In late September, Thomas Duncan became the first person to be diagnosed with Ebola in the U.S. Two hospital workers who treated him also became infected, setting off a nationwide effort to contain the disease, and fears of a larger outbreak. Keep checking this page for all the latest updates on the crisis.

All times Eastern

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October 29, 11:45 a.m.

Hagel Signs Ebola Quarantine Order for Military

Soldiers returning from the military's mission combatting Ebola in West Africa will be placed in a 21-day quarantine under an order signed Wednesday by Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel.

Hagel approved a recommendation from the Joints Chiefs of Staff to create what the military is calling a "controlled monitoring regimen" for service members in the region. The order formalizes a more restrictive Ebola protocol than the CDC recommends for civilian health workers, and Hagel said in an appearance at the Washington Ideas Forum that the move was prompted in part by concerns raised by military families, who "very much wanted a safety valve on this."

Just over 1,000 service members are in Liberia and Senegal, and as many as 4,000 could be part of the mission to build treatment centers and help the local population contain the outbreak. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said in a statement that the policy would be reviewed after 45 days based on what the military learns from the first wave of returning soldiers.

"The secretary believes these initial steps are prudent given the large number of military personnel transiting from their home base and West Africa and the unique logistical demands and impact this deployment has on the force," Kirby said. "The secretary's highest priority is the safety and security of our men and women in uniform and their families."

–Russell Berman

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October 29, 10:30 a.m.

Nurse Threatens to Go to Court If State Quarantines Her

Days after being quarantined against her will behind a New Jersey hospital, nurse Kaci Hickox says that she will go to court if Maine tries to impose a quarantine on her. Hickox, who was detained after returning from West Africa, where she was treating Ebola patients, was flown to Maine earlier this week and has been following the state's voluntary quarantine. However, she says, if the restrictions against her aren't removed by Thursday, Hickox says she will go to court.

"I am not going to sit around and be bullied by politicians and forced to stay in my home when I am not a risk to the American public," she said during a televised interview on Today.

Hickox maintains that she is not sick, having twice tested negative for Ebola. Her initial detainment was spurred by a high temperature reading on an airport forehead scanner, although a follow-up reading showed her temperature to be normal. Her case has become something of a lightning rod as political grappling over quarantine policy continues between officials on the state and federal levels.

–Adam Chandler

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October 28, 4:32 p.m.

Standing Up for Ebola Health Workers

President Obama never mentioned Chris Christie's name during his brief update on the government's Ebola response on Tuesday afternoon. He didn't need to.

To anyone who has followed the shadowboxing between federal officials and the governor of New Jersey over the last several days, it was clear to whom Obama was referring when he spoke up repeatedly in defense of health workers who treat Ebola patients in West Africa and insisted that public health policies must not discourage them from fighting the virus at its source. Read More...

—Russell Berman

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October 28, 9:20 a.m.

Second Infected Nurse Is Declared Ebola-Free

Amber Vinson, the second Dallas nurse who contracted Ebola from Thomas Eric Duncan, is now free of the virus and will be released from Emory University Hospital in Atlanta on Tuesday afternoon, the hospital said.

Vinson was transferred to Emory from the Dallas hospital where she treated Duncan, who died October 8. She had flown to Cleveland and back to Dallas in the days before she became symptomatic, but thus far no one with whom she came in contact has been diagnosed with Ebola. Another nurse who treated Duncan, Nina Pham, was released from an NIH hospital in Maryland after being treated successfully for Ebola.

The only person in the U.S. currently known to have Ebola is now Dr. Craig Spencer, who is undergoing treatment in New York.

–Russell Berman

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October 28, 9:10 a.m.

U.N. Ambassador Won't Face Quarantine After West Africa Trip

On Monday, White House press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters that Samantha Power, the American ambassador to the United Nations, would undergo active monitoring for Ebola upon her return from West Africa, where she has been dispatched on a fact-finding mission.

When she arrives, Power will become the latest face of federal policy with regard to Ebola (whatever it may be by then). As of now, that seems to mean that she will check in regularly with doctors and otherwise go about her business unless she (or her doctors) detect symptoms of the virus. Read more...

