International travelers arriving at 5 U.S. airports will soon be subject to Ebola screenings, federal officials announced Wednesday just hours after the virus claimed its first victim in the country.
According to The New York Times, New York's JFK airport will begin screenings as early as this weekend, while Chicago O'Hare, Newark, Washington's Dulles, and Atlanta's airport will begin the screenings next week.
"We work to continuously increase the safety of Americans," said Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.
"We believe these new measures will further protect the health of Americans, understanding that nothing we can do will get us to absolute zero risk until we end the Ebola epidemic in West Africa."
Roughly 90 percent of passengers arriving from Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea — the countries hardest hit by the virus — arrive through the five announced airports, with 43 percent coming through JFK and 22 percent through Washington Dulles. Passengers' temperatures will be taken after they deplane, using a gun-like, non-contact thermometer, and they will be asked to complete a questionnaire.
According to the officials, about 36,000 travelers have departed from the three countries in the last two months, with 9,000 — roughly a quarter of those — coming to the U.S. Of those that traveled here, 77 had symptoms characteristic of Ebola, but testing revealed that none had the virus.
NBC News announced Thursday that a majority of Americans support banning flights from the three countries altogether, according to a new survey it conducted. Nearly 60 percent of respondents supported the ban, 20 percent opposed it, and the rest said they weren’t sure.
Previously, President Barack Obama said on Monday that in addition to working on screenings here in the U.S., officials are also "working on protocols" for additional screenings "at the source."
Republican lawmakers like Texas Sen. Ted Cruz have said the administration is not taking seriously the potential severity of the Ebola threat, and have called for tougher security.
"I remain concerned that we don’t see sufficient seriousness on the part of the federal government about protecting the American public," Cruz said this week on a radio show in his home state.
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