US steps up health monitoring of visitors from West Africa

Federal officials working to keep Ebola from spreading into the United States have ordered all travelers who come into the United States from three Ebola-stricken West African nations to be monitored for three weeks.

Starting on Monday, anyone traveling from Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone will have to report to health officials daily and take their temperature twice a day, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced on Wednesday.

The measure applies not only to visitors from those countries but also returning American aid workers, federal health employees and journalists.

The virus has killed more than 4,800 people in West Africa, nearly all in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

CDC Director Tom Frieden said monitoring will provide an extra level of safety. Passengers already get screened and temperature checks before they leave West Africa and again when they arrive in the United States.

The monitoring program will start in six states - New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, New Jersey and Georgia - the destination for the bulk of the travelers from the outbreak region. It will later extend to other states.

Each passenger will be required to provide contact information for themselves as well as a friend or relative. They will be instructed to check for a fever twice a day and report their temperature and any symptoms to health officials daily for 21 days.

The number of people with Ebola is set to hit 10,000 in West Africa, the World Health Organization said, as the scramble to find a cure gathered pace.

The UN's public health body said 9,936 people in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone - the three countries at the epicenter of the world's worst ever Ebola epidemic - have contracted the disease. In total, 4,877 people have so far died.

DPRK suspends tourism

The Democratic People's Republic of Korea will bar entry to foreigners on tourist trips from Friday, because of worries over the spread of Ebola, according to operators of tours to the country.

It was not immediately clear if the DPRK ban also covered non-tourist members of the diplomatic or business community with ties to Pyongyang.

"We have just received official news from our partners in the DPRK that, as of tomorrow, tourists from any country, regardless of where they have recently visited, will not be permitted to enter," said Gareth Johnson of Young Pioneer Tours, a travel company based in China that runs tours in the DPRK.

AP - Reuters - AFP

(China Daily 10/24/2014 page12)