--- title: Ebola: Thomas Eric Duncan Contacts in U.S. Off Watch List description: "We are so happy this is coming to an end" canonical: https://time.com/3524384/ebola-thomas-eric-duncan-contacts-containment/ author: Alice Park article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-10-20T12:57:23.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T08:00:26.566Z article:section: Health og:title: Ebola: Thomas Eric Duncan Contacts in U.S. Off Watch List og:description: "We are so happy this is coming to an end" og:url: https://time.com/3524384/ebola-thomas-eric-duncan-contacts-containment/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0abdd4b5407362f9/698761c455a85927e1a8354b/ebola-mike-rawlings.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3000 og:image:height: 1688 og:image:alt: Mayor Mike Rawlings speaks during a news conference about the recent Ebola infections with Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins and Dallas County Health and Human Services Director Zachary Thompson at the Dallas County Administration Building on Oct. 20, 201 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Ebola: Thomas Eric Duncan Contacts in U.S. Off Watch List twitter:description: "We are so happy this is coming to an end" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0abdd4b5407362f9/698761c455a85927e1a8354b/ebola-mike-rawlings.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Dozens Who Had Contact With the First U.S. Ebola Patient Are in the Clear > Sponsored content. 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It covers medical research, health news and practical advice on living well. #### Where can I get reliable health news by email? Health Matters is TIME's weekday health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free weekday newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-health-2026q3/newsletters?i=012398bc-c3ef-41ad-a740-1157993eedef&cr=time-nl-health-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Watch One Man’s Story of Surviving Ebola [Watch (HLS stream): Watch One Man’s Story of Surviving Ebola](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/XfeUoCr9.m3u8) (1:32)  _Published 2014-10-03. Watch One Man’s Story of Surviving Ebola_  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent Oct 20, 2014 12:57 PM UTC  Mayor Mike Rawlings speaks during a news conference about the recent Ebola infections with Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins and Dallas County Health and Human Services Director Zachary Thompson at the Dallas County Administration Building on Oct. 20, 2014 in Dallas. Mayor Mike Rawlings speaks during a news conference about the recent Ebola infections with Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins and Dallas County Health and Human Services Director Zachary Thompson at the Dallas County Administration Building on Oct. 20, 2014 in Dallas. Chip Somodevilla—Getty Images  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent Oct 20, 2014 12:57 PM UTC The first wave of people who were being monitored because they had direct contact with the first Ebola patient in the U.S. were declared free of the disease early Monday, an important step in the containment effort. The Texas Department of State Health said 43 people were in the clear after they had contact with Thomas Eric Duncan, who died of the disease Oct. 8\. Health officials have been taking their temperature twice daily for 21 days, the longest incubation period for the virus, and said that none have developed symptoms. Those individuals will now be taken off the watch list and will no longer need to be checked for symptoms. At least two health care workers who helped treat Duncan have been infected, amid an outbreak that has killed more than 4,500 people in West Africa. The group taken off the watch list Monday includes “a mix of health care workers, household contacts and community members whose last possible contact with the state’s first patient was Sept. 28,” the department said. They had to make themselves available for daily monitoring and were told not to leave the state during the incubation period. The four people who lived with Duncan after he arrived from Liberia, where he contracted the disease, have also shown no signs of infection and will be taken off the watch list. They included Louise Troh, Duncan’s girlfriend, his son with Troh and two young men. They were placed under quarantine because of their high risk but will be now allowed to leave their temporary home. “We are so happy this is coming to an end, and we are so grateful that none of us has shown any sign of illness,” Troh said in a statement. “We ask to be given privacy as we seek to rebuild our home, our family and our daily living.” Texas state health officials and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continue to monitor 120 people, including health workers who cared for Duncan while he was hospitalized at Texas Health Presbyterian before he died, and passengers who sat within three feet of a nurse from the hospital who flew on two commercial flights on Oct. 10 and Oct. 13\. Those health care workers have now been told to remain at home and avoid public places. _Read next:_ [_Nigeria Is Ebola-Free: Here’s What They Did Right_](http://time.com/3522984/ebola-nigeria-who/?xid=time%5Freadnext) ## Transcript [ MUSIC ] I saw decent people losing their life to Ebola. [ MUSIC ] I work overtime. I work in the day. I work in the night. People will call me. Me. I have to be there, I have to take them to the center and today because of that a lot of them have their life back. When I went in he was lying in a pool of vomit. I picked him up. he kept vomiting so maybe it through that, mistakenly it seeped through somewhere in my PPEs and. I didn't, I didn't really care because I did not want him to lost his life, so when I checked him for what was happening my only concern was to drive him to the center that he, he received treatment. Day after then, I fell sick [ MUSIC ] I don't regret anything. Even if I lose my life in the process, I don't regret it. It's what God wanted to happen. I'm gonna go back and do my job. I wanna help save a lot of lives. Our people are dying. Everybody can't see a way. Now that I have built an immunity to Ebola, I'm gonna go in with full swing. 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