–Adam Chandler

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October 27, 10:30 a.m.

Quarantined Nurse Discharged as White House Weighs Changes

Nurse Kaci Hickox will be discharged from her Ebola-related quarantine in a tent outside a New Jersey hospital on Monday, and officials said she would be allowed to return to her home state of Maine.

Governor Chris Christie announced the move after Hickox, who tested negative for Ebola, called her conditions "inhumane" and retained attorney Norman Siegel to file a lawsuit challenging her mandatory isolation. The move comes as the White House weighs changes to the federal policy on health workers who return to the U.S. after treating Ebola patients in West Africa. Read more...

–Russell Berman

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October 26, 4:33 p.m.

Christie Has 'No Second Thoughts' About Ebola Quarantine

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie on Sunday defended his Ebola quarantine policy, dismissing complaints from a nurse quarantined under the policy, as well as worries that the approach would deter American health workers from traveling overseas to tackle the virus—a stance that has drawn the attention of the White House and could bring legal action against the state.

"The government's job is to protect safety and health of our citizens," Christie said on Fox News Sunday. "I have no second thoughts about it."

Criticism of the quarantine policy started when Kaci Hickox, a nurse placed under mandatory quarantine in New Jersey, slammed the "knee-jerk reaction by politicians" and the policy over how she has been treated during that time in anopinion piece for the Dallas Morning News. On Sunday, she reiterated her position, saying on CNN's "State of the Union," "This is an extreme that is really unacceptable, and I feel like my basic human rights have been violated." Read more ...

— Allen McDuffee

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October 24, 5:33 p.m.

New York, New Jersey Announce New Ebola Quarantines at Airports

The states of New York and New Jersey will begin quarantining all medical workers who treated Ebola patients in West Africa and return to the U.S. through their airports, Governors Andrew Cuomo and Chris Christie announced Friday.

The stepped-up response comes one day after a New York doctor was diagnosed with Ebola about a week after returning from Guinea, where he was working with Doctors Without Borders. Cuomo and Christie said the CDC allows states to determine their own quarantine guidelines, even though the policy will not–as of yet–be in effect nationally. Christie said a health worker who had treated Ebola patients in West Africa was already quarantined at Newark Liberty International Airport earlier Friday under the new policy, even though she did not present any symptoms of the virus.

"This is not the time to take chances," Cuomo said.

He said it was clear voluntary quarantines for workers returning from West Africa were not enough, especially after it emerged that Dr. Craig Spencer, the New Yorker diagnosed with Ebola on Thursday, had gone out and about in public during the 21-day period after he treated patients in Guinea.

–Russell Berman

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October 24, 1:00 p.m.

Scientists Consider Role of Robots in Caring for Ebola Patients

Ebola is a cruel disease in many ways, but one of the worst is that it preys on the very things that help make us who we are, as a species: our need for community. Our impulse for love. Our inability to see a baby, abandoned, and not reach out. Ebola preys on human bodies, by way of human souls.

From a technological standpoint, the best way to combat all of this is for the healthy to distance themselves from the stricken. And the most obvious way to do that is to remove human interaction from the equation. And the most obvious way to do that may involve removing humans themselves from the equation—at least when it comes to the care of the sick.

On November 7, scientists will convene at universities across the country to consider the role that autonomous machines might play in combating the Ebola crisis. Read more...

–Megan Garber

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October 24, 12:00 p.m.

Lawmakers Voice Doubts on Ebola Protocols

The Ebola diagnosis in a New York doctor who had returned recently from Guinea is prompting lawmakers to voice fresh concerns about protocols for preventing the spread of the virus in the U.S.

At a hearing on Capitol Hill, several lawmakers questioned whether people who may have been exposed to the virus should be trusted to "self-monitor" themselves during the 21-day period when Ebola could be in their system. Dr. Craig Spencer, the New York doctor, had gone bowling and taken the subway the day before he reported a fever to health officials.

