Ebola Update (11/24/2014)

• Liberia's President claims that Liberia will be Ebola free by Christmas.
• An Italian doctor working in Sierra Leone has been diagnosed with Ebola and will be flown to Rome for treatment.
• Pakistan may have its first Ebola case. From the article:

Zulfiqar Ahmad, 40, who resides in Chiniot, returned to Pakistan on November 16 after working for the Togolese Republic in West Africa. 

Ahmad faced multiple health-related problems and was admitted to the DHQ Hospital in Chiniot and later shifted to the Allied Hospital by his relatives. 

After conducting initial diagnostic tests, doctors said that he may have contracted the Ebola virus. 

“He is a chronic patient of various diseases, and was previously admitted in a hospital in Togo for more than 20 days,” Medical Superintendent (MS) Allied Hospital Dr Rashid Maqbool told The Express Tribune. 

He also stated that Ahmad has a serious liver issue and has been vomiting blood.

• The U.S. is stockpiling Ebola survivors' plasma to treat future victims. From Wired: 

On Friday, the FDA announced that it would start developing a stockpile of blood plasma from Ebola survivors, treated with a pathogen inactivation system that’s never been used before in the United States. So far, the US has had some amazing success in curing Ebola, possibly thanks to experimental plasma treatments. Drawn from survivors, the stuff comes enriched in antibodies that could help to fight off the disease—but it also has the potential to carry other diseases, like malaria, that are common in west Africa where Ebola is raging. The new system will kill off any extra contaminants that may be lurking in this potentially live-saving serum.

•  The company hired by New York City authorities to clean up Dr. Craig Spencer's apartment after he came down with Ebola turns out to have been a con-man. Fox News reports Sal Pane’s clean-up truck bore permit numbers that belonged to a dead man, Ron Gospodarski. Gospodarski had actual experience with cleaning up anthrax, but Pane claimed Gospodarki's experience as his own to get the contract. No word on what Pane did with the materials removed from Dr. Spencer's apartment. (H/t Raconteur Report).