Dr. Anthony Fauci, the Director of the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health, warned Sunday against "draconian" requirements for health care workers returning from West Africa, suggesting that mandatory quarantines may go too far.
"I don't want to be directly criticizing the decision that was made but we have to be careful that there aren't unintended consequences," Fauci said of the 21-day mandatory quarantines instituted at airports in New York and New Jersey.
"The best way to stop this epidemic is to help the people in West Africa," he added during an interview on NBC's Meet the Press. "We do that by sending people over there, not just from the U.S.A, but from other places. We need to treat returning people with respect."
Fauci said that direct monitoring of those who may have been exposed to Ebola is a practical way of minimizing risk.
"Go with the science," he said.
House Oversight and Government Reform chairman Darrell Issa suggested Sunday that the quarantines are necessary due to a lack of public trust in the federal government.
"Governors of both parties are reacting to an absence of leadership and belief that the federal government knows what they are doing," he said on CNN's State of the Union program.