"I am highly skeptical," said Representative Michael Turner, a Republican of Ohio. "The American public is worried. I believe these [standards] need to be revised." He questioned why military service members in West Africa were allowed to travel after just 10 days, rather than wait the full three weeks.

Democratic Representative Steven Lynch of Massachusetts said travelers should be required to spend the 21-day monitoring period abroad before they are allowed to enter the U.S.

"I understand we don’t want to panic people, but we also don’t need happy talk about what we’re dealing with," Lynch said.

"We are not taking this seriously enough. We are not," he added.

Lynch directed questions to Rabih Torbay, a senior official with the International Medical Corps, which is treating Ebola patients in Africa. Torbay said a much longer waiting period would be unworkable for hospitals who need staff on the job. "We cannot completely wrap ourselves in a bubble here," Torbay said.

The chairman of the Oversight Committee, Representative Darrell Issa of California, raised alarmed about the possible spread of Ebola through public transportation, which health experts say is unlikely because the disease is spread only through contact with bodily fluids from a patient presenting symptoms. Issa harshly criticized CDC director Dr. Thomas Frieden (who was not present) and suggested that contrary to his public statements, Ebola could easily be transmitted on public transportation if, for example, an infected person vomited on a bus.

"When the head of the CDC says you can't get it on a bus from someone sitting next to you, that's just not true," Issa said. "The fact is the head of the CDC gave false information."

–Russell Berman

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October 24, 11:07 a.m.

First infected Dallas Nurse Declared Free of Ebola

Nina Pham, one of the two nurses who contracted Ebola in Dallas, will be released from an National Institutes of Health facility in Maryland on Friday after medical officials there declared her to be free of the virus. She was admitted on October 16.

Pham was the first nurse infected after treating Thomas Eric Duncan, the Liberian man who died in Dallas earlier this month. The second nurse, Amber Vinson, is also improving and was told by doctors at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta on Wednesday that the virus could no longer be detected in her bloodstream.

–Russell Berman

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October 23, 9:40 p.m.

Doctor in New York City Diagnosed with Ebola

A doctor who treated Ebola victims in Guinea has been diagnosed with the virus in New York, in the first U.S. case confirmed outside of Dallas.

Dr. Craig Spencer was rushed to Bellevue Hospital Center in Manhattan on Thursday after he called authorities and reported a fever and gastrointestinal symptoms. An initial blood test came back positive for Ebola.

Spencer is the fourth person in the U.S. to be diagnosed with Ebola. The first case, Thomas Eric Duncan, died in Dallas earlier this month, and two nurses who treated him have become infected. One of those nurses, Amber Vinson, was cleared of the virus on Wednesday. Spencer's diagnosis is likely to cause concern in New York because he traveled on the subway and went to a bowling alley in Brooklyn on the night before he came down with a fever. Spencer, 33, worked with Doctors Without Borders in Guinea and returned to the U.S. a week ago, officials said Thursday night.

The CDC has dispatched a rapid response team to New York, and "disease detectives" were trying to reach people who had come in contact with Spencer in recent days. CDC director Dr. Thomas Frieden said that by coincidence, the center already had a team in New York observing Bellevue's preparations for a possible case.

City and state officials immediately sought to head off a public panic at the first case of Ebola in the nation's largest and densest city. "We want to state at the outset that there is no reason for New Yorkers to be alarmed," New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a nationally-televised press conference.

The city's health commissioner, Dr. Mary Bassett, said Spencer had felt fatigued in recent days but did not have a fever until Thursday morning. He had been checking his temperature twice a day since returning from West Africa. Three of Spencer's contacts will be monitored for symptoms for 21 days, Bassett said.

–Russell Berman

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October 22, 6:18 p.m.

Dallas Nurse Cleared of Ebola

A spokesperson for the Vinson family told CBS News that Amber Vinson, the nurse who cared for Dallas, Texas Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan, has been found in good health. Doctors no longer detected the virus in her bloodstream. Vinson has been in Emory University Hospital in Atlanta for the last week and due to her progress, she will be transferred out of the isolation unit.

–Polly Mosendz