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Seeking to quell a debate about whether to isolate medical workers returning from the Ebola-stricken region, Obama said yesterday that the country must support “the incredible heroism” of those who combat the often-fatal virus.
While Obama didn’t directly mention the quarantine requirements imposed by New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, he said all levels of the U.S. government must be working together.
Obama last week hugged a nurse who’d recovered from Ebola, to reassure the public. Today, he plans to meet with health care workers involved in fighting the disease
“We don’t just react just based on our fears,” Obama said yesterday, pointing out
that only two cases of Ebola have been contracted in the U.S. and both victims have recovered. “We react based on facts and judgment.”
The administration is seeking to head off creation of a patchwork of state and local responses to Ebola. He spoke a day after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released tighter guidelines for handling potential cases of Ebola exposure that stopped short of broad mandatory quarantines.
U.S. President Barack Obama leaves a podium after making a statement on Ebola in... Read More
Quarantine Policies
Cuomo and Christie announced policies requiring 21-day quarantines for anyone returning from a country with an Ebola outbreak who may have had contact with patients.The New York governor yesterday released 19 pages of protocols that go beyond the CDC guidance. They require anyone who was in the presence of infected people to be quarantined -- even if they were wearing protective gear.
The CDC recommends home quarantines only for those who may have been exposed to the virus, which is spread through direct contact with bodily fluids.
Cuomo, a Democrat, said the state will cover salaries for those quarantined if their employer doesn’t, and he’s seeking to provide benefits similar to those received by reservists called up during war.
Republican Christie said yesterday that he isn’t “moving an inch” on the policies imposed in New Jersey.
Adding to the conflicting messages, the Joint Chiefs of Staff has recommended holding all U.S. military personnel returning from duty in West Africa for 21 days of confinement and monitoring. Obama and other administration officials said the situation for the military is different from that of civilian health workers.
USAID Team
Obama spoke after a conference call with members of the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Disaster Assistance Response Team working in Liberia and Guinea.They and the medical personnel in the Ebola-stricken region “are doing God’s work over there,” Obama said.
Treating volunteers with respect was key to containing the outbreak in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, where more than 10,000 cases have been diagnosed. Halting the disease at its source is the only way to stop it from spreading to the U.S. or other regions of the world, he said.
“America cannot look like it is shying away, because other people are watching what we do,” Obama said. “And if we don’t have a robust international response in West Africa, then we are actually endangering ourselves here back home.”
The virus arrived in the U.S. last month in a Liberian man who later died. Two nurses who treated the traveler at a Dallas hospital were infected and have since recovered. An American doctor who worked with Ebola patients was diagnosed last week in New York City and is undergoing treatment.
Limited Impact
Obama said those cases underscore that Ebola can be contained. “Only two people have contracted Ebola on American soil,” Obama said. ‘Today, both of them are disease-free.’’Five other Americans who were infected in Africa and who returned to the U.S. for treatment also have survived.
Obama said that his meeting today with doctors and public health workers who have returned from West Africa or are about to go there was “not only to say thank you to them and give them encouragement but to make sure that we’re getting input from them, based on the science, based on the facts, based on experience, about how the battle to deal with Ebola is going.”
CDC Guidelines
The CDC guidelines break people down into four categories. Those considered highest risk would be isolated in their homes for 21 days. People like the New York doctor would be monitored closely, as well as a nurse who was quarantined under New Jersey’s policy until the state let her go to Maine, where she’ll be monitored at home.Under the U.S. system, however, governors and local officials have wide latitude to set stricter policies.
Christie said on NBC’s “Today” show that the CDC is “incrementally moving toward our position” with its latest guidance and six states along with the Army are following New Jersey’s lead.
While the Army has decided to isolate soldiers after their Ebola-related duty, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel is still considering whether that should apply to all branches of the military.
White House press secretary Josh Earnest said the military operates under different rules and circumstances. The number of health care workers affected numbered in the dozens, while the armed forces will have thousands of personnel in the region, making monitoring their health more difficult, he said.
Obama said that while the military personnel aren’t treating patients, they aren’t there voluntarily “are already, by definition, if they’re in the military, under more circumscribed conditions.”
Obama has committed to spending as much as $1 billion to the U.S. response, which include the USAID teams, as many as 4,000 military personnel, protective equipment, medical supplies and laboratory work.
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