola's ravages every day, patients vomiting blood, suffering from severe diarrhea and from organ failure, dying in front of his eyes. you said, i held the hands of countless individuals as this terrible disease took their lives away from. them. i witnessed the horrors first hand and i can still remember every face, every name. that's a lot to live with. >> it is. but you know these were people that we were trying to serve medically. trying to give them the best chance for survival. but we were also trying to

minister to them spiritually, trying to support and encourage them. >> reporter: in the makeshift isolation unit run by the missionary aid group samaritan's purse, kent and his team were exhausted. yet one night, to fight the misery, kent sang to a patient who'd just lost two daughters. >> and as i sang that song to her, she just gave a head nod of affirmation and squeezed my hand. unfortunately she passed away a few days later, but for those few days she had some level of peace, some level of dignity and comfort. >> reporter: what was the stress put on the staff? how many hours were you working? i mean, were people having a chance to take any breaks? or was this simply so intense that there was no relief? >> we agreed to split 12 hour shifts, but those 12 hour shifts usually turned into 16 or 18-hour shifts as there was always more to do. because there were patients to be tended to in the hospital or patients to be evaluated in the emergency room that the nurses were concerned might be ebola

patients. so that was a very stressful and trying time. >> reporter: it became even more so on wednesday, july 23rd. it was three days after kent had kissed his family goodbye at the airport. >> i woke up that morning, and really i just felt a little off. i took my temperature and it was 100 i think. >> reporter: as you took your temperature feeling a little off in the back of your mind was there was a possibility? >> there was always the possibility. >> reporter: a possibility terrifying but remote, that somehow he had contracted ebola. >> but i really thought, "i probably have malaria. i probably forgot to take my malaria medicine for a few days. we had been working night shifts. there were a lot of mosquitoes. >> reporter: yet a few hours later, his fever rising kent tested himself for malaria. the result was negative.

and in this strange world of ebola, that was not good news. he called another doctor at the hospital. >> he said, "okay, i'll send somebody over." and what he meant was, "i'm going to send somebody over to suit up in full personal protective equipment, and come in, and draw your blood so we can do an ebola test." >> reporter: can you describe how odd a feeling that was? you were the guy in that protective suit for all those months treating the other patients. and here, the door opens, and two of your colleagues wearing that suit, full protective gear, are coming in to draw your blood. >> yeah i mean we joked back and forth as they came in. i had pretty big veins. i said, "you know, i can draw this for you if you want me to, if you don't want to do it." >> reporter: kent usually called amber every day, but not this day. >> he purposely did not call me till the next day when his first ebola test had come back negative. and he called to tell me he was sick but his test was negative.

but he didn't want me worrying in the meantime. >> reporter: kent needed one more blood test 72 hours later to be confident he didn't have ebola. and as the hours ticked by, he kept feeling worse. and what was that period of time like between that negative first test and waiting for the returns of the next test? >> i was really nervous. i just kind of drifted through the days. >> reporter: kent was getting weaker by the minute. overwhelmed by nausea he could barely stand up. as a precaution, no one was allowed in without protective gear. these are photos of his house under quarantine. on saturday, july 26th. three days after kent began feeling sick, one of his doctors knocked on the bedroom window, peered inside and called his name. >> and he said, "kent, bud, i've got your test result. i'm really sorry to tell you

it's positive." that was a very surreal moment. i was sick. my mind was a little cloudy. but my first comment was, "okay, what's next? what's the plan? and how am i going to tell amber?" >> reporter: coming up -- the power of love. >> i'm too young to become a widow. my kids need their daddy. >> reporter: and faith. >> i said, "god, i know you can save me. i know you can." obile. and to make it easier, we'll even buy out your whole family's contract. the sprint family share pack up to 10 lines for $100 a month

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>> reporter: it was july 26th. in liberia dr. kent brantly had just received life-altering news. he'd tested positive for ebola, one of the world's deadliest viruses.

his wife and children were in texas. when did you make the phone call to amber? >> it was pretty quickly after that. and to be honest with you, i don't remember that phone call. >> reporter: but amber will never forget it. >> i had worried all day. then when he did call to tell me he had ebola -- i don't know, i can't describe that. i was -- i knew it was coming. i'd seen him treat these people. he had already been diagnosed. and i knew how it ends. i knew how everyone had ended up so far. so i was scared. >> reporter: amber, a nurse, yearned to be at her husband's bedside, but kent considered it a blessing that his family was more than 6,000 miles away and safe. >> that would have been an

