WASHINGTON, October 24 (RIA Novosti) - US President Barack Obama will meet Friday with nurse Nina Pham who has recently been cured of Ebola at the National Institute of Health (NIH), before she returns to her home in Texas, the White House said.
President Obama agreed to meet with Pham after the NIH confirmed Friday that they had successfully cured her of the disease.
"Our patient Nina Pham is free of Ebola virus," NIH's Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease Dr. Anthony Fauci said during a press briefing.
Pham appeared to be healthy and in good condition, but said that it would still take time for her to gain back her strength.
"I hope that people understand that this illness and this whole experience has been very stressful and challenging for me and for my family," said Pham.
"Although I no longer have Ebola, I know that it may be a while before I have my strength back," she added.
Dr. Fauci told reporters that during Pham's stay at the NIH Clinical Center in Bethesda, Maryland she did not receive any experimental drugs, but would not confirm whether the blood plasma transfusion that she received from Ebola survivor Dr. Kent Brantly earlier this month was what cured her.
Fauci also declined to say whether Pham would too donate her blood plasma or how she would be transported by to her home in Texas.
"At this point everything is experimental," said Fauci.
Pham, 26, is one of two nurses who tested positive for the disease on October 11 after caring for Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person to be diagnosed with the disease in the United States at the Dallas, Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital.
Duncan died on October 8, but spread the disease to another Presbyterian Hospital nurse, 29-year-old Amber Vinson on October 15.
Pham was subsequently flown from the Presbyterian Hospital to the Special Clinical Studies Unit of the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center in Maryland, and Vinson, to the Emory University Hospital in Georgia.
Vinson also tested negative for Ebola on Thursday, but still being monitored at the Emory Hospital.
On Friday, Craig Spencer, a 33-year-old doctor who treated Ebola patients in Guinea and later returned to New York, also tested positive for Ebola and is now being treated at New York City's Bellevue Hospital.
The current outbreak of Ebola, which is the worse in history, started in Guinea in February later spreading to Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria and Senegal, with smaller cases in the United States and Europe.
The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that there have been 4,877 deaths from the disease and 9,936 confirmed, probably and suspected cases of Ebola.
