Wheelchair-bound students get level playing field in Grand-Digue, N.B.

Physical education teacher Rhéal Hébert of Grande-Digue, N.B., has gone an extra step to see that all students get moving in his classes.

When Hebert had two students with muscular dystrophy in his École Grande-Digue class — Renelle Belliveau and her older sister — he realized they weren't getting as much physical activity as the other students.

Rheal Hébert was honoured by Ability New Brunswick for exposing all students to para sports and recreation activities. (CBC)

"They still had their everyday wheelchair," said Hebert.

"They were being pushed around by the teacher's assistant, and that's when it really hit me that we have to do something about that, because everybody's moving and they're not. And that's not OK."

Hébert applied for a grant last year to purchase two wheelchairs designed for use in sports. They have a wide wheelbase and can turn on a dime.

"From one day to the other, it was such a huge difference," said Hébert.

"I knew from that point we had to go further, and we had to explore para sports at school."

Hébert wanted to do more than just have Renelle play with the other Grade 8 students.

He wanted the other students to be able to play with her. So Hébert borrowed about half a dozen sports wheelchairs from a club in Moncton that could be used by able-bodied students.

Now, Renelle and her friends have a level playing field: everyone's on wheels.

"It's really fun, because they feel what I felt when I was in a wheelchair and I played sports, and they like it very much," said Renelle, who was voted class president this year.

"They're very good at it."

Along with badminton, Renelle Belliveau and other students in Grand-Digue have been exposed to sledge hockey, basketball and track and field. (CBC)

​The class is currently doing court sports like badminton. They've also played sledge hockey, basketball and track and field.

Janie Cormier participates in para sports regularly at the school now that the sports chairs are available.

"She used to do things by herself with only her in a wheelchair, but now we get to do it with her, so we can see like how she got used to it and all that stuff," said Janie.

"So it's really nice."

Hébert's Sports Plus program is exposing students to para sports and recreation activities. It has grown from a pilot project involving two schools three years ago and now operates in eight schools.

Ability New Brunswick honoured Hébert this year with its Para Sport and Recreation Award.

"Rhéal strongly believes that all students deserve the same opportunities at school," states Ability NB's award citation for Hébert.

Lynn Belliveau, Renelle's mother, says she appreciates what the physical education teacher has done for the family.

Lynn Belliveau appeciates the effort of her daughter's physical education teacher to include her in sports activities. (CBC)

"It's getting them to be able to do stuff that I didn't imagine they'd be able to do and obviously as a mom, I'm really happy that they get that opportunity," said Belliveau.

Belliveau has installed a basketball hoop at the home where her daughters and their friends can play.

"It's important to them," said Belliveau. "Even though you have a disability, it's not going to stop you from doing what you want, and that's what I want them to learn from that. I mean, you thought you weren't able to participate in sports, but now you can."

Renelle also knows she has a teacher who has gone above and beyond what's expected. But she's never told him so.

"I never really thanked him because like, I get nervous and I just, like — I don't want to start crying because it really means so much to me."

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Texas nurse leaves Emory University Hospital free of Ebola virus

A nurse who fuelled Ebola fears by flying to Cleveland after being infected by her dying patient in Dallas was released Tuesday from a hospital isolation unit, where doctors defended her as a courageous and passionate front-line caregiver.

Another nurse, held for days against her will in a medical tent in New Jersey after volunteering in West Africa, was in an undisclosed location in Maine, objecting to quarantine rules as overly restrictive.

While world leaders appeal for more doctors and nurses on the front lines of the Ebola epidemic, health care workers in the United States are finding themselves on the defensive.

Lawyers now represent both Amber Vinson, who contracted the virus while caring for a Liberian visitor to Texas, and Kaci Hickox, who is challenging the mandatory quarantines that some states have imposed on anyone who came into contact with Ebola victims.

Getting more volunteers to the front lines is the only way to keep the virus from infecting people around the world, experts say. It's still spreading faster than the response, killing nearly half of the more than 10,000 people it has infected in West Africa.

