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Chris Christie defends Ebola quarantine policy as criticism mounts Isolated nurse slams Chris Christie's Ebola quarantine policy
(about 1 hour later)
New Jersey governor Chris Christie on Sunday defended his decision to impose a 21-day medical quarantine on healthcare workers returning to the US from the Ebola “hot zone” in west Africa, and said it would soon be national policy. The first nurse to be isolated under New Jersey’s new Ebola rules has slammed governor Chris Christie’s decision to quarantine all health workers returning from west Africa who have had direct contact with people suffering from the disease, saying the policy was “poorly planned” and “not evidence-based” while directly criticising the governor.
“I don’t think when you’re dealing with something as serious as this you can count on a voluntary system,” he said, during an appearance on Fox News. “This is the government’s job.” Kaci Hickox, who spent a month in Sierra Leone, was quarantined when she arrived at Newark Liberty airport on Friday and is now in an isolation unit at University Hospital in Newark. Having tested negative for Ebola, she subsequently criticised her detention in a piece for the Dallas Morning News.
Christie, a likely candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016 who spent the weekend at midterm campaign events in Iowa and Florida, added: “I think this is a policy that will become a national policy sooner rather than later.” On Saturday, Christie said Hickox was “obviously ill”, and added: “I’m sorry if in any way she was inconvenienced, but the inconvenience that could occur from having folks who are symptomatic and ill out and amongst the public is a much, much greater concern of mine.”
Christie’s comments came after Kaci Hickox, a nurse quarantined at a New Jersey hospital after working with Ebola patients in Sierra Leone and returning to the US at Newark Liberty airport, criticised the move as an overreaction that could dissuade healthcare workers from fighting the disease at its source. On Sunday he defended his decision that his state, alongside New York and Illinois, would implement a 21-day quarantine programme for people returning from Guinea, Liberia or Sierra Leone if they had had direct contact with Ebola patients, even if they show no symptoms of infection.
Craig Spencer, the doctor who contracted the disease in Guinea and tested positive on Thursday night, remained in isolation in New York’s Bellevue hospital. His condition was reported to have worsened, as expected. Speaking to CNN on Sunday, Hickox said her treatment had been “inhumane”. She added: “I also want to be treated with compassion and humanity and I don’t feel I’ve been treated that way in the past few days.”
In a first-person account written for the Dallas Morning News and published on Saturday, Hickox said the new quarantine laws could lead to medical professionals being treated like “criminals and prisoners”. “This is so frustrating for me,” Hickox said. “First of all I don’t think he [Christie] is a doctor, secondly he’s never laid eyes on me and thirdly I have been asymptomatic since I’ve have been here. I feel physically completely strong and emotionally completely exhausted.”
The same day, Christie said: “I’m sorry if in any way she was inconvenienced, but the inconvenience that could occur from having folks who are symptomatic and ill out and amongst the public is a much, much greater concern of mine.” She said she wished Christie would be “more careful” in his public statements. “I am not ‘obviously ill’,” she said. “I am completely healthy and with no symptoms. And if he knew anything about Ebola he would know asymptomatic people are not infectious.”
Hickox, who said she had her temperature taken three times at the airport and hospital and contested whether she ever had a fever – one of the key symptoms of Ebola – tested negative for the disease on Saturday. Criticising the conditions in which she was held, she wrote: “This is not a situation I would wish on anyone, and I am scared for those who will follow me.” Hickox said she had been tested at the hospital, was negative for Ebola and did not have a temperature. She had displayed a high temperature at the airport, but she said: “I truly believe it was an instrument error”
Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and the Republican congressman Darrel Issa, chairman of the House oversight committee, added their criticisms of the policy that was announced on Friday by Christie and New York governor Andrew Cuomo. Under the policy all people entering the US through Newark Liberty and New York’s John F Kennedy Airport after direct contact with Ebola patients in Guinea, Liberia or Sierra Leone will be quarantined for 21 days – the agreed incubation period for Ebola – even if they show no symptoms of infection. “They were using a forehead scanner and I was obviously distressed and a bit upset and so my cheeks were flushed. I think there has been some evidence that that machine is not very accurate in those kinds of situations.”
Illinois also introduced a 21-day quarantine on Friday. The state is home to Chicago O’Hare, the sixth-busiest airport in the world. Florida Governor Rick Scott has ordered twice daily monitoring for anyone returning from west African countries as well. She said she had spoken to New Jersey’s assistant health commissioner, Christopher Rinn, at 6pm on Saturday and had yet to hear a clear plan from him by midday Sunday. “No one has told me how long it will last,” she said. “I don’t know if I am going to be retested and if so why I would be retested. I am completely asymptomatic and the test is not even accurate if you don’t have symptoms.”
Scott signed the order Saturday, giving the Florida Health Department authority to monitor individuals for 21 days. Hickox said the quarantine rules were “not based on any clear public health evidence and it is not the recommendation of public health and medical experts at this point. We have to be very careful about letting politicians make medical and public health decisions and all of the evidence about Ebola shows that if you are not symptomatic, you are not infectious.”
