EBOLA survivor Pauline Cafferkey has criticised Public Health England's (PHE) "blame culture" after a nurse was suspended for concealing the fact that the Scottish medic had a raised temperature before she tested positive for the disease.
Ms Cafferkey, who is a cousin of Irish soccer legend Packie Bonner and whose late grandmother was from Kincasslagh, Co Donegal, said she was "extremely disappointed" that nurse Donna Wood had been handed a two-month suspension order and said PHE had "failed to recognise their own failings".
The high temperature, noted on December 28 2014, should have triggered concerns that Ms Cafferkey was infected with the deadly virus.
But Ms Wood suggested a lower temperature was recorded on Ms Cafferkey's form so they could pass through the screening process at passport control at Heathrow Airport more quickly, a Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) panel found.
Ms Cafferkey told The Guardian: "I am very sorry to hear the outcome of Donna Wood's hearing.
"I still feel extremely disappointed that in making complaints against volunteers who willingly put themselves in danger for the benefit of others, Public Health England employed a blame culture and failed to recognise their own failings - which were many - on the day the volunteers arrived at Heathrow.
"I hope that Public Health England will now acknowledge their mistakes and accept that as a result of these, they took the decision to allow me to fly on to Glasgow, rather than transferring me to hospital in London. I look forward to this continuing ordeal eventually being concluded."
Ms Wood was suspended during a hearing in Stratford, east London, on Friday, after the panel found her fitness to practise had been impaired on public interest grounds.
She had faced the possibility of being struck off.
Ms Cafferkey was cleared at an earlier hearing in September of allowing the incorrect temperature to be recorded.
