US Ebola cameraman 'in good spirits'

The parents of a US cameraman diagnosed with Ebola have said their son is in good spirits.

Ashoka Mukpo was hired on Tuesday to be the second cameraman in Liberia for NBC’s chief medical editor and correspondent Nancy Snyderman.

Mitchel Levy said of his son: “Obviously he is scared and worried.”

Mr Mukpo has been “seeing the death and tragedy and now it really hit home for him. But his spirits are better today”, added Dr Levy, who appeared on NBC’s Today show with his wife, Diana Mukpo.

Their 33-year-old son is being treated in the Liberian capital of Monrovia and is scheduled to return to the US this weekend for treatment, his mother said.

“I think the enormous anxiety that I have as a mother or that we share as parents is the delay between now and him leaving on Sunday,” she said, adding that she hopes his symptoms do not worsen rapidly.

“Doctors are optimistic about his prognosis,” Dr Levy said.

The couple live in Providence, Rhode Island.

Ms Snyderman and her team are also returning to the US and being placed in quarantine for 21 days “in an abundance of caution”, NBC News president Deborah Turness said.

In a phone interview with Today, Ms Snyderman said all the gear she and her crew had used was being disinfected because they all shared work space and vehicles.

She believes she and her team were at a low risk because they had been “hyper-vigilant”.

Mr Mukpo has been working in Liberia for three years for Vice News and other media outlets.

ABC News said Dr Levy issued a statement saying his son had been involved in human rights work in West Africa for several years and was aware of the risks, but he felt compelled to go back to Liberia when the Ebola crisis erupted.