Re: “A post-ordeal briefing, in the words of nurse Hickox” (Nov. 19):

Here’s a little background on Kaci Hickox’s indeterminate employment status that Portland Press Herald resident epidemiologist Bill Nemitz didn’t include in his column.

President Obama has decreed that military personnel returning to the United States from Ebola-stricken West Africa will be isolated in quarantine for 21 days before they can be reunited with their families, even though those troops have had no contact with Ebola patients.

At the same time, returning civilian health workers like Kaci Hickox who have treated or cared for Ebola patients need not be quarantined and may mingle with the public if they are asymptomatic.

Yes, you read that correctly: Civilian health care workers may roam free if they have treated patients with the deadly virus, even if they have a skin temperature that appears to be elevated, as did Hickox when she landed in Newark.

Nemitz says that Nurse Hickox is “far more qualified to run the state’s infectious-disease unit than CDC Director (and acting state epidemiologiat) Dr. Sheila Pinette,” although Pinette is a licensed physician with a medical degree from the University of New England and has practiced medicine for many years.

Nemitz always know best. He’s the same psychiatrist who once diagnosed Gov. LePage as being crazy and “borderline sociopathic.”

President Obama recently appointed Washington insider Ron Klain as the “Ebola czar” to oversee the federal effort to contain the Ebola virus. Klain has no medical experience whatsoever, and since his appointment is nowhere to be found.

Nurse Hickox tells Nemitz: “I don’t have a job yet. I’m still searching.” Since Nurse Hickox is obviously better qualified by virtue of education and experience than Klain to be the “Ebola czar,” perhaps advocate Nemitz would recommend her to replace the missing person of that title.

Walter J. Eno

Scarborough and Florida

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