In this Oct. 28, 2006, file photo, a mock patient is wheeled in an isolation pod during a drill at the Nebraska biocontainment unit in the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, Nebraska. (AP)
A Sierra Leone surgeon with Ebola being flown to the United States for treatment is critically ill, possibly sicker than other patients treated in the U.S., the Nebraska Medical Center said on Saturday.
Dr Martin Salia, 44, a permanent U.S. resident who caught Ebola working as a surgeon in a Freetown hospital, was stable enough to take a flight from West Africa to the U.S. and was expected to arrive in Nebraska at 4 p.m. local time (22:00 GMT) on Saturday, the hospital said in a statement.
"Although the patient's exact condition won't be available until doctors here evaluate him after he arrives, information coming from the team caring for him in Sierra Leone indicates he is critically ill - possibly sicker than the first patients successfully treated in the United States," the hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, said in a statement.
Salia will be the third patient treated for Ebola in the Nebraska hospital's Biocontainment Unit since the outbreak gained momentum this year in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia.
Salia was chief medical officer at the United Methodist Church's Kissy Hospital when he was confirmed on Tuesday to have contracted Ebola.
A medical crew with Phoenix Air examined Salia in Sierra Leone before leaving with him en route to the U.S. on Friday night, the Nebraska hospital said.
According to the latest figures from the World Health Organization, at least 5,177 people have died in the world's worst recorded Ebola outbreak.
Most of the victims have been in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, where already weak healthcare systems have been over-run by the disease. A total of 570 local health workers have been infected, with 324 of these dying.
Salia would be the 10th known case of Ebola in the United States. All but one of the other cases were successfully treated.
The Nebraska clinic has successfully treated two other people who caught Ebola in West Africa since September and is one of four American hospitals approved by the federal government to treat Ebola.
© Thomson Reuters 2014