BBC News - UK Ebola screening for arrivals from affected countries

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http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-29559444

UK Ebola screening for arrivals from affected countries

9 October 2014 Last updated at 14:43 ET
The US has already implemented checks for passengers arriving at some American airports
The UK is to introduce "enhanced screening" for Ebola for arrivals from affected countries.

Downing Street said passengers arriving at Gatwick, Heathrow and on Eurostar would face questions and potentially a medical assessment.

Earlier ministers had ruled out screening, saying the UK was following World Health Organisation advice.

Meanwhile, the UK is investigating reports a Briton suspected of having Ebola has died in Macedonia.

A Macedonian government spokesman told the BBC he could not confirm that Ebola was the cause of death of the Briton, who died in the capital, Skopje.
He said samples of blood and tissue had been taken and were being sent to a laboratory in Frankfurt for analysis.

The spokesman said the man's travelling companion, also British, had told the authorities there they had travelled to Skopje directly from Britain and had not been in any country known to have Ebola outbreaks.

The Foreign Office said it was aware of the reports "and are looking into them urgently".

The outbreak of the disease has already killed more than 3,000 people and infected more than 7,200 - mostly in West Africa.

The condition of a Spanish nurse with the virus has worsened, according to the hospital treating her
Earlier this week a Spanish nurse became the first person to contract the deadly virus outside of West Africa.

People leaving areas affected by the outbreak have been subject to checks for some weeks, although people do not become infectious until they display symptoms.

Keith Vaz called for checks at "airports, train stations and ferry ports"

Ministers had ruled out introducing screening at UK airports, pointing out that government policy was in line with advice from the World Health Organisation.

A statement on the Department of Health's website also said: "Entry screening in the UK is not recommended by the World Health Organisation, and there are no plans to introduce entry screening for Ebola in the UK."

But in a statement, Number 10 said advice from the chief medical officer was that checks on arrivals would "offer an additional level of protection to the UK".

The new checks - for those arriving from Liberia, Sierra Leone or Guinea - will involve "assessing passengers' recent travel history, who they have been in contact with and onward travel arrangements", it said.

Passengers could also be subject to medical checks "by trained medical personnel rather than Border Force staff" and will be given advice on "what to do should they develop symptoms later".

Analysis

By James Gallagher, health editor, BBC News website

The UK's stance on screening has shifted rapidly.

As recently as two days ago Public Health England was saying firmly there were no plans for screening arrivals.

The argument being there was exit-screening in affected countries, the WHO said it was unnecessary and it would mean screening "huge numbers of low-risk people".

But now there will be "enhanced screening" for arrivals from affected countries.

So what has changed?

The chief medical officer argues concern over rising numbers of cases justifies the move, although it is not clear what assessment of the threat to the UK has changed since Tuesday.

However, some scientists have argued the move is more political than scientific

The advice issued on Thursday from the UK's chief medical officer said it was now "right to consider what further measures could be taken, to ensure that any potential cases arriving in the UK are identified as quickly as possible".

BBC transport correspondent Richard Westcott said the announcement was more about looking like something was being done than stopping the disease's spread.

Medical experts say the chances of someone boarding a flight with no symptoms and being contagious by the time they land was "highly, highly unlikely", our correspondent added.

'Ineffectual tool'
In the US temperature checks and questionnaires were introduced earlier this week for passengers arriving at some airports from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

But speaking on BBC Radio 4's World at One, chairman of the government's Advisory Committee on Dangerous Pathogens Prof George Griffin said temperature tests were "a very ineffectual tool".

"We know the clinical course of the disease now very well, a maximum incubation period of 21 days, and fever is only part of the clinical syndrome at the end of that period."

And the chairman of Public Health England Prof David Heymann said similar attempts to combat the life-threatening Sars virus in 2003 had been ineffective.

"Very few people were actually found who were infected," he added.

"In fact, there's no record of anybody in most countries having been shown to be infected with Sars when they crossed the border."