The recent Ebola outbreak in West Africa has led to widespread fear and hysteria. The secondary effects of the outbreaks have been seen many places that are not directly affected. Whether or not the outbreak is being dealt with correctly is a major dispute amongst the world and how our school is handling the situation is important to be known.

“We would have an easier time containing something if there was an issue, so I really didn’t panic,” Nurse Sherri Thompson said. “It didn’t really scare me because I feel like our medical guidelines and experience and skill level is much different than in Africa.”

Nurse Thompson is very confident in the government’s ability to avoid any outbreaks of the illness in America and feels there is no need to fear local contamination.

“I still think for us we’re still pretty safe, but I think that some other people really start to panic,” Thompson said. “When people have questions or worries (we) try to educate them and give them the facts.”

Junior Josh Irons believes that we need to stay cautious with this disease and not allow any more mistakes in the health industry to occur.

“I thought it was kind of the fault of the CDC,” Irons said. “It concerned me that we weren’t taking all the precautions that we probably should have.”

When asked about the school closures, Irons didn’t think the districts had overreacted to any great degree.

“It wasn’t my school that it happened to, so I feel like we can’t really judge them for what they thought was right for their students,” he said.

With no current quarantines enacted at the school, senior Kade Barnett believes there is no major risk.

“We played Lewisville in a fall league game and they are one of the two towns that had people with Ebola,” Barnett said. “The school didn’t seem to think that could be an issue.”

The town of Argyle has had no connection to Ebola and freshman Chase Book anticipates that this won’t change.

“The measures the United States government has taken to keep the disease out of the U.S. will keep us safe,” Book said. “It hasn’t affected me inside or outside of school. I have just learned about the disease.”