World Bank President Jim Yong Kim said Tuesday that at least 5,000 more health workers are needed in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea to fight the epidemic. Kim was in Ethiopia with United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who has spoken out against mandatory quarantines for health care workers, and said Ebola-related travel restrictions and border closings are not the answer.

Vinson was cleared to fly

Dr. Bruce Ribner, an infectious disease expert who oversaw Vinson's recovery at Emory University Hospital, said fellow medical workers "deeply admire Ms. Vinson's care and courage in caring for patients with serious communicable diseases."

But Vinson's trip home to join her bridesmaids for wedding preparations was one of several moves by doctors and nurses that may have exposed others in the United States. In Ohio alone, 163 people were still being monitored Tuesday because of contact or potential contact with Vinson in a bridal shop and on the airplanes she travelled in.

This undated image provided by University of Texas at Arlington shows Kaci Hickox. The nurse is back in her native Maine, where it appears she will remain quarantined at home for a period of time. (University of Texas at Arlington/Associated Press)

N.J. Gov. Chris Christie said voluntary stay-at-home measures were obviously insufficient, since even doctors and nurses had moved around in public before getting sick. He was among the first to announce mandatory 21-day quarantines for anyone who had contact with possibly infected people.

Vinson, 29, was infected while caring for Thomas Eric Duncan, who died at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas on Oct. 8. She inserted catheters, drew blood, and dealt with Duncan's body fluids, all while wearing protective gear.

Ribner said her doctors in Atlanta don't have any knowledge of how she got infected in Dallas. Neither would he release any details about her treatment, or whether certain drugs are proving more effective. "The honest answer is we're not exactly sure," he said.

But Emory University Hospital spokeswoman Holly Korschun later confirmed that Vinson received blood plasma from Ebola survivor Kent Brantley, and said Ebola survivor Nancy Writebol also donated her plasma, but it wasn't ultimately needed.

Ebola is only contagious when people who carry the virus get sick, and Vinson didn't show symptoms before flying to Ohio on Oct. 10. She reported her temperature to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as required, on Oct. 13, and was cleared to fly back to Dallas. The next day, she developed a temperature, and on Oct. 15, she tested positive for Ebola.

Hickox will be quarantined at home

Another nurse, Nina Pham, also was infected by Duncan, and was released Oct. 24 from the National Institutes of Health.

Vinson didn't take any questions at the Emory news conference. Instead, she read a statement thanking God, her relatives and her doctors, and asked "that we not lose focus on the thousands of families who labour under the burden of this disease in West Africa."

Hickox, the Doctors Without Borders volunteer, was staying meanwhile in an "undisclosed location," said Steve Hyman, one of her lawyers. Maine health officials announced that she will be quarantined at home for 21 days after the last possible exposure to the disease, following the state's health protocols.

But Hyman said he expected her to remain in seclusion for the "next day or so" while he discusses her situation with Maine health officials. Hyman said the state should follow the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines, which require only monitoring, not quarantine, for health care workers who show no symptoms after treating Ebola patients.

"She's a very good person who did very good work and deserves to be honoured, not detained, for it," he said.

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South Africa aiming to be 'leading player' in HIV research

South African doctors and researchers seem to be gaining confidence in their decades-long battle against HIV, international delegates at a conference in Cape Town say.  

The HIV Research for Prevention Conference is dedicated to biomedical HIV prevention research.

A nurse, left, speaks with a patient at an AIDS centre in South Africa, which strives to be a leading player in HIV science. (Schalk van Zuydam/Associated Press)

Sub-Saharan Africa remains the epicentre, with nearly 1 in every 20 adults living with HIV and accounting for 71 per cent of the people living with the illness worldwide, according to the World Health Organization.

South Africa's minister of science and technology, Naledi Pandor, told the conference today it's time the country assumed more responsibility "to be a leading player in science and not a client of others."

