Posted on 10/03/2014 6:11:29 AM PDT by markomalley
Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, on Friday said restricting travel between the U.S. and West Africa would likely “backfire” and put Americans more at risk of contracting Ebola.
Appearing on MSNBC, Frieden was asked about potentially prohibiting air travel between the U.S. and West Africa, where the Ebola outbreak is most widespread. He said that such a restriction would likely be ineffective and would make it harder for health officials to root out the virus.
“The only way we’re going to get to zero risk is by stopping the outbreak at the source” in West Africa, Frieden said.
“Even if we tried to close the border, it wouldn’t work,” the top health official added. “People have a right to return. People transiting through could come in. And it would backfire, because by isolating these countries, it’ll make it harder to help them, it will spread more there and we’d be more likely to be exposed here.”
Frieden’s comments come as health officials continue to screen up to 100 people in Texas in connection with Liberian national Thomas Eric Duncan, who is in isolation at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital. Duncan flew to the U.S. on Sept. 19, but the CDC said that he was screened before his flight in Monrovia and showed no symptoms of Ebola. Health officials say his temperature was 97.3 degrees and that he was not contagious on the flight, meaning his fellow passengers were not at risk.
While in Liberia, Duncan had contact with a woman who had the virus and helped carry her from a taxi, according to The New York Times.
On Friday, Frieden said airport screenings are reducing risks. “There are a lot of checks in place. It’s not perfect,” he said.
In several interviews and at a Thursday news briefing, the CDC director has expressed confidence that health officials will be able to contain the spread of the virus in the U.S.
On Thursday evening, NBC announced that a freelance journalist working for the network in Liberia had contracted Ebola and quarantined himself on Wednesday.
But who says that we live in a sane world? In a sane world, this pretender would have never been elected to the post of dog-catcher, much less elected President twice.
Revoke their passports.
Maybe they can’t shut down the border but they can sure as hell stop all incoming flights from ebola infected countries!
But obama wants this crisis.
‘zackly.
Bump, bump and bump!
We can’t shut the border because another wave of Central Americans “children” is scheduled to arrive at anytime.
His logic is ridiculous. We could still let certain persons(health care workers, etc.) be able to enter the country, then quarantine them before they return to the US. They can shut off other people’s visas.
This guy should be fired. Where are our congressmen/women asking for the borders to be shut off; where are they asking for this guy to be fired? A spokesperson for CDC had the audacity to call this a “very wimpy virus”. ?????
A-hole contradicts himself in one sentence. How could we be more exposed here if we isolate it there? Quarantine now!
I hear a cuckoo clock ringing somewhere!
This just doesn't make any sense at all to me. People have a right to return? BS! Not if the CDC recommends that they not be allowed.
I also can't quite place this CDC Director's accent. It is slightly foreign and his overpronounced words annoy the hell out of me. Couldn't find his place of birth online anywhere.
Preventive Medicine Expert: Obama ‘Underplaying’ Ebola Risk
on Breitbart TV 2 Oct 2014
Dr. Elizabeth Lee Vliet, a preventive medical specialist who practices in Texas and Arizona, who has served as Adjunct Associate Professor in Family Medicine at the University of Arizona College of Medicine, Assistant Professor in Family Medicine at Eastern Virginia Medical School, and Medical Director for the Women’s Program at Maryview Hospital accused the government of “underplaying the risk” of the Ebola virus, and seemed to argue that flights from countries with large Ebola outbreaks should not be allowed into the US on Thursday’s broadcast of “The Laura Ingraham Show.”
Dr. Vliet said that the government is not doing everything it could to protect Americans from the virus. Speaking on the prospect of a flight ban and the contention that only individuals who are showing symptoms of the virus can transmit it, she said “viruses mutate and change, and so to say anything with 100% certainty when you are dealing with viruses that change is medically irresponsible.” And that “no one can say with 100% certainty” when someone becomes infectious, and this is the reason why European nations have halted flights from countries like Liberia.
She further wondered why the American recently diagnosed with Ebola was not stopped, asking “why wasn’t he stopped at customs, why wasn’t he screened then, why wasn’t he quarantined as they’re doing in other countries?”
Dr. Vliet also declared that President Obama is “underplaying the risk to Americans, and I think when we have evidence going back to the Reston lab accident in Virginia a couple decades ago, of potential airborne transmission, the Canadian government has said that airborne transmission was strongly suspected [we should be more cautious].”
She reported that Canadian health advisories on the virus scrubbed their mentions of the potential for airborne transmission of the virus even though the data did not change, “I printed out the Canadian public health advisory back in June. There is a statement in their report that airborne transmission was strongly suspected based upon the 2012 Canadian study with a transmission between two species [pigs and monkeys] that were not in physical contact…I just re-printed the Canadian advisory this week, lo and behold, that statement has been taken out…the medical data did not change,” she said.
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
Tom, I hope you catch it and die.
BULL$H!T
YOU WON’T BECAUSE THE zero WANT’S TO KILL AMERICANS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WHY IS THIS ENTIRE administration NOT IN JAIL FOR TREASON AND DERILICTION OF DUTY/OFFICE??????
Weird.
Ping.
No such thing as can’t.
What kind of convoluted logic is that? Sounds like another faculty lounge consensus.
BS
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