We have been told that Governor Scott will not be participating in this debate. The incumbent governor of florida is a noshow thanks to a fan under his podium. Frank will join me tonight as we examine exactly what happened. Is there anything wrong with being comfortable. All in starts right now. Good evening from new york. Im chris hayes. Just moments ago, president obama pushed back on mounting calls to impose a travel ban from the west african countries where the outbreak began. I dont have a philosophical objection, necessarily, to a travel ban, if that is the thing that is going to keep the American People safe. If we institute a travel ban instead of the protocols that weve put in place now, history shows that there is a likelihood of increased avoidance. People do not readily disclose their information. They may engage in something they called broken traffic. Essentially breaking up their trip so that they can hide the fact that theyve been to one of these countries where there is a disease in plaus. And, as a result, we may end up getting less information about who has the disease. Theyre less likely to get treated properly, screened properly, quarantined properly. And, as a result, we could end up having more cases than less. Now, i continue to push our experts whether in fact were doing whats adequate to protect the American People. If they come back to me and they say that theres some additional things that we need to do, i assure you, we will do it. President s comments amid growing concerns where a house panel today over lapses of an Ebola Response that led to the infection of two nurses at that texas hospital. Nina fomm is now on her way from Presbyterian Hospital to a specialized facility of the National Institutes of health in maryland. Was this information given to your emergency room personnel . And was there any actual persontoperson training at texas presbyterian for the staff at that time . Yes or no . It was given to the emergency department. Was there actual training . No. This morning, on the today show, another nurse at Texas Health Department presbyterian what she saw as the hospitals mishandled response. They gave us an optional seminar to go to. Just informational. Not handson. It wasnt even suggested that we go. It wasnt, you know, something that they said, you know, you really should try to make it. It was no special gear. We were underpaired in the sense that we did not know what to do with the lab specimens. I just couldnt believe it, you know. And the second week of the ebola crisis at my hospital, the only gear theyre offering us at that time and up until that time is gear that is allowing our necks to be uncovered. Another nurse told nbc news that she is confident and the hospital has been pushing back on other nurses. The hopt is for the first time acknowledging missteps that may have resulted in the death of thomas eric duncan, the first ebola patient diagnosed in the u. S. Who succumbed to the illness last week. The cdc also came under fire in todays hearing why the there the cdc also came under fire in todays hearing why the there was allowed to board a plane with an elevated temperature on monday . Your comments you just made to us was that if she was wearing properly protected gear, shes okay to travel. If she was not, she should not have traveled. You just told us you dont know. We need to find that out. If theres one thing that everyone agreed on is that everyone on the republican side of the aisle is to control the travel in the countries where the outbreak originated. The president does have the Legal Authority to impose a travel ban because of health reasons, including ebola. I want to choin the chairman in urging the president to immediately institute a travel ban. I think perhaps this committee should consider forwarding to the full house a request that we have a vote on travel restriction because people are asking us to do that. And i think they are exactly correct. This is the question the American Public is asking. Why are we still allowing folks to come over here . And why once theyre over here, is there no quarantine. Even jamaica, as i read in the press earlier this week, has issued a travel ban from folks coming from west africa. Are you aware of that . But as the president explained, heres why a travel ban is actually a pretty bad idea. Under the status quo, a man in guinea would have to go through screening before getting on his flight. If he didnt have a fever or other sitsymptoms, hed be able to depart. For travel ban in place, it would notlessly keep this hypothetical man from getting into the u. S. All he would have to do is cross the border from guinea into mali. And there would be no screening and no record. The patient would have insentive to lie. Further, a travel ban would massively complicate aid workers, doctors and others from getting in and out of west africa where they are desperately needed to contain the outbreak at its source. The white house has so far resisted the growing calls for a travel ban. Moments ago, president obama said he would consider apointing an ebola czar. It may make sense for us to have one person in part just so that after this initial surge of activity we can have a more regular process just to make sure that were crossing all the ts and doting all the is. I spoke to one of the members of the House Committee that heard the hearing today and i asked her what she learned. Well, i think we learned that there were lessons learned. I think we learned that the Presbyterian Hospital in dallas made some mistakes and i think there were mistakes made by the cdc. By the ultimate thing that i learned, number one, we need to work hard as part of an International Community to contain the outbreak of in virus in west africa. And number two, we need to concentrate on our first responders, our emergency rooms, our icus, to make sure that they