The country's government provides anti-retroviral medications to nearly 40 per cent of HIV-infected South Africans. On the research front, new labs, scientists, technicians and funding commitments are on the rise.

"They're very competitive for research funding elsewhere," said Canadian HIV researcher Cate Hankins, currently deputy director of science for the Amsterdam Institute for Global Health and Development.

Conference co-chair Anatoli Kamali, of Uganda's Medical Research Council, pointed out that a third of the research papers being presented this week are from African researchers.

Professor Robin Shattock of Imperial College London is another co-chair of the conference. Shattock said it makes sense to have people work across fields of prevention rather than working in a bubble.

The conference aims to build linkages between investigators in developing and developed countries to open the door to collaboration.

Before the conference closes on Oct. 31, scientists plan to present 550 research papers, such as new results on microbicidal gels and vaginal rings, to try to prevent HIV infections.

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WHO says 82 being monitored for Ebola in Mali

Health workers are monitoring 82 people who had contact with a toddler who died of Ebola in Mali last week, but no new cases of the disease have yet been reported, World Health Organization spokesman Tarik Jasarevic said on Tuesday.

Three WHO officials are already in the country, having travelled to Mali a week ago to test its Ebola preparedness, and five more are arriving, Jasarevic said.

Mali became the sixth West African country to report a case of the disease, and health officials want to try to contain the virus before it can spread out of control.

It has already killed some 5,000 people in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, but Senegal and Nigeria both stopped the virus in its tracks by tracking down hundreds of people who had contact with the person who first brought it into their country and monitoring them constantly for symptoms.

The girl had travelled with her grandmother hundreds of kilometres by bus from Guinea via Mali's capital and was hospitalized in the western Malian town of Kayes on Oct. 20, but died four days later.

WHO has said the girl already started showing symptoms including fever, vomiting and blood in her stools — and was therefore contagious — before being taken to Kayes.

Jasarevic said the 2-year-old girl's grandmother was "doing OK so far", but the deadly disease can take up to 21 days to show up in a patient, so all the 82 contacts who have been traced, including 11 health workers, will continue to be monitored.

Diplomatic sources have expressed concern about the preparedness of Mali, one of the world's poorest countries, to contain an outbreak. Home to a large UN peacekeeping mission, the mostly Muslim country is still battling northern Islamist militants after a brief French-led war last year.

The possibility of setting up a treatment centre in Kayes was being discussed, Jasarevic said, and 40 volunteers had been trained in contact tracing, which is considered one of the key defences against the fast-spreading disease.

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Ebola death count likely exceeds 5,000, as rate of new cases in Liberia slows, WHO says

The Ebola death toll is likely over 5,000 out of 13,703 cases worldwide, the World Health Organization says.

Dr. Bruce Aylward, WHO assistant director-general in charge of the operational response, gave the update to reporters on Wednesday.

In Liberia, there are signs of progress, such as decline in burial numbers and lab-confirmed cases that appear to have plateaued, Alyward said. That could be thanks to the right information getting to people to change their behaviour and protect themselves as well as safe burials.

Ibrahim Sorie Kamara looks after his child as they await transport to the holding centre in the Port Loko Government Hospital in Sierra Leone for those suspected of having Ebola. (Christopher Black/WHO/Reuters)

"Do we feel confident that the response is now getting an upper hand on the virus? Yes, we are seeing slowing rate of new cases, very definitely," he told a news conference.

While he's confident that they're seeing a slowing in the rate of new cases, the danger is that instead of cases going down steadily, they start to oscillate up and down, for example, if burials go wrong and start new chains of transmission, he warned.

The number of cases in the worst affected countries of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone is 13,676.  WHO attributes what looks like a jump in the number of cases to updated data on old cases that were piling up and took time to reconcile.

In contrast, the seven-day rolling average has been steady at around 9,000 or 10,000 in recent weeks, he said.

Aylward said this isn't the time to let up, and the response needs to continue.

"I'm terrified the information will be misinterpreted," he said, and the international response will slow.

