If more Americans contract Ebola and need advanced medical care, they will be sent to Europe rather than brought to the U.S., senior administration officials said Thursday.
The announcement is the latest in a series of moves Trump administration officials have made to keep Americans exposed to or infected with Ebola out of the country amid the ongoing outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Already, the U.S. has set up a facility in Kenya for any Americans exposed. It is set to open Friday with 50 quarantine beds.
The facility is expected to expand to have isolation and biocontainment units for people who test positive, but those sick individuals will not stay in Kenya — nor will they return to the United States, the officials said. Instead, they will go to as-yet unidentified European countries.
“The [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] is working with the Department of State to identify where that facility or facilities might be,” a senior administration official said.
The administration has maintained that shorter flight times to Europe are the reason why Americans who get Ebola will be sent there for care. The only American who has tested positive so far, a surgeon who had been working at a Congo hospital, was flown to Germany.
“It is much better to be able to transport them to a facility that takes a shorter transport time, as opposed to flying them back all the way to the United States,” the official said.
At a Cabinet meeting Wednesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said, “We cannot and will not allow any cases of Ebola to enter the United States.” The CDC has blocked all noncitizens who have been in Congo, Uganda or South Sudan in the last 21 days from entering the U.S.
Another senior administration official said, “We want the absolute best care for American citizens,” adding that U.S. doctors have been sent to the Kenya facility and the hospital in Germany where the American doctor is being treated.
The quarantine camp is at the Laikipia Air Base in central Kenya. The U.S. has “forward approval” for the facility and has been in conversation with the president of Kenya, the official said. The facility will be staffed by members of the U.S. Public Health Service, including some who worked with Ebola patients in Liberia in the 2014 outbreak.
The outbreak in Congo, caused by a rare strain of Ebola called Bundibugyo, has grown rapidly, with 1,077 cases and 246 deaths, according to the World Health Organization. There is no vaccine or treatment for the Bundibugyo strain.
Last week, seven Americans who had been exposed to Ebola in Congo were flown to Europe, including the doctor hospitalized in Germany. His wife and four children are quarantining in Germany, and another doctor is quarantining in the Czech Republic.
Senior administration officials said they were not aware of any other Americans who have been exposed to the virus and would need to be transported to Kenya.