can identify anybody who comes in with ebola symptoms and then be able to train them. Do you think that you have a clear sense now of where the breakdowns happen and what is now being done to rectify those breakdowns . It seems inevitable, just given the math, that there will be another ebola patient who walks into some other emergency room during the course of this outbreak. I think we have to prepare for the worst. And, obviously, having another ebola patient would be the worst. But i think people still need to realize that its very hard to transmit this. You cant just get it from the air like you can the flu or a cold. So thats poshlt e important for people to realize. We learned some good information today. We learned for example what we knew already that when mr. Duncan came into the hopt in dallas and he said that he had come from west africa and he had a fever, they sent him home. And then we learned today that when he came back to the hospital for the first two days hoefs there and he was very, very sick in icu, the doctor told us that its likely that thats when these nurses were contaminated because the hopt wasnt using all the protocols that it could. So that needs to be beefed up. And then the final thing that i really learned is that the cdc needs to educate its providers much more clearly and they also need to be much more clear about these travel bans. Yeah, talk about the travel bans. There has been a chorus for the Republican Party for a ban. What do you think . What do you learn about that issue today . Well, when i said travel bans just now, i meant bans for the people who are being watched, the 41 people who are being watched. Some people are calling for travel bans from west africa to the united states. I, you know, the doctor said thats on the table. And if he thinks that could work, hell do it. But what we need to realize is that we need to contain that virus in west africa. So anybody who thinks that a travel ban is going to stop ebola from getting here is very, very foolish. This is a chart that we put into the record. I dont know if you can see it. We put this into the record at the hearing today and what it shows is people fly from west africa all around the world. If we did a travel ban in the united states, people could still come to europe or south america or other places. And the World Health Organization has said that if we dont stop ebola in west africa, 1. 2 Million People could be effected. Well, if that happens, youre going to have people with ebola all around the world, whether you have a travel ban or not. I think thats a little bit of a red herring. So do you think right now theres sufficient resources being devoted to that project . And theres a sufficient political weight behind the project of stopping the oitbreak in west africa as opposed to the attention being paid, upsblely, to those who have attracted the disease here in the u. S. Both the cdc and other witnesses that we had here today said that theres enough resources to go into wesz africa. I think we kind of got a late Start Building these clinics and sending people out. But now the International Community realizes to stop a real blossoming, its going to take a concerted, International Effort than weve ever seen before. Do you think theres been a soberminded approach to this . Or do you see a lot of Election Year grand standing and fear mongering . Well, let me say this. Ive been on this committee for a long time. Ive seen czars. Ive seen bird flu, h1n1. And i knew that this could be happening. So on september 2 nd, i asked the chairman to have a hearing on ebola. Were not having a hearing now until two and a half weeks before the election. And there were a lot of pretty outthere statements being made today. So i would hope that because this is a serious issue facing this country, i would hope everybody would Work Together in a bipartisan way. Number one, we need to figure out what went wrong a t the dallas hospital. We need to fix that. And we need to make sure every Single Health worker in this country knows what to do. And, also, we need to really double down on stopping this virus in west africa. I just want to make sure im understanding this clearly. You requested from the republican chair of the kplit tee, of the subcommittee, a hearing on ebola september 2 nd and there was no hearing until today . Thaekt. Thaekt. Cell. Thats correct. Yes. Meaning everyone went back to their district and called back to d. C. Only after these transmissions had happened. Thats right. I requested it in Early September and then again in october. So ive been asking for several moments for this. Youre right, its just a few weeks before the election everyone is called back to do this hearing. I will say, september 2 nd, thats before mr. Duncan showed up. Thats before the nurses who were infekted. So maybe we could have gotten to the bottom of some of these protocols before that. I dont know, maybe none of this would have ever happened. Thats why im concerned and thats why we need to work in a bipartisan way to fix this. Thank you very much. Thank you. President obama continues to resist republicans calls for a travel ban, an ebola truthism is starting to occur. Msnbc reported paul told his audience senator paul seems to think the only reason were not instituting a travel ban is some kind of misplaced political correctness. Thats far from those radical theories circulating about ebola. Ron johnson was asked today if we should be worried about isis infecting themselves and traveling to this country in order to use the virus as a buy logical weapon. Here was his response. Its something i started to think about it since this Ebola Outbreak started. We should do Everything Possible to defend ourselves against that possibility. I think that is a real and present danger. Real and present danger. Joining me now, editor in chief of vox. Com. I feel