The downward trend in Liberia is based on information on burials, admission and occupancy rates at Ebola treatment centres and reports of cases from all sources.

But the outbreak is "burning quite hot" in parts of Sierra Leone, he said.

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No coverage for Saskatoon woman's $30K dental procedure so she can chew

Judy Perrin-Royer's dental surgeon described her as an oral cripple in need of dental implants, but the provincial government won't pay for the $30,000 procedure.

The 59-year-old Saskatoon woman cried when she heard herself described as an "oral cripple," but she said it's true.

Her upper jaw has deteriorated to the point that it no longer holds her dentures. They even move around while she talks.

The family support worker said she's approaching retirement and can't really afford to fix her teeth on her current income.

"We just had to set up financing in order to do it. And it's a necessity. I had no choice."

'I won't be able to eat'

When she was in her 20s, Perrin-Royer had a bone graft and dental implants on her lower jaw. She said she's never been sure exactly what's wrong with her.

"Just really unhealthy teeth. I am not certain whether it was lack of calcium during my mother's… pregnancy."

Regardless of the reason, she had to pay the $10,000 bill back then to fix her bottom teeth.

Now it's three times that amount for her upper teeth.

For months before the surgery, Perrin-Royer was in discussions with the ministry, asking the provincial government to cover the procedure.

However, her surgeon was told she didn't qualify for government funding.

So in September she decided to go ahead and get it done on her own because the situation was urgent.

Her surgeon grafted bone from her hip to her upper jaw and then drilled titanium posts into the bone, which will enable her new teeth to stay in place.

"If I don't have it done, then at some point, I won't be able to eat," she explained.

In a letter she delivered to the Ministry of Health, her surgeon, Dr. Myles MacLennan, explained Perrin-Royer's jaw had deteriorated to the point where it was "impossible… to even place a traditional denture."

And so he recommended dental implants "so that she can have teeth to chew food and speak."

Perrin-Royer said her doctor saw this surgery as a health-care necessity, not cosmetic.

"This is not an instance of 'I need pearly whites'. I need them to eat."

New program covers some dental implants

Dr. Frank Hohn is an oral surgeon in Saskatoon who says Saskatchewan's funding program for dental implants is flawed because applications are adjudicated by bureaucrats, not dental experts. He also says it is underfunded. (CBC)

Prior to 2010, the government of Saskatchewan wouldn't pay for dental implants under any circumstance.

Saskatoon-based oral surgeon Frank Hohn thought that was unacceptable and pushed the government for change.

"At the time, the Ministry of Health stopped all funding once it became a dental issue and that didn't satisfy the needs of the patient," Hohn said.

Hohn worked with the government to set up a new program that would pay for dental implants in cases where no other method of treatment is appropriate.

The ministry says that since the program began, it has received about 130 applications and approximately 60 per cent of them have been approved.

The government explains the implants will only be covered in the case of "tumours and congenital defects" (cleft palate and metabolic disorders).

Perrin-Royer denied coverage

Executive director of Saskatchewan Medical Services Branch Shaylene Salazar said Perrin-Royer's claim was not technically denied because she never submitted a formal application. But she says the ministry is taking another look at her case. (CBC)

Perrin-Royer said her dental surgeon had conversations with Ministry of Health officials and he was told she didn't fit that criteria and wouldn't be covered.

So he didn't formally apply for funding.

Because there was no formal application, executive director of Saskatchewan Medical Services Branch Shaylene Salazar said the claim was not technically denied.

However, she did confirm that, in effect, the claim was denied and she said the ministry is now having another look at Perrin-Royer's case.

"Every case that we get that we deny we evaluate it against the policy and see if the policy needs to change. We do that with all coverage decisions," Salazar said.

Program needs review

Hohn said he's happy the government has a program for dental implants, but he thinks it's in need of change.

For starters, he said the fact that government officials decide who gets covered, not oral surgeons, is problematic.  

"If individual cases were brought forward and adjudicated by the proper people, not bureaucrats, I think the program would be better," Hohn said.

