Ebola: Arguments against the Arguments against Travel Restrictions

Containment has always been the buzz word when it comes to epidemics but, at least in regards to Ebola, experts reporting to Forbes (see Thinkprogress.org Article) are saying that travel should not be restricted and provide us with four less-than-compelling reasons. Although the article does not differentiate between them, I will address these three kinds of travel:  1.) from the U.S., 2.) within an African country with an Ebola epidemic, and 3.) to the U.S.

Travel for the health professional from the U.S. should be allowed as we do not have an Ebola epidemic. If it is not economically feasible for the airlines to provide one-way service to Africa, our military should provide the service--certainly to any duly-registered health professional.

Within the country with the epidemic, experts say that health officials will not be "able to effectively" track people with symptoms. The reason being that people will find ways around barriers to travel anyway and, if that happens, there will be no chance to document whereabouts. This is a bogus argument as presented because when symptoms appear people seek medical attention and can then, I believe, easily recite much of their itinerary over the last 3 weeks. I could be missing something but what? Passenger manifests now in use do not add more "whereabouts" than the very own words of the victim. In fact, WHO calls it a "huge problem" when Liberia does not obtain past itineraries from patients. How do they track down the patients? Do they not present themselves with symptoms? Are the authorities there going around from area to area taking temperatures? If so, I would think you would want the people in one place, not traveling from here to there. So, perhaps at the hot spots you do want to curtail travel in order to contain, no?

Which brings me to travel to the U.S. The article quotes a physicist as saying that even with 90%, we can only buy ourselves (if I'm doing the math right) 2 months of freedom from more Ebola infections. As I see it, that's 2 months of time that will be used to try to contain the virus. They should note that with freedom to travel, there will be many people coming in that will not be quarantined and who will have opportunity to infect while we can only predict success based on computer models that were probably based on Ebola epidemics in the rural African landscape. Furthermore, this model says nothing (that was reported on in the article) about comparing the infectivity rate associated with travel restrictions versus that of no restrictions. Would the constant trickle of possibly infected travelers traveling freely to the U.S. be more dangerous than a more curtailed assault resulting from travel restrictions? I'm not an expert but I'd put money on yes.

Today, I went to a large flea market near Giants' stadium in Rutherford, NJ. A fellow shopper there kept on sneezing. During the time that I was within hearing distance of him (perhaps 1 minute) he sneezed at least a dozen times--right into the air. I held my breath and maneuvered myself upwind of him as quickly as I could. I could just see the conversation, "Oh, you were at a large public venue for 2 hours?" How effective would be their attempt at locating all the shoppers? Do we really know?

They then proceed to talk about the logistical nightmare of granting approval to such people as Doctors Without Borders. This is nonsense. If the ordinary citizen can comprehend the importance of healthcare workers, so can government--the lesson from Katrina has been learned.

Finally, the article talks about destabilization and economic consequences of isolationism. Well, that one is true; just look at the economies of N. Korea and Cuba, for instance. However it also quickly turns into a bogus argument because there is no reason why humanitarian aid can't make up for their lack of exports--good God, Gates himself could probably support them during the period of their sequestration. I have thought of a win-win here. Give to every family (or tribal area) there one cell phone to use to report fevers, vomiting, etc. The phones can be activated regionally at will by such agencies as the CDC. Any bona fide report made by a family member or friend (first come basis, of course) will be rewarded with cash (TBD). You now have got yourself the ideal systematic tracking. If we don't have one already, we should have an extra telecommunications satellite for such purpose. When the virus is contained, we can buy back the cell phones to be used during the next epidemic; or, they can keep the cell phones and buy telecom services.

Be safe everyone.