like we are watching all of the worst dysfunctions of american politics play out before our eyes three weeks before an election in which you have politicians basically looking for some kind of brute force response that is going to play the best in election as opposed to what would actually bestaddress the problem. Incredible levels of fear do not tend to improve politics as a general rule. And, yeah, you have an issue happening now where you have politicians back at home. People terrified. Theyre coming to them. They want something done. And the publishings do not have a good answer. Ebola isnt something you can ledge slat away. The thing that makes an intuitive sense of people and i think it should be said that its clear why it does is a travel ban. So that becomes the thing. Number one, your constituent sill wants you to. Now you cant go back to people and say theyre fighting for what you want. But those democrats righthand turn giving it to you. So that is an easy way to seem like youre doing something and theres a political value ents as to why it isnt getting done. Some people have been saying his affinity is with africa and thats why he wont institute a travel ban. He just says everyone who studies Infectious Diseases has told me this is a bad idea and will make the problem worse. Yeah. I think its worth saying. I think he gave a very good explanation why travel bans are a bad idea. But people, i think, missed it. The most important thing for making ebola for stopping ebola is west africa. Its not america. A disease cluster in dallas. The problem is starting out in dallas, imcolluding the nursz going on that plane. The issue with ebola is when you have isolation points. We are so far from that in america, anything like that isnt a consideration. The way that it happens is not that it happens here. Its not that it jumps from west africa to dallas. It overwhelms west africa and gets into india. You see that congressman had that chart of travel. And it begins to happen that way. And you get into a situation where the numbers are so large. They are very, very effective and they are incredibly time consuming. Incredibly labor intensive and require the infrastructure of isolation words that that fails you because you simply have too many patients. If you want this to not become a global epidemic. If you want this not to become a problem where its popping up in every city and airport, the thing to focus on is west africa. That is exactly, exactly correct. Thank you. The texas school that rejected students from nigeria because of ebola ahead. I thought itd be bigger. dad theres nothing i cant reach in my subaru. vo introducing the allnew subaru outback. Love. Its what makes a subaru,a subaru. New york giants are scheduled to play dallas in dallas. Are you worried because they had that breakout of ebola in dallas. Are you worried about your team going in dallas and, maybe, like, catching ebola or Something Like that . Are you guys going to have to take medical precautions . I think the cowboys are going to get it first. So its to our advantage. Giants were actually briefed on ebola ahead of their trip to dallas this weekend. But they should probably be more worried about trying to beat a team thats 5and1. Earlier this month, several applicants to Texas Navarro College received some troubling news in the mail. A letter dated october 2 nd, five days after Thomas Duncan was put in isolation reads, quote that letter was sent to at least two nigerian applicants. Today, the school stood by the decision saying quote so it looks like the texas school is now blocking all students from countries labeled at risk of ebola. We know theyve rejected students from nigeria. Nigeria has actually done a very good job of containing ebola. Nigeria flew into what could have been a complete and total disaster in one of the most heavily populated and poorest cities. Instead, it looks as if to be a successful containment. Eight times the population of guinea, sierra leone and liberia combined. Nigerians had no new cases since august and has been declared ebola free by the world Health Department organization. Its been such a successful effort, the cdc has sent researchers to see just how it was done. Doctor, how did nigeria that has a lot less money and less wellendowed Health Infrastructure pull this off . Good evening, chris. There are a lot of reasons why nigeria has been so successful. Nigeria has not been suffering through horrible conflict and civil war like the three most affected countries are. They went through horrible civil war, total depletion of health care infla structure. Were looking at a very different situation in nigeria. Theres a lot of Health Disparities because theres a lot of poor people, but there is an infrastructure in place. And then theres another infrastructure not many people know about that was articulated very well to me by my colleagues at the bill and Melinda Gates foundation. In 20 12, they put together a polio Emergency Response unit. So this was a president ial task force for combatting polio in this country. And they created an entire Health Care Infrastructure just for purposes of combatting polio. So when the first ebola case hit from the individual coming in from liberia, they used that as a template to mobilize a similar type of Emergency Operations unit. They used some of the same polio people that were so successful in controlling polio, put them on and repurposes for ebola. They mobilized a thousand soshl woerkers and caseworkers and they snuffed it out. I think its a great example of how they went from one case to 20 and then snuffed it out as opposed to what were seeing elsewhere in west africa. It isnt necessarily rocket science. Its a certain brut force and care and labor and execution of the plan that matters. Yeah, exactly. Thats why well never see an Ebola Outbreak in the united states. We have a