overwhelming mental burden, if i had woken up sick, laying in bed next to my wife, with one of my children snuggled up next to me. >> reporter: have you in your mind, kent, figured out to the best of your ability, how you were exposed to the virus? >> i am thoroughly, 100% convinced i did not get exposed to ebola in the isolation unit. our process was safe, but i was still having to evaluate suspected cases as they presented to the emergency room. and i tried to protect myself to an appropriate level, but i know there were times where maybe i didn't have full protection while i talked to the patient or while i counseled their family and maybe put the arm around the daughter's shoulder. >> reporter: no matter how he got it, he was now gravely ill and alone. kent put his life in god's hands. >> as i sat there facing my own

possible death from ebola, i said, "god, i know you can save me. i know you can. but even if you don't, i want to be faithful to you. i won't deny you." >> reporter: his faith would be tested even further. kent wasn't alone in his fferin. nancy writebol, the woman kent's children considered a surrogate grandma, was also sick. the same day kent was diagnosed, nancy received a double-dose of shocking news from her husband, david. >> he said, "nancy, kent has got ebola." and my heart sank. and then david said, "and so do you." and david went to hug me and put his arms around me. and i knew how dangerous that was.

and i just said, "dave, don't. just don't." >> reporter: both nancy and kent had no illusions about what lay ahead. >> so, as i developed bloody diarrhea and vomited some blood and developed a rash and my eyes got red, i was still looking at it through my doctor eyes, thinking, "okay, what symptom's going to come next?" >> reporter: well, let me ask you this. as a doctor who treated all those patients, had you ever treated a patient who had that type of symptom who survived? >> i hadn't. we had only had one survivor at that point. he never had any of the symptoms. everyone who deals with ebola knows that once you start having hemorrhagic symptoms, your chance of survival goes down drastically. >> reporter: he had one lifeline, daily calls to amber via facetime. she had to be wondering, and you have to be wondering, "will i ever see her again?" >> we spent a lot of time on those next few days staring at each other on the computer and

talking. my memory of details of a lot of that time, it's foggy. she was more cognizant of that than i was, that this might be the last time i see him. >> reporter: there was a time during those days in liberia when you were really sick, that doctors didn't think you would make it through one of those nights. were you aware of that? >> yeah. >> reporter: did they talk to you about it? >> i don't think they ever said, "kent, i think you're about to die." but i felt like i was about to die. i remember very clearly laying in my bed with labored breathing, breathing very fast and having a hard time breathing. and my body was shaking, just violent shivering rigors. and i couldn't control it.

and i said to the nurse who was taking care of me, "i'm sick. i have no reserve. and i don't know how long i can keep this up." >> reporter: back in the united states, amber could only pray. was there a particular prayer that brought you comfort? >> i was real incapable of coming up with any other words on my own except, "lord, please, they need him." that's what i could pray. that's all i could pray. "they need him." "i'm too young to become a widow. my kids need their daddy." while amber and so many others prayed, the race to save dr. brantly had begun. coming up -- help from the heavens above. an unprecedented rescue operation. and a shot seen around the world. >> i was so proud of him. i watched him come off that

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>> reporter: as dr. kent brantly fought for his life in liberia, franklin graham, the president of samaritan's purse, the charity kent had gone to liberia to work with, was nearly 8,000 miles away in alaska. he was devastated to hear dr. brantly had contracted ebola. >> it had to be, honest with you, one of the toughest days of my life because i knew what ebola was. and it was a death sentence. and my heart sank. >> reporter: graham decided they needed to bring kent back to the united states. >> he's coming home. and he's coming to the best medical care that the world has to provide. >> reporter: no one had ever flown an ebola patient to this country. graham needed to get clearance from multiple government agencies.

that would take several days. he was terrified they might not get a specially equipped medical plane to kent in time. >> the clock is ticking. we thought we were gonna lose him. >> reporter: and then in liberia, brantly's doctors were able to get their hands on an experimental drug from america. it was called "z-mapp." it had never been tested on humans, and there was only enough medicine for one person. the way the story was played here in the states, kent, was that they came to you and they said, "we have one treatment course." and you said, "give it to nancy writebol." is that what happened? >> so that did happen on the wednesday when i had been sick for a week. and on that day, i was starting to feel a little stronger. i thought i was improving. so this was not a heroic gesture of sacrificing myself on behalf of nancy. i'm getting out of here, back to

