Thomas Duncan's fiancee wants his death investigated

Louise Troh

The story of Thomas Duncan has taken another twist. I pray that at the end of the day,something good comes out of this. Please read:

The man who brought Ebola to the United States from West Africa 18 days ago has died in Dallas. Thomas Eric Duncan succumbed to the virus at 7.51am today at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital.

His fiancée Louise Troh spoke out in anger shortly after his death and called for a full review of his medical care. Reverend Jesse Jackson, who appeared in public with Duncan's mother, raised the specter of legal action against the hospital as he condemned Duncan's treatment.

When Duncan first went to Texas Presbyterian on September 25, he was sent home with a prescription for antibiotics and was never tested for Ebola, despite telling nurses that he had come from Ebola-stricken Liberia.

On Monday doctors began giving Duncan the experimental antiviral drug brincidovir, though he was never given ZMapp, the 'miracle drug' credited with curing two American healthcare workers who were infected with the disease. Health officials say there are no more doses of ZMapp left anywhere in the United States.  

Duncan also did not receive a transfusion of blood from Ebola patients who have beaten the disease, which has helped at least two of the four American Ebola patients. 

Ms Troh released a statement about Duncan saying: 'His suffering is over. My family is in deep sadness and grief, but we leave him in the hands of God... Eric was a wonderful man who showed compassion toward all.' 

She added: 'I trust a thorough examination will take place regarding all aspects of his care. I am now dealing with the sorrow and anger that his son was not able to see him before he died. This will take some time, but in the end, I believe in a merciful God.'

Troh is currently in quarantine with her 13-year-old son and two nephews and under constant monitoring by health officials over fears that they, too, could develop symptoms during a 21-day incubation period. 

Duncan, a 42-year-old Liberian national exposed nearly 50 people to the disease in America before he was put in isolation at Texas Presbyterian. 

Speaking to MailOnline on Wednesday, Rev Jackson claimed that the treatment Duncan received contributed to his sad end.

He questioned whether there was really no more ZMapp left and why Duncan has received a drug that had never been tested on Ebola patients before, instead. 

'All I do know is that Mr Duncan received late treatment and not the best drug. They say that there is no more ZMapp. It’s hard for me to believe that there’s only enough ZMapp to treat two people in all of America.

‘All of his vital signs were improving yesterday, except for the kidney and the lung area. They tried an experimental drug other than Zmapp which has been used to treat others and it didn’t work.’

He said that there were ‘many questions’ to be asked regarding the protocol followed, and not followed, by medics at Dallas’s Texas Presbyterian Hospital.

The reverend said, 'He came to the hospital. He said he had come from Liberia, West Africa but they did not check for Ebola. He came to the hospital and they sent him away with antibiotics, deathly ill.'

Rev Jackson’s echoed the ’sorrow and anger’ expressed by Ms Troh and raised the specter of legal action ahead, though he pointed out, 'That’s for the family not for me to decide.'

For now, he said, ‘We’re just grieving. It’s all so shocking. We really are in shock right now and grieving.’

Rev Jesse Jackson with Mr Duncan's mother

Rev Jackson spent yesterday in Dallas with Mr Duncan’s mother, Nowah Gartay, who had travelled from her home in Charlotte, North Carolina to visit the son she had not seen for 12 years, Duncan’s nephew Josephus Weeks and 19-year-old son, Karsiah . At a vigil outside the hospital in which Mr Duncan lay in his isolated deathbed, Rev Jackson led prayers and called upon others to ’save Thomas Eric Duncan’s life.’

Karsiah had not seen his father since the age of three when his mother Ms Troh left Liberia for America after a falling out with Mr Duncan. The two reconnected over phone earlier this year and Mr Duncan described her as the ‘love of his life.’

Duncan's Ebola case drew widespread American attention to the West African epidemic that continues to spread like wildfire through Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea - three of the poorest nations in the world. More than 3,400 people have died from the virus and more than 7,500 have been infected. 

Duncan landed in Dallas on September 20 after traveling from his home in Monrovia, Liberia. He is accused of lying to airport screeners about his contact with Ebola patients, though his family and friends say he had no idea he had been infected.

Karsiah, Duncan's 19-year-old son

He came to America in the hopes of marrying Ms Troh after rekindling his relationship with her after more than a decade apart. He was also hoping to meet his 19-year-old son Karsiah, a college student in Texas whom he had not seen since the boy was three. The father and son were never reunited before Duncan's death.

Duncan developed symptoms of the disease on September 24. He went to the hospital the next day - only to be given antibiotics and sent home by doctors. For three more days, he suffered with Ebola in Ms Troh's Dallas apartment, potentially exposing her and her family to the disease.

On September 28, four days later after he became contagious, he was rushed back to Texas Presbyterian and admitted.   

His family said on Tuesday that he was medically sedated and unresponsive when they tried to visit him at the hospital. 

One of Ms Troh's pastors sought to explain her statement that she was hoping for a review of Duncan's medical care. 

Mark Wingfield, associate pastor of Dallas's Wilshire Baptist Church, said: ‘Louise is of course devastated by this news. She is very saddened by it and as is the case with anyone dealing with grief you have lots of questions about how your life and circumstances could have spun so quickly into a reality you could never have envisioned.’  