He said independent dental experts should be evaluating applications "on their individual merits as opposed to just a cookie cutter 'it covers this that and the other thing and no more.'"

Hohn said there's another problem with the system.

As the former president of the Canadian Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons, where he worked closely with colleagues from across the country, it became clear to him that Saskatchewan's program "is underfunded" when compared with other provinces.

"This program has really become a cost containment program as opposed to a patient-centred program," Hohn said.

Salazar defended the province's program saying "our coverage in Saskatchewan is fairly comparable to other provinces across Canada."

And she said it is being constantly evaluated with an eye to improving it.

Dental care underfunded across Canada

The dean of the College of Dentistry at the University of Saskatchewan argued it's not just Saskatchewan that underfunds dental care.

Gerry Uswak said it's a national problem that becomes evident when you compare what Canada spends on a per capita basis to other G8 nations, including the United States.

"We are basically at the bottom of the barrel in terms of our public funding of oral health and dental care," Uswak said. 

As for Perrin-Royer, she had the titanium pins installed in September. The new teeth haven't been installed yet and likely won't be for a few months yet.

She said soon she'll be getting a temporary denture.

Perrin-Royer said she's looking forward to that as she says she's tired of drinking protein shakes.

An X-ray of Judy Perrin-Royer's mouth in February 2013 before she had bone grafting done. (Judy Perrin-Royer)

An X-ray of Judy Perrin-Royer's mouth in June 2014 after she had bone grafting done to increase the depth of her upper jawbone. (CBC)

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Replay the live chat below, or if you'd like to weigh in, leave your thoughts in the comment section.

Join online host Matt Kruchak from Monday to Friday between 6-8:45 a.m. on cbc.ca/saskatoon for a lively and engaging live chat. While chatting, tune into Saskatoon Morning on 94.1 FM with host Leisha Grebinski.

Live Blog Live chat: Oct. 28

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Nun awake while heart valve replaced, procedure livestreamed

Less than an hour after having heart surgery on Monday, Sister Theresa Stickley was alert and in high spirits, and was looking forward to going home the next day.

"I'm feeling pretty good. I had a little pressure in the chest, that's all," the 83-year-old woman told reporters from her hospital bed, with the lead surgeon by her side.

Sister Theresa Stickley, left, was in good spirits just an hour after having a heart valve replaced on Monday, Oct. 27, 2014. Her doctors said she may be well enough to go home to Squamish the next day. (CBC)

"When he told me there'd be cameras, I thought 'oh my goodness sake, just keep me covered,'" she said.

Sister Theresa's aortic valve replacement operation, which went beautifully, was fairly unique in that it was broadcast in real time and observed by hundreds of cardiologists at the 2014 Canadian Cardiovascular Congress in Vancouver.

It was even more unique due to the fact that the Squamish-based Sister was awake during the entire procedure.

The surgery marks a stark departure from the standard valve replacement operation of a decade ago, in which doctors would have had to break open her sternum, or breastbone, and she would have been recovering in hospital for more than two weeks afterward. A full recovery could have taken up to six months.

Sister Theresa Stickley's heart valve replacement surgery was livestreamed to viewers at the 2014 Canadian Cardiovascular Congress in Vancouver, B.C. (CBC)

But in 2005, B.C. doctors pioneered a new procedure that threaded a replacement valve up to a patient's heart using a catheter inserted into the artery just above the leg.

The technique revolutionized the surgery, and now a team of B.C. cardiologists, including Dr. David Wood, is taking what they believe is the next step forward.

"The innovation done here at the Centre for Heart Valve Innovation is stripping that procedure down to its bare essentials," he said.

Using only a local anaesthetic, patients are wide awake during the surgery. Post-surgery recovery time is usually less than a day.

Cardiologist Dr. David Wood, centre, and two members of his team spoke with reporters following Monday's successful operation on Sister Theresa Stickley. (CBC)

"As you saw the case took about half an hour, and she'll be mobilized about four hours later and, if she's like the other patients, about over three-quarters will go home the next day—and why that's critical is that you don't pick up infections, you don't have any complications," he said.