america, and i want her to survive. >> reporter: all right, gallows humor here. there was no part of this story, i wondered when i heard this story. so it was, "let her have it because she's sicker," it wasn't, "this is experimental. i'm not taking that. give it to nancy." >> right. no, there was -- i was more scared that i was going to lose my friend than i was of my own death. >> reporter: nancy agreed to be the first person to try z-mapp... >> the serum was frozen when it got to us and so they put it underneath my arm to defrost it naturally. and then came in and got it and said "kent is really, really sick." >> reporter: kent had taken a turn for the worse. the doctors decided to take a risk and split the z-mapp between kent and nancy. kent got the first dose on that thursday, july 31st, eight days

after his first symptoms. did you immediately feel different? did you feel better? >> it was actually after that infusion started that the shaking became violent. and that lasted about 30 minutes. after about an hour, the rash actually started to fade a little bit. and what i remember is that i was able to get up and walk to the bathroom, which i hadn't done in a day and a half. >> reporter: but he was still very ill, far from being cured. the race to save him was on. that saturday the plane finally arrived in liberia... inside, kent was sealed in an isolation pod. >> they gave me a little walkie-talkie radio that i could talk to them on. and they hooked me up to monitors that they were watching outside of the pod that could give me i.v. fluid. >> reporter: 13 hours later the plane touched down in atlanta, the first time a known ebola

patient had arrived in the u.s. he was headed to emory university and to a hospital that has one of the most sophisticated infectious disease control facilities in the country. kent brantly was making history, although he was too sick to know it. when that ambulance pulled up at emory and you were escorted off that ambulance, did you hear the helicopter? >> no. >> reporter: you didn't know that there was a news helicopter hovering over, taking pictures of the first american with ebola to come back to this country? >> i was focused on putting one foot in front of another. >> reporter: waiting to treat him, a team of more than 100 at emory university hospital. they'd been training for this moment for years. we spoke with a group of them. they're discussing the case in detail for the first time. you're all volunteers, right? >> yes, yes.

>> reporter: the ebola virus is as dangerous as it gets. did any of you have any trepidations? >> the first thing that goes through your mind is, this is a virus which is associated with a 90% mortality. >> reporter: dr. marshall lyon -- >> and it sort of gets you a little bit. and then, sort of the rational training kicks in. and you realize that this is not -- you know, we're not going to expose ourselves to this. >> reporter: but many outside the hospital were fearful that the virus could not be contained, starting a catastrophic ebola epidemic in this country, just like it had in parts of africa. dr. bruce ribner -- >> i had a tsunami of negative emails coming to my university account. and they were accusing me of threatening the health of the united states. >> reporter: did it give you pause at all? >> i was pretty comfortable in what we were doing. and it was concerning to me that there were this many people who had this much misinformation about this infectious disease. >> reporter: shortly after kent arrived at the hospital, so did

amber. she still couldn't touch her husband. but she could at least see him. >> he looked so good. he was red-eyed, and rashed, and super swollen, and laying in the hospital bed, but he looked the best i've ever. >> reporter: to her eyes, maybe. but his doctors knew better. now all their training, equipment and facilities were about to be tested. coming up -- risking their lives to save his. >> i was in his room drawing lab work and got a blood splash on my tyvex. >> reporter: and an exclusive look inside the "hot zone." can i touch something in here? l-

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much about for the last four to six weeks? this is the special isolation unit at emory university hospital. tv cameras have never passed through this door before. >> this is the preparation room, if you will. >> reporter: this week, dr. bruce ribner, the unit's founder and director, gave me a tour. so once you go through this door, if there were a patient in there you would then have to have one of those full protective suits on? >> precisely. >> reporter: so this is where kent brantly -- >> this is where kent brantly spent approximately three weeks. >> reporter: can i touch something in here? >> absolutely. >> reporter: okay. >> this room has been completely sanitized -- >> reporter: okay. >> -- since kent left. >> so everything we're doing, we're watching each other for safety. >> reporter: nurse jill morgan showed us the tedious but critical steps the team took to help each other suit up before crossing the red line that marks the hot zone. >> and you can see it's quite a production. >> reporter: it was in one of those suits that she held out her hand to kent when he arrived at the unit. >> when he came in he was very sick.

i think the morning or two before that he thought that he probably was going to die soon. >> reporter: she'd written a message for him on this board from the team. >> i said, welcome home. we're glad you're here. >> reporter: that first night, nurse crystal johnson didn't leave kent's bedside. >> each time that he got out f bed to go to the bathroom, he was getting weaker and weaker. he had trouble breathing. his heart rate was high. he could barely stand. >> reporter: he had severe diarrhea. >> severe, yes. >> reporter: in the early days, doctors slept just outside the unit, monitoring their patient around the clock. because of the diarrhea, kent was losing electrolytes, essential body chemicals, at a terrifying rate. doctors colleen kraft and annesh mehta fought to restore kent's health. i hear you got to replace the electrolytes, and i'm thinking of gatorade and things like that, i mean, you know. you're laughing. is it -- >> but it's -- >> reporter: is it that simple? or is it similar? >> but it's at an intensive care unit level of replacing it. so, drinking gatorade certainly

