Law, Power, and Justice

Second Part

· It’s frankly been bizarre to public health officials and epidemiologists that Americans would not be allowed to come home. The Trump administration is taking a very hard line against letting anyone who is known to have Ebola to be allowed back in the United States.

· Multiple agencies involved are also involved in tracking people to make sure that nobody comes into the country that has Ebola.

· One of the lawyers who is part of the legal group arguing this case said: “Is Kenya being reduced to a dumping site?”

· “How is it that the Americans say they don’t want to touch this thing? They want to stay away from it. Yet we are the ones who think we are Wakanda.”

· “Why would you create a facility in my country…that…doesn’t serve me? Yet the same…facility is going to host people who are endangering my…life….There are obviously a lot of concerns, including from medical groups in Kenya, that there could perhaps be an outbreak in Kenya that stems from bringing Americans to the country who’ve been exposed to the virus. Does anyone know why Kenya?”

· The administration said that they were looking for somewhere in the region that was unaffected by the outbreak where they don’t believe there is as high risk of spread, and that is not…so far that that people can’t get there quickly. Obviously, there are also politics involved, and it seems like they were able to come to some kind of agreement with the government, even if it’s been halted by the courts. . So it doesn’t even look like it was necessarily a plan designed to be used long-term. While they are saying Americans can quarantine in Kenya, they also said that anyone who truly gets sick would be evacuated to a tertiary care center and that they’re currently talking to partners in Europe to try and identify where sick patients can be taken.

· These are just some of the questions that people have about the administration’s plans. The plans have drawn criticism not just from people in Kenya, but also from public health experts who simply do not understand why Americans would not allowed to return to their home country.

· Public health experts say that it is the responsibility of the United States government to take care of its own people and to allow them to return home so that they could receive the highest quality of care.

· We built and sustained a system of specialized treatment centers all around the United States that are capable of managing patients exactly like this. Right now, they are sitting empty. The United States has a moral and ethical obligation to its citizens abroad. If they are going to be abroad, especially helping out people during this global health outbreak, we should be taking care of them. Also people should have access to a support system such as their families.

· Trump administration has not provided a medical rationale for why they’re so opposed to Americans coming back, other than saying that time is of the essence when someone has Ebola. Well, time was also of the essence in prior outbreaks,

· The Trump administration has been willing to embrace very aggressive quarantine and isolation measures in the case of Ebola, despite the fact that the administration is full of people at the highest levels of leadership who were extremely critical of what they saw as heavy-handed social distancing and isolation guidelines during the COVID-19 pandemic.

· There are a couple of (ship) passengers who wanted to leave a Nebraska facility where they have been quarantined. The acting director of the CDC, Jay Batacharya, has signed an order forcing them to stay where they are. Now, those passengers are reaching the end of their quarantine period. They are passengers who were exposed to hauta virus who have been asymptomatic. As they’re now returning to their home states, the Trump administration is essentially insisting on 24-7 monitoring and not allowing them to leave their homes. It’s a very heavy-handed way to respond. These were the very people in gpvernment who used political criticisms of public health institutions and of the scientific community during COVID as a way to appeal to voters who were frustrated by these exact kinds of guidelines and rules. So we are waiting on the Kenyan court to make a decision on Tuesday.