BEIJING—A top Red Cross official says he is confident the Ebola epidemic can be contained within four to six months.
The secretary-general of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Elhadj As Sy, told a news conference in Beijing on Wednesday that the time frame is possible if there is “good isolation, good treatment of the cases which are confirmed, good dignified and safe burials of deceased people.”
The Ebola outbreak has killed more than 4,500 people since it emerged 10 months ago. Most of the deaths have been in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone.
The humanitarian network is holding its four-yearly Asia-Pacific regional conference in the Chinese capital. Fending off demands to ban travel from Ebola-stricken West Africa, the Obama administration instead tightened US defenses against Ebola by requiring that all arrivals from the disease-ravaged zone pass through one of five US airports.
The move responds to pressure from some Congress members and the public to impose a travel ban on the three countries at the heart of the Ebola outbreak, which has killed over 4,500 people, mostly in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, since it emerged 10 months ago.
Beginning on Wednesday, people whose trips began in Guinea, Liberia or Sierra Leone must fly into one of the five US airports performing fever checks for Ebola, the Homeland Security Department said.
Previously, the administration said screenings at those airports covered about 94 percent of fliers from the three countries but missed a few who landed elsewhere.
There are no direct flights from those nations into the US; about 150 fliers per day arrive by various multi-leg routes. Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said “we currently have in place measures to identify and screen anyone at all land, sea and air ports of entry into the US who we have reason to believe has been present in Liberia, Sierra Leone or Guinea in the preceding 21 days.”
Since screening started on October 11 at New York’s Kennedy airport, 562 people have been checked at the five airports, according to Homeland Security.
Of those, four who arrived at Washington’s Dulles airport were taken to a local hospital. No cases of Ebola have been discovered.
The other airports are Newark’s Liberty, Chicago’s O’Hare and Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson.
Homeland Security officials at the airports use no-touch thermometers to check for fever, which can be a symptom of Ebola infection. People who have been infected with the virus may not develop a fever and illness for up to 21 days, however.
As the US closed a gap in its Ebola screening, an Ebola-free African country said it would begin checking visiting Americans for the disease.
Rwanda’s health minister said on Tuesday that travelers who have been in the US or Spain—the two countries outside of West Africa that have seen transmission during the Ebola outbreak—will be checked upon arrival and must report on their health during their stay. No Ebola cases have been reported in Rwanda, which is in East Africa.
Meanwhile, Ron Klain spent his first day as the new White House “Ebola czar.”
Klain is a former White House adviser who starts on Wednesday as President Barack Obama’s Ebola response coordinator. The White House says Klain will meet with Obama and top aides in the afternoon in the Oval Office.
Klain also has meetings scheduled with various White House teams leading the government’s response to Ebola at home and in West Africa.
Obama named Klain to the post on Friday. He’s already been spotted at the White House chatting with senior Obama advisers he’ll be working with in his new role.
Klain is Vice President Joe Biden’s former chief of staff and a veteran political operative.
He’s tasked with coordinating the array of federal agencies dealing with the Ebola crisis.
AP