Ebola quarantines may backfire
Experts: Stricter guidelines could result in less volunteer help
Yamiche Alcindor
Stricter quarantines for dealing with potential Ebola cases in the U.S. could discourage health care workers from volunteering in the impacted West African countries, making the outbreak harder to contain, experts say.
New York, New Jersey and Illinois announced mandatory 21day quarantines for those returning to the United States after having direct contact with Ebolainfected individuals in West Africa. The outbreak — the largest in history — has left more than 10,000 people infected and nearly 5,000 dead, the World Health Organization announced Saturday.
“It may be politically the obvious thing to do but it may well be counterproductive,” said Stephen Morse, an epidemiology professor at Columbia University. “If people are forced to quarantine for three weeks, that means most of them will not be able to do any sort of work and that means essentially lost income.”
The new mandates are also worrisome because people in the general public, if included in mandatory quarantines, may be less likely to come forward if they have symptoms because such measures will increase the stigma surrounding the virus, Morse added.
“We need to rethink this with science and reason,” said Robert Glatter, an emergency medicine physician at Lenox Hill Hospital on New York City’s Upper East Side. “It’s going to discourage health care workers from going out to the source, which is where we need to be.”
A health care worker — who treated Ebola patients in West Africa and is being quarantined at University Hospital in Newark — tested negative for Ebola on Sat- urday, officials said. The nurse, Kaci Hickox, wrote a first-person story published Saturday by The Dallas Morning News, where she criticizes the treatment she received when she arrived at Newark Liberty International Airport on Friday.