A Caribbean Cruise Ship Can't Dock Because Of A Worker Who May Have Had Contact With The Ebola Virus

Roughly 1,000 passengers are trapped aboard a Caribbean cruise ship with a Dallas health worker who may have handled specimens from Thomas Eric Duncan, a Liberian patient with Ebola who later died at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital.

The health worker has remained isolated in a cabin, the State Department said in statement, while the Cruise line and the US government are working to bring the employee back to America.

In the meantime, the Belize Coast Guard will not allow the ship to dock, according to The Washington Post.

The employee, who has not yet been identified, and a traveling partner boarded the ship on Oct. 12 from Galveston, Texas. This was before the Centers for Disease Control required active monitoring, the State Department said.

The employee, who has not shown any signs of infection, did not come into direct contact with Duncan, but may have processed some of the patient's fluid samples, The New York Times said.

Duncan died on Oct. 8. Since then, two other Texas health workers, Amber Vinson and Nina Pham, have been diagnosed with Ebola.