Dr. Nancy Snyderman, NBC's chief medical editor and correspondent who was recently exposed to the Ebola virus, issued a statement on Monday night after reportedly breaking quarantine, NJ.com said.
The 62-year-old journalist was in Liberia covering the latest outbreak in West Africa when she and other NBC crew members were exposed to Ebola. Ashoka Mukpo, a freelance cameraman on the team, was infected with the disease and is currently being treated in Omaha.
Upon their return to the United States, Snyderman and the rest of the crew told the CDC as well as state and local health officials that they would voluntarily remain in isolation for three weeks.
Last Friday, New Jersey health officials issued a mandatory quarantine for the journalists that is in effect until Oct. 22, KSNW-TV reported.
Then, several media reports came to light that claimed Snyderman had been spotted on Oct. 9 at the Peasant Grill restaurant in Hopewell, N.J.
On Monday, Snyderman issued a statement about the violation that was read by Brian Williams of NBC's Nightly News:
While under voluntary quarantine guidelines, which called for our team to avoid public contact for 21 days, members of our group violated those guidelines and understand that our quarantine is now mandatory until 21 days have passed. We remain healthy and our temperatures are normal.
As a health professional I know that we have no symptoms and pose no risk to the public, but I am deeply sorry for the concerns this episode caused. We are thrilled that Ashoka is getting better and our thoughts continue to be with the thousands affected by Ebola whose stories we all went to cover.
So far, the crew remains symptom-free, the state Health Department told The Associated Press.
At the time of this writing, more than 4,000 people have died in the latest Ebola outbreak.