could help, but there are also -- i mean, you need to replace it in a very monitored and aggressive way, which i think is more than gatorade. >> we gave the electrolytes through the vein to get those levels. >> reporter: so he was on intravenous the whole time. and you're administering drugs. let's make sure we understand this too, because i've read it time and time again. there is no cure for ebola. so, what a talented team like this one does is you try to care for the body the best you can so that the body can start to fight the virus on its own. >> yes. correct. that's exactly right. >> what the supportive measures are there for is to support, in specific, the immune system and help the rest of the body that's been damaged by the virus recover. and then, the immune system can kick in and clear the virus on its own. >> reporter: three days after kent arrived, nancy writebol joined him at the isolation unit. kent watched his dear friend through the window. >> they had to wheel her into her isolation room, which was directly across from mine. >> reporter: did she see you at that moment? >> no. i don't think nancy was really aware of anything at that moment.

and it broke my heart as i tried to wave to her and see her face and could just see that she was all bundled up, and they were trying to get her in her room as quickly as they could. >> she confessed to me that she thought she was just being brought back here to die, and that we were just being nice to her and making her comfortable until she was going to die. and i said, you know, "not if i can help it. >> reporter: but her survival, and kent's, were anything but certain. what was the level of virus in their blood when they arrived here? scale of one to ten in layman's terms. >> so, one to ten, this would be probably a ten. >> reporter: nancy writebol? >> and dr. brantly. >> reporter: both of them were a scale one to ten. they were a ten in terms of virus in their system? >> yeah, a lotta virus. >> reporter: with two dangerously ill patients, the team set up this special lab, steps from the patients' beds, to handle their blood work. but it wasn't all drips and draws. kent and nancy also needed to recover emotionally. i would imagine some of you were

in the room during those moments where their family members came to the window. >> yes. >> reporter: and from what i've heard from both dr. brantly and nancy writebol, there were some very emotional moments between those. was it hard to watch those? >> it was very hard. nancy, her husband came, he and she thought that they would never see each other again. and when they saw each other, i mean, the tears were rolling. >> reporter: but it was too soon for hugs. the patients were still toxic. there are these body fluids that they are presenting, can you flush that down the toilet knowing it is ripe with ebola virus? what do you do? >> so, we can't flush it straight down the toilet because our sewage treatment plant would not be very happy with us. so, what we, in fact, do is we put it in a sterilizing solution and let it sit for five to ten minutes. and then, we can safely flush it down the toilet. >> reporter: every blood draw was a risk. and no one knew that better than

the doctor they were treating. >> i was in his room drawing lab work and got a blood splash on my tyvex. now we prepared for this, i knew what to do. i was never in any danger because i was well protected. so i changed my gloves cleaned my suit. that part was not a problem. but dr. brantly looked at me and said, i really hope you don't get ebola. but if you do, i'll take care of you. >> reporter: days of hyper vigilance. tremendous stress. but finally -- was there a moment, was there a day, where you all looked at each other and were able to communicate to these patients, "you're going to live"? >> reporter: coming up -- a miracle moment. >> the number one thing on my list was to walk out of that room and give my wife a

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>> reporter: it's possible she was the first to sense it. amber brantly could only see her husband through this tiny window but still, somehow she knew -- kent was going to live. >> i could see his eyes had cleared. and he had the look that he was going to make it. he was going to get better. >> reporter: nurse crystal johnson noticed a change too in both her patients. >> for me it was when they asked for a shower. that was it. >> reporter: even though kent

and nancy felt better, doctors confined them to their rooms. they were still contagious until their blood samples tested free of the ebola virus. recovery became a waiting game. >> as i improved and was able to get out of bed and walk around and it just became my little home. >> reporter: walk around, but just in that room? >> i measured it one day. i think it was about 12 by 14. >> reporter: some of the nurses, still in their protective suits, played nerf basketball with kent to help him pass the time. >> he played the nurses. >> reporter: he told me he beat you all but two times. >> oh, no, no. you're playing h.o.r.s.e. against a guy who is suffering from the ebola -- you should win. >> reporter: yeah. that's right. that's right. >> reporter: both kent and nancy were excited to start eating again. what were the foods? what were their cravings? >> pizza. >> pizza? >> doc -- >> nancy wanted pizza. >> dr. brantly's first request was for a chick-fil-a sandwich, which he immediately regretted.

