The Trump administration plans to send U.S. citizens exposed to Ebola to Kenya for observation and treatment, three people with knowledge of the plans told The New York Times.
Here’s the latest on the Ebola outbreak.
1. Dozens of public health service officers are being trained to deploy to Kenya to provide medical care to Americans deemed at high risk of developing Ebola, the Times reported. The initial plan was to monitor patients in Kenya, and move anyone who developed symptoms to Europe for treatment. However, sources familiar with the plan said the administration now plans to provide treatment in Kenya as well. HHS, the State and Defense departments are coordinating to set up a facility where citizens, as well as any deployed health service officers who develop symptoms, can quarantine or be treated. Each case will be evaluated for advanced treatment as needed. A White House spokesperson declined the Times‘ request to comment. The plan still needs approval from the Kenyan government, ABC News reported.
2. The U.S. has 13 biocontainment facilities capable of treating highly infectious diseases. The move to keep Americans out of the U.S. is a marked contrast to such decisions in previous outbreaks, including the last large Ebola outbreak in 2014 or the more recent hantavirus outbreak. Currently, the University of Nebraska Medical Center is monitoring patients amid the hantavirus outbreak.
3. The CDC has asked staff to volunteer for urgent deployment to support Ebola screening at selected international airports. In the email, CDC Acting Director Jay Bhattacharya, MD, PhD, said the agency has activated a level 2 emergency response May 18 and is expanding recruitment beyond its usual emergency responder pool. Public health advisors, emergency specialists and licensed medical providers, among others, are being asked to support the effort. Volunteers would be tasked with monitoring incoming travelers for signs of illness, checking temperatures and referring suspected cases for further assessment, according to the email.
4. U.S. citizens returning from the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan and Uganda can only return through four airports: John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City, Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport and George Bush International Airport in Houston. Non-U.S. citizens traveling from those countries are temporarily banned from entering.
5. The CDC will host a webinar May 28 for U.S. clinicians about the ongoing Ebola outbreak, including preparing for, diagnosing and managing patients with suspected or confirmed Ebola disease, and preventing virus spread.
6. This is the third largest Ebola outbreak on record. As of May 26, there are more than 906 suspected Ebola cases and 223 suspected deaths in the Democratic Republic of Congo, with 105 confirmed cases and 10 confirmed deaths. In Uganda, there are seven confirmed cases and one death.
“We are urgently scaling up operations, but at the moment, the epidemic is outpacing us,” World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Ghebreyesus, PhD, said May 25.
7. In Congo, conspiracy theories are running rampant, making it more difficult to contain the spread. Among the more popular theories is that nonprofit workers brought Ebola to the country to get more money and that the outbreak is fabricated to frighten people and gain access to the country’s resources, including gold, The Washington Post reported. These theories, along with existing civil unrest, has made it difficult to contain Ebola spread and may have contributed to three attacks on healthcare facilities treating Ebola patients.
8. Uganda has closed its border with Congo.
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