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White House finally orders extra Ebola screening at five airports

By David Martosko, US Political Editor for MailOnline and Reuters

Published: 13:26 EDT, 8 October 2014 | Updated: 08:25 EDT, 9 October 2014



The federal government plans to begin taking the temperatures of travelers from West Africa arriving at five U.S. airports in order to screen them for Ebola, but the White House said Wednesday that federal agents will only screen about 150 passengers per day.

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said the five airports cover the destinations of 94 percent of the people who travel to the U.S. from the three heavily hit countries in West Africa – Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

It has been just ten days since a Liberian man was rushed to a Dallas, Texas hospital with the first case of Ebola diagnosed on U.S. soil. He was pronounced dead on Wednesday morning.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Thomas Frieden told reporters Wednesday that 'as long as Ebola continues to spread in Africa, we can't make the risk zero here.' Dialed in: President Barack Obama participated in a conference call Wednesday with state and local officials to discuss the Ebola epidemic in West Africa Coming to America: Duncan, seen here with a female relative shortly after landing at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, traveled to the US to marry his longtime love Louise Troh

But extra Ebola screening will be put in place at New York's John F. Kennedy, Newark Liberty,Washington Dulles, Chicago O'Hare and Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta.

'These five airports are the destination of 94 percent of individuals who travel to the United States from the three countries that are currently affected by Ebola,' Earnest said in a news briefing.

The new targeted screening regime will only apply to inbound international travelers who have visited Ebola-hit nations.




The plan calls for 'targeted questions, temperature checks and contact information' collected in airports, according to Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who joined Frieden in the press conference via telephone.

Earnest called the administration's strategy 'an additional layer of screening that can be targeted to that small population in a way that will enhance security but also minimize disruption to the broader traveling public.'


The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Wednesday that the federal government will start an 'enhanced' screening protocol targeting about 150 inbound airline passengers every day who arrive from Guinea, Liberia or Sierra Leone, or who have passed through those countries.

The CDC says that 94 per cent of U.S.-bound airline passengers arrive in America at one of just five airports, so they are limiting the new plan to those locations.

The CDC says all passengers headed out of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea are already screened before they are allowed to board airplanes.

So far 77 of them have been stopped from boarding because they had fevers. But most of these people were diagnosed with malaria – a very common illness in Africa – not Ebola.

Malaria is not communicable from one person to another, and is spread by contact with infected mosquitos.

The Obama administration, and the CDC specifically, have said repeatedly that it would be counterproductive to restrict air travel from western African nations where Ebola is running rampant.

Prohibiting the entry of commercial flights from that region, the government claims, would limit the options for sending supplies and relief personnel back to where they are needed.

The CDC did not immediately respond to a question after the press conference about why military aircraft aren't used for that purpose.

President Obama has already dispatched close to 4,000 military personnel to Liberia to help with constructing field hospitals and other mission-critical activities.

He said Wednesday during a conference call with state and local government leaders that 'in recent months, thousands of travelers arrived here from West Africa, and so far, only one case of Ebola has been diagnosed in the United States.'

'And that’s the patient in Dallas who we know, sadly, passed away,' Obama noted, 'and our thoughts today are with his family.'

In his press conference, Frieden led with confident gusto, insisting that 'we have stopped every Ebola outbreak until this one.'

'The only people with Ebola in the United States are in hospitals,' he said.

But he admitted that the Homeland Security Department will be testing a 'particularly small' group of people. 'We're talking about 150 travelers per day,' he said.

Frieden also conceded that the new measures might not have flagged Liberian national Thomas Duncan, the U.S. 'index patient' who died Wednesday ten days after entering a hospital isolation ward.

Duncan lied about his contact with a contagious Ebola patient when he left Liberia en route to Brussels, Washington, D.C. and finally Dallas.

'It is true that the index patient, when he left Africa, did not have a temperature,' Frieden said, and also seemed healthy when he arrived in the U.S.

The 'additional questions' he would have faced if he arrived today instead 'may have identified him as a contact,' the CDC chief insisted, but couldn't say with certainty whether the outcome would have been different. Taking their temperature: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director Dr. Thomas Frieden talked to reporters Wednesday about new procedures for screening inbound airline passengers Doctor's (Oval) Office: Obama participated in an Ebola-related conference call on Wednesday

The new strategy, he said, is intended to 'increase the likelihood that if someone arrives and develops Ebola, they will be rapidly identified and isolated.'

Mayorkas said Customs and Border Protection agents – the same cadre of officials responsible for screening luggage for contraband – are handing out information sheets to travelers with details of what symptoms to look for and directions to call doctors if they become sick within 21 days – the incubation period for Ebola.

Homeland Security agents at airports and other ports of entry already had begun observing travelers coming into the United States for potential signs of Ebola infection, he emphasized.

The fact sheet to be given to arriving travelers says: 'You were given this card because you arrived to the United States from a country with Ebola.' It tells passengers to 'please watch your health for the next 21 days' and to 'take your temperature every morning and evening, and watch for symptoms of Ebola,' which are listed on the sheet.

Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said customs agents 'will continue to observe all travelers entering the United States for general overt signs of illnesses at all U.S. ports of entry.' Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said the new plan calls for 'targeted questions, temperature checks and contact information' collected in airports This image provided by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) shows a flyer given to people arriving in the US. The Homeland Security Department has ordered agents at airports and other ports of entry to observe everyone coming into the United States for potential signs of Ebola infection, officials said Wednesday

Mayorkas said the department was aware of those issues and is 'taking a layered approach.'

The virus has taken an especially devastating toll on health care workers, sickening or killing more than 370 of them in the hardest-hit countries of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone – places that already were short on doctors and nurses before Ebola.

'Screening of outbound travelers is already underway' at airports in the target zone, Frieden said Wednesday. 'It has been going on for some time.'



White House orders extra Ebola screening at five airports





