Anne Hull, Dana Priest, Michel du Cille

Michel du Cille is a three-time Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer for The Washington Post. He was uninvited from a journalism conference at Syracuse University because school officials fear he might spread Ebola, after covering the disease in Liberia 21 days ago.

(AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

Syracuse University's decision to "un-invite" a Pulitzer Prize winning photojournalist because he had been exposed to Ebola while on assignment in West Africa set off a controversy that stretches from Marshall Street to the Mall in Washington, D.C.



Michel du Cille, of The Washington Post, raked SU over Twitter and on Facebook for "pandering" to public hysteria over the lethal virus.



Pandering? We think not.



Since returning to the United States, du Cille has been monitoring himself for an elevated temperature, which is one of the first symptoms of the virus. Officials currently say that after being symptom free for the 21-day Ebola incubation period, a person is in the clear. There is some question as to whether that's long enough to rule out Ebola.



Du Cille was to be on SU's campus on Day 21 to meet with students and discuss their portfolios. One student expressed concern to school officials over having a close encounter with someone so recently exposed.



University officials contacted the Onondaga County Health Department and local doctors for their opinion. The medical folks counseled the university to rescind its invitation to du Cille out of an abundance of caution.



Showing caution is not the same thing as pandering -- or panicking.



University officials are responsible for the 21,000 students who attend SU -- many of them highly mobile -- and the 5,300 faculty and staff who work there.



Du Cille called the canceled appearance "a missed opportunity to teach future media professionals how to seek out accurate hard facts; backed up with full details about the Ebola crisis. I guess it is easier to pull the hysteria and xenophobia cards."



The criticism is misplaced. It was journalism that brought to light the mistakes public health officials made in Dallas by not being cautious enough in restricting the movements of people known to have been exposed to Ebola.



If the photographer is so keen on teaching future media professionals this weekend, we suggest he dial them up on Skype.