In a pilot study, the one-year survival rate went from a 75 to 93 per cent. A clinical trial is about to get underway in 10 centres across North America and by the spring of 2016 the procedure, which also cuts health system costs, could be used in hospitals around the world.

"The economic, potential implications are just staggering," Wood said.

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PSA test should be abandoned as screen for prostate cancer, task force says

The blood test mostly commonly used to screen men for prostate cancer should be dropped, because it can result in  more harm than good, says a Canadian task force.

The prostate-specific antigen, or PSA, test measures inflammation that can be elevated for many reasons other than cancer, such as normal enlargement of the prostate with age or an infection.

Researchers said over-diagnosis occurs when cancer is detected correctly but would not cause symptoms or death.

The main problems are false-positive results and over-diagnosis, the review indicated. A positive PSA test result often leads to more tests such as a biopsy, which carries risks of bleeding, infection, and urinary incontinence.

In most men with prostate cancer, the tumour grows slowly, and they're likely to die of another cause before the prostate tumour causes any symptoms.  

Prostate cancer is the most commonly diagnosed non-skin cancer in men. The prognosis for most prostate cancers is good, with a 10-year survival rate of 95 per cent.

Screening aims to find cancer before symptoms appear and reduce the chance of dying from cancer with early treatment.

In Monday's issue of the Canadian Medical Association Journal, the Canadian Task Force on Preventive Health Care reviewed the latest evidence and international best practice to weigh the benefits and harms of PSA screening with or without digital rectal exams.

"Available evidence does not conclusively show that PSA screening will reduce prostate cancer mortality, but it clearly shows an elevated risk of harm. The task force recommends that the PSA test should not be used to screen for prostate cancer," Dr. Neil Bell, chair of the prostate cancer guideline working group member, and his team concluded.

The guideline is aimed at physicians and other health-care professionals and policymakers. It updates the task force's recommendation from 1994 on screening with the PSA test.

The new recommendations include:

• For men under age 55 and over age 70, the task force recommends not using the PSA test to screen for prostate cancer. This strong recommendation is based on the lack of clear evidence that screening with the PSA test reduces mortality and on the evidence of increased risk of harm.
• For men aged 55–69 years, the task force also recommends not screening, although it recognizes that some men may place high value on the small potential reduction in the risk of death and suggests that physicians should discuss the benefits and harms with these patients.
• These recommendations apply to men considered high risk — black men and those with a family history of prostate cancer — because the evidence does not indicate that the benefits and harms of screening are different for this group.

The key evidence was from a well-done European study. It showed inconsistent results, with a small potential positive effect over a long period of time, which the reviewers balanced against the clear evidence of harm, said Dr. James Dickinson, a member of the prostate cancer guideline working group and a professor of family medicine at the University of Calgary.

"Fundamentally this is not a good enough test to be worth using," Dickinson said in an interview. "Let's hope that better things come in the future, but right now it's not worth using. It's more likely to cause harm than benefit."

A Canadian specialist, however, takes issue with the recommendation.

The task force's guidelines are flawed for Canada, said Dr. Neil Fleshner, who studies and treats prostate cancer at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre in Toronto.

"By using the PSA test, we can absolutely find lethal cancers early and by intervening in those men, we can save their lives. Therefore, these recommendations undoubtedly will lead to more prostate cancer deaths," Fleshner said.

The task force's Bell said almost one in five men aged 55 to 69 have at least one false-positive PSA test, and about 17 per cent end up with unnecessary biopsies.

"If you screen men [aged 55 to 69] based on the protocol in those trials, every two to four years for 13 years, five out of 1,000 will die from prostate cancer. If you don't screen, six out of 1,000 men will die from prostate cancer," Bell said. "So the reduction in prostate cancer mortality is one in 1,000 or about 0.1 per cent."

