The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued an order Wednesday related to the Ebola outbreak, saying it would begin to screen certain international travelers for the virus at major transportation hubs, including at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport.
The order came ahead of a planned CDC briefing on the virus set for Wednesday afternoon. Earlier in the day, anxious healthcare workers in eastern Congo said they are underprotected and undertrained in the rapidly spreading outbreak of a rare type of the Ebola virus.
The order applies only to non U.S. citizens who departed from or were present within the Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda or South Sudan over the last 21 days. It does not apply to U.S. citizens, U.S. nationals, lawful permanent residents or members of the armed forces.
According to the CDC, the order will remain in effect for 30 days, and is “intended to address the serious risk of introduction of Ebola disease into the United States, while allowing the U.S. Government the time necessary to conduct a full assessment of the unique public health risks posed by Ebola disease.”
The order was also intended to limit the number of people entering the U.S. who recently visited the impacted countries.
A number of large, international airports and transportation corridors were mentioned in the order because they “support continuous movement of travelers between Central and East Africa and major U.S. metropolitan centers,” the CDC said.
Such movement increases the likelihood that people exposed to the Ebola virus could enter the U.S. before symptoms become apparent, the order states, and “complex multi-leg itineraries and the rapid pace ofinternational travel create substantial challenges for identifying potentially infected travelers before arrival.”
In addition to O’Hare, other U.S. airports listed in the order include John F. Kennedy Airport in Newark, Washington Dulles International Airport, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta Airport and Los Angeles International Airport.
When asked for a statement, the Chicago Department of Aviation directed NBC Chicago to the CDC.
How does the Ebola virus spread, and where is it?
The Ebola virus is highly contagious and spreads in the human population through contact with bodily fluids such as vomit, blood or semen. Symptoms include fever, vomiting, diarrhea, muscle pain and at times internal and external bleeding.
WHO has declared the outbreak a public health emergency of international concern, and expressed worry over its “scale and speed.” The WHO head in Congo says it would last at least two months.
The rare type of Ebola, known as the Bundibugyo virus, spread undetected for weeks following the first known death while authorities tested for another, more common Ebola virus and came up negative.
Investigations continued into where and when the outbreak started, but “given the scale, we are thinking that it has started probably a couple of months ago,” said Anaïs Legand, a technical officer in the WHO emergencies program.
So far, 51 cases have been confirmed in Congo’s northern provinces of Ituri and North Kivu, and two cases in Uganda, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Wednesday. There are 139 suspected deaths and almost 600 suspected cases.
But “the scale of the epidemic is much larger,” he said.
This is Congo’s 17th Ebola outbreak, and the WHO has said its health ministry has experienced staff and capacity to respond. Most outbreaks, however, were of the more common Ebola type.
American with Ebola is in isolation in Germany
A U.S. national who tested positive in Congo arrived in Berlin on Wednesday and was in a special isolation ward. A “comprehensive examination” was taking place to determine treatment, German Health Ministry spokesperson Martin Elsässer said.
He wouldn’t comment on the patient’s condition, whom German authorities and the U.S. CDC have not identified. The ministry later said it was taking the patient’s wife and three children at the request of U.S. authorities. It was not clear whether any were infected.
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