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ATHENS, Ga. (AP) — Ebola concerns have prompted the University of Georgia to postpone a guest lecture by a Liberian journalist.
Officials said in a release that Washington Post reporter Todd Frankel will replace Wade C.L. Williams as a guest speaker during a lecture on the crisis at the university on Thursday.
Williams is editor of the news site FrontPage Africa and is a New Narratives fellow, which is a project to support African journalists. Frankel spent 10 days in Sierra Leone and returned to the U.S. on Sept. 1, UGA officials said in a statement.
Williams' visit was postponed because she's within a 21-day incubation period for the virus "and we didn't feel like that was safe for our students," UGA spokeswoman Sarah Freeman said. "It's certainly a hope that we will have her in the future," she said.
Ebola is transmitted through direct contact with bodily fluid, such as getting an infected person's blood or vomit into the eyes or through a cut in the skin, not through the air, experts have said. And people infected with Ebola aren't contagious until they start showing symptoms, such as fever, body aches or stomach pain, research shows.
Syracuse University also recently rescinded an invitation for Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post photojournalist Michel DuCille to speak at a workshop because he had been in Liberia covering the Ebola crisis. There, school officials consulted with county health officials, who supported their decision to cancel his visit. DuCille said he returned more than 21 days ago and is symptom free.
UGA officials said that Frankel and three other writers are also scheduled to speak about what journalistic courage means during a symposium at the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication.
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