Speaking as a pastor who deals with people in grief a lot, a very natural part of the grief process is to question, What if? What could I have done differently? What if this had happened or that had happened? How could I have prevented this from happening?

‘And she’s absolutely at that stage of running through events.'

He also a said Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins, who has overseen the Ebola outbreak and visited Ms Troh several times, told her that: 'He’s had to tear off the rear view mirror and not look back.

‘He can’t spend time looking behind right now. He’s got to deal with the next 15 minutes.’

But, he continued, ‘When you’re in quarantine and grieving the situation all you have to do is look in the rear view mirror and think of what has gone out and how could I have made this play out differently?’

Asked if Ms Troh felt anger over the treatment Mr Duncan received and whether she questioned the hospital’s choices, he admitted, ‘I think there is an undertone in all of that.’ 

Pastor Wingfield said that the church was working on how to address that additional heartbreak. He said, ‘I suspect there will be multiple memorials but we don’t know that for sure yet.’ 

Following Duncan's death, Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital issued a statement that read: 'It is with profound sadness and heartfelt disappointment that we must inform you of the death of Thomas Eric Duncan this morning at 7.51am. Mr. Duncan succumbed to an insidious disease, Ebola.  

'He fought courageously in this battle. Our professionals, the doctors and nurses in the unit, as well as the entire Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas community, are also grieving his passing. We have offered the family our support and condolences at this difficult time.'

Texas health officials must now dispose of Duncan's body, which still harbors the disease. Ebola spreads by having contact with the bodily fluids of an infected patient. Even getting sweat or blood on the skin can cause an infection.

Guidance that the Centers for Disease Control issued to hospitals on the disposal of dead Ebola patients calls for Duncan's body to be immediately wrapped in a plastic shroud and zipped up in two leak-proof body bags - with his medical lines and tubes still attached. 

His remains will then be shipped to the Dallas County morgue, where his body will be cremated, killing all trace of the virus. His remains will then be returned to his family. 

Officials recommend no autopsy or embalming, for fear that unnecessary contact with the remains could spread the infection. 

Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings issued a statement saying he was 'deeply saddened' to learn of Duncan's death.  

'On behalf of the city of Dallas, I extend our deepest sympathies to the family and friends of Mr. Duncan. I remain confident in the abilities of our health care professionals and the medical advances here in the U.S. and reassure you we will stop the Ebola virus in its tracts from spreading into our community.

'I want to reinforce to the public, that this was an isolated incident of the Ebola virus; contracted by the individual while residing in another country. This is sad news for all involved. We will continue to work in partnership with Dallas County to do everything possible to protect our public health and all of the City of Dallas.'

Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins, who has helped coordinate the local response to the disease outbreak offered his condolences, saying: 'My thoughts are with the family and friends of Thomas Eric Duncan at this time, especially his fiancée Louise, their son Karsiah and all those who loved him.'

Thomas Eric Duncan apologized to his fiancée after doctors told him he had the deadly disease and told her he would have rather died in Liberia than put her at risk, a family friend has said.

'He apologized to Louise the day they told him what he had. He told her, "I’m so sorry all of this is happening. I would not put the love of my life in danger,'" Saymendy Lloyd told the Washington Post. 

Duncan's family are now saying that he had no idea he had been exposed to Ebola when he boarded a plane in Liberia, bound for the United States. 

It has been previously reported that Duncan helped care for a pregnant woman who later died of the disease in Monrovia, Liberia. However, he ha told those close to him that he thought she was suffering complications from the pregnancy and had no idea she was infected with Ebola.

Duncan told Louise Troh, whom he came to the United States to marry, that he 'would have preferred to stay in Liberia and died than bring this disease to you,' Mr Lloyd told the Post.  

Liberia authorities have accused Duncan of lying on an airport screening form before flying out of Monrovia last month and claiming he had no contact with Ebola victims. The Dallas County prosecutor also announced this week Duncan could face criminal charges if he knew he had Ebola and exposed people to the disease anyway.

Ten people, including seven healthcare workers and three family members, are considered at high risk for Ebola after they were exposed to Duncan after he became contagious. Another 38 more are being monitors by the CDC for possible risk of the disease.

Duncan's fiancee Louise Troh, who is perhaps highest at risk of catching the disease after she cared for him at her Dallas apartment while he sweated and vomited through the early staged of the disease, says she does not blame him for possibly exposing her.

She told WFAA-TV on Tuesday, before Duncan's  death, that she just wanted him to get better so that he can return to her. The couple, who met in a refugee camp in the Ivory Coast, have a 19-year-old son Karsiah together who is currently in college.

'I'm just praying to God that he gets better. He's a generous guy, and I'm just so sad. He just come to America and just get so sick, and just went down just in a second,' she told the TV station.

'I feel so sad. I'm confused, and really disturbed. I don't know. I'm just praying to God so he can wake up and for him to be able to see his children and be able to come back to his family.'

Karsiah Duncan, a student at Angelo State University, arrived in Dallas to visit his father for the first time on Tuesday, but by then Duncan was unresponsive