"To get the benefit, you're diagnosing about 27 or 28 men with prostate cancer who would never benefit from the treatment related to prostate cancer because they would never suffer any difficulty from it."

Bell added that more than half of detected prostate cancers are over-diagnosed.

The task force said that separating screening from treatment through watchful waiting or active surveillance, could change the ratio of risks to benefits of PSA screening, but the hypothesis needs to be tested.

Dr. Murray Krahn of Toronto's University Health Network wrote a journal commentary on prostate cancer screening. 

Krahn said the task force guideline provides a good summary, but he would like to see more emphasis on patient preference, such as whether the harms are important, and shared decision-making.

On the sidelines of a recreational hockey game in Toronto, Rakesh Patel, 53, said he had a PSA test at his doctor's suggestion.

"She goes through the whole series of things that I should be aware of, especially at my age," Patel said.

The task force said it did not consider the costs of screening or treatment of prostate cancer.

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Amber Vinson, 2nd Texas nurse to contract Ebola, to be released today

A nurse being treated for Ebola will leave hospital Tuesday after tests showed she's virus-free, while another nurse quarantined against her will after treating patients in West Africa has returned to her home state.

Atlanta's Emory University Hospital spokeswoman Holly Korschun said Amber Vinson, who cared for the Liberian man who died of Ebola in the U.S. on Oct. 8, would be discharged following a 1 p.m. ET news conference.

Vinson, 29, was one of two nurses who became infected while caring for Thomas Eric Duncan at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas.

The other infected nurse, Nina Pham, was released Oct. 24 from a hospital attached to the National Institutes of Health near Washington.

Meanwhile, Doctors Without Borders volunteer Kaci Hickox, has travelled to an "undisclosed location," in her home state of Maine, according to Steve Hyman, one of her lawyers.

Hickox spent the weekend in a quarantine tent in New Jersey upon returning from West Africa despite testing negative for Ebola and having no symptoms other than a slightly elevated temperature she blamed on "inhumane" treatment at Newark Liberty International Airport.

Maine health officials announced that Hickox will be quarantined at home for 21 days after the last possible exposure to the disease under the state's health protocols.

But Hyman, said he expected her to remain in seclusion for the "next day or so" while he works with Maine health officials.

Hyman said the state should follow the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines that require only monitoring, not quarantine, for health care workers who show no symptoms after treating Ebola patients.

"She's a very good person who did very good work and deserves to be honoured, not detained, for it," he said.

Hickox was the first person forced into New Jersey's mandatory quarantine for people arriving at Newark Liberty from three West African countries.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo were sharply criticized for ordering mandatory quarantines. But Christie said Monday that his priority is protecting the health of people in his state.

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Enterovirus D68 confirmed in Fredericton child

New Brunswick has its first confirmed case of Enterovirus D68, which is the strain that has hospitalized children across North America and been linked to at least three deaths.

A Fredericton child, who tested positive for Enterovirus D68, was hospitalized for four days, but is now doing well, public health officials say. (CBC)

The patient, a Fredericton school-aged child without underlying medical conditions, was hospitalized for four days, released in early October and is now doing well, said acting chief medical officer of health Dr. Jennifer Russell.

There are no other suspected cases in the province, she said in a statement on Monday.

Public health announced the confirmed case after receiving test results from the national microbiology lab in Winnipeg. Confirmation of test results takes several weeks, Russell said.

The results do not impact the treatment, which is the same for all strains of the disease, but they can be beneficial for researchers, she said.

Earlier this month, test results confirmed two other children in Fredericton, who tested positive for Enterovirus, did not have the D68 strain.

EV-D68 is one of more than 100 non-polio enteroviruses, which are common at this time of year.

Symptoms are similar to that of a cold, such as a runny nose and fever, but can cause serious respiratory problems.

Much like the common cold, the virus is transmitted through close contact, from nose or throat secretions.

New Brunswickers are encouraged to take proper measures to protect themselves through frequent washing of hands, coughing into one's sleeve and staying home when sick.

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