Speaking to Fox News, Christie defended his decision and said it would garner national support. “I don’t think when you’re dealing with something as serious as this you can count on voluntary system,” he said. “This is the government’s job.”
The likely candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016 added: “I think this is a policy that will become a national policy sooner rather than later.”
But the quarantine rules are meeting with mounting opposition. On Sunday Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and the Republican congressman Darrel Issa, chairman of the House oversight committee, added their criticisms of the policy that was announced on Friday by Christie and New York governor Andrew Cuomo.
Illinois, home to Chicago O’Hare, the sixth-busiest airport in the world, also introduced a 21-day quarantine on Friday. On Saturday Florida governor Rick Scott rdered twice daily monitoring for anyone returning from west African countries.
Fauci said the new quarantine rules threatened to discourage US health workers from tackling the disease at its source.Fauci said the new quarantine rules threatened to discourage US health workers from tackling the disease at its source.
“The best way to stop this is in Africa,” he told CNN at the start of a tour of the Sunday morning political talk shows. “Health workers needed to be treated in a way that doesn’t discourage them from going to Africa.“The best way to stop this is in Africa,” he told CNN at the start of a tour of the Sunday morning political talk shows. “Health workers needed to be treated in a way that doesn’t discourage them from going to Africa.
“Our first goal is to protect the American people but you want to do it in a way that has a scientitfic basis to it. The best way to protect the American people is to stop the epidemic in west Africa.”“Our first goal is to protect the American people but you want to do it in a way that has a scientitfic basis to it. The best way to protect the American people is to stop the epidemic in west Africa.”
Sophie Delauney, the US executive director of Doctors Without Borders, the charity for which Hickox and Spencer worked in Africa, also criticised the new quarantine rules, telling NBC: “Quarantine measures or coercive measures against aid workers could give a superfluous sense of security, while the most important [thing] is to tackle the epidemic at its source.”Sophie Delauney, the US executive director of Doctors Without Borders, the charity for which Hickox and Spencer worked in Africa, also criticised the new quarantine rules, telling NBC: “Quarantine measures or coercive measures against aid workers could give a superfluous sense of security, while the most important [thing] is to tackle the epidemic at its source.”
On Fox, Christie said: “Folks that are willing to take that step and willing to volunteer also understand that it’s in their interest and in the public health’s interest to have a 21-day period thereafter if they’ve been directly exposed to people with the virus.”On Fox, Christie said: “Folks that are willing to take that step and willing to volunteer also understand that it’s in their interest and in the public health’s interest to have a 21-day period thereafter if they’ve been directly exposed to people with the virus.”
Fauci said the scientific evidence showed that people who are not ill, do not have symptoms, and have not come into contact with the bodily fluids of Ebola patients do not transmit the disease. He was backed about the quarantine by Issa, who was also speaking on CNN. Fauci said the scientific evidence showed that people who are not ill, do not have symptoms, and have not come into contact with the bodily fluids of Ebola patients do not transmit the disease. He was backed about the quarantine by Issa.
Issa, however, added: “I think governors of both parties are reacting to an absence of leadership, an absence of belief that the federal government really knows what its doing.”Issa, however, added: “I think governors of both parties are reacting to an absence of leadership, an absence of belief that the federal government really knows what its doing.”
Christie is a Republican; Cuomo, himself mentioned as a potential 2016 presidential candidate, and Illinois governor Pat Quinn are Democrats.Christie is a Republican; Cuomo, himself mentioned as a potential 2016 presidential candidate, and Illinois governor Pat Quinn are Democrats.
Issa said: “Science has told us, if we are to take them at their word, that if someone does not have an elevated temperature or the other leader symptoms then we can rely on them not being contagious. If that’s true then immediate isolation of people for 21 days is not the answer. Again, trust matters.”Issa said: “Science has told us, if we are to take them at their word, that if someone does not have an elevated temperature or the other leader symptoms then we can rely on them not being contagious. If that’s true then immediate isolation of people for 21 days is not the answer. Again, trust matters.”
Of President Barack Obama’s handling of the crisis, which has included sending UN ambassador Samantha Power to the African nations worst hit and the appointment of Ron Klain as an “Ebola czar”, Issa said: “He’s appointed a lawyer. If this was an election problem, I’d be a little less worried.Of President Barack Obama’s handling of the crisis, which has included sending UN ambassador Samantha Power to the African nations worst hit and the appointment of Ron Klain as an “Ebola czar”, Issa said: “He’s appointed a lawyer. If this was an election problem, I’d be a little less worried.
“The fact is I’d rather he had found a four-star general or admiral to co-ordinate these people who have said things that didn’t turn out to be accurate, who have made mistakes and didn’t want to admit them.”“The fact is I’d rather he had found a four-star general or admiral to co-ordinate these people who have said things that didn’t turn out to be accurate, who have made mistakes and didn’t want to admit them.”
Craig Spencer, the doctor who contracted the disease in Guinea and tested positive on Thursday night, remained in isolation in New York’s Bellevue hospital. His condition was reported to have worsened, as expected.