>> reporter: days passed. kent and nancy growing stronger. but their release hinged on those frequent blood tests. and then it happened. 17 days after he arrived in atlanta, a goodbye. kent watched his friend nancy get discharged. the medical team including dr. jay varkey cheered. >> when she came out of the room, it was like seeing a new person. it wasn't the person that had been brought in on a stretcher. it was the person that had been seen on photos all around the world. >> reporter: kent had to stay. waiting on the second of two blood tests. what was the feeling like when that second test came back okay? >> i was elated. i was so happy. all of a sudden, there were a lot of things to do. but the number one thing on my list was to walk out of that room and give my wife a hug. >> reporter: amber came running from the hospital cafeteria when

she got the news. but the nurses had one last safety check for kent. >> we basically scrubbed a path with bleach. between his shower and coming out so that he had a completely clean path to walk through so he could see his wife and touch her for the first time. and we decontaminated his wedding band and gave it to her so she could give it back to him. and i think we were all just so overwhelmed with emotion when they got to see each other for the first time. >> what a bunch of softies. >> reporter: kent was finally discharged. he spoke at a press conference a few hours later. >> today is a miraculous day. i'm thrilled to be alive, to be well and to be reunited with my family. >> reporter: at that press conference, at the end when you had given your statement and the doctors had spoken, you were

seen hugging some of them. were you sending a message about fear and ebola? or was it just gratitude? >> i'm glad that message about fear and ebola went out. but that was not a scripted event. that was gratitude from me to my caregivers. >> reporter: but you know that moment got a lot of attention because look, i'll be honest with you, when i told friends of mine that i was going to come here to interview you, you know what the number one question was? "are you going to shake his hand?" are you worried about a stigma traveling with you? >> i haven't been until now. >> reporter: i shook your hand, i'll do it again. but are you worried that people, when they hear your name they might say, "wait a minute. this is the guy who had ebola." >> you know, i'm not worried about that. it may happen. i've been recognized a few times out in public. but the only people who come and speak to me are the ones who grab my arm and say, "i am so

glad to meet you. we have been praying for you." >> reporter: kent is recuperating, his wife and two small children by his side. but he says it's hard not to think about liberia, the patients he cared for and saw die, whether he should go back to continue his mission. have you given thought to that yet? >> right now, i still have a lot of recovering to do. but i'm trying do everything i can right now to continue helping the people in liberia. talking with you is an opportunity to hopefully help the people of liberia. and will we go back? i don't know the answer to that. >> we really don't know. >> reporter: would you be okay with it? >> if kent was. i told him long ago, "i'll go anywhere you're going. we're going together." >> reporter: the ebola outbreak in west africa is now one of the largest in history. the world health organization estimates 20,000 people could be infected before it's over.

just this week a third american missionary, dr. rick sacra, was diagnosed. he arrived today in omaha for treatment. >> i wish this ebola epidemic would end. i wish that everyone who is sick could get the level of care that i received. >> reporter: questions remain about that experimental drug kent and nancy were given in liberia. >> dr. bruise rib dsh bruce ribner said it's too early to know whether it could be a magic bullet. >> i would caution everybody to -- yes, our two patients have survived. but there are two other patients who received this product who did not survive. if ebola should surface in the united states, the centers for disease control says it has systems in place to contain it. >> reporter: you've said to me in no uncertain terms, that while it's probably a combination of factors, that god saved your life. and when you said that before, there were some reaction to that. some people said, "he's saying

his faith in god saved him." but is that in some ways saying that all those people in liberia who died because of this virus didn't have the same faith in god? that he didn't spare them? >> that's a really difficult issue. i don't think there's anything special about me that made god save my life. and i don't think god saving the life of one person and another person dying means that there's something more important about that one person than the other. >> reporter: or stronger about their faith? >> i survived. and i want to give credit to god for bringing me through that. like you said, it was a combination of factors that treated my medical condition. it was the team in liberia that was taking care of me. there was the experimental drug. there were the doctors and

nurses at emory, and that technology and resources of emory university hospital and the cdc. when i see all of those things coming together, when i see how every piece of the puzzle came together to provide me with the care that i received, i see the hand of god at work and i have to give him glory. 3 f2 trabajando y tengo que darle su i'm matt lauer for all of us at hmm... fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. everybody knows that parker. well... did you know auctioneers make bad grocery store clerks? that'll be $23.50. now .75, 23.75, hold 'em. hey now do i hear 23.75? 24! hey 24 dollar, 24 and a quarter, quarter, now half, 24 and a half and .75! 25! now a quarter, hey 26 and a quarter, do you wanna pay now,

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