See the inspiring stories Come meet us Time to legalize weed?
OPINION

Stop transporting host and virus: Opposing view

Gerald Weissmann
Port Loko, Sierra Leone.

We've learned from the Ebola outbreak of 2014 that to stop pandemics, we must regulate the transport of host and virus alike. Public transmission and cellular invasion depend on the unimpeded traffic of people across borders and viruses across cell membranes.

Barring the traffic of people across the Atlantic from Liberia would certainly have prevented the first three cases of Ebola in the United States. Blocking the traffic of virus in human cells would have prevented thousands of cases worldwide.

The Ebola epidemic in West Africa presents a major challenge not only to our public health system, but also to our capacity to develop antiviral drugs.

Until such drugs emerge, there are only two time-tested ways to quell an epidemic: quarantine and sanitation. The first step would be to stop reliance on "voluntary quarantine" via thermometers and telephones to prevent transmission. Temperatures quiver and telephone interviews depend on who's asking the questions and who's answering them. Voluntary quarantines were broken in New York and Dallas.

The popular New England Journal of Medicineclaimed that "hundreds of years of experience show that to stop an epidemic of this type requires controlling it at its source." That's dead wrong. In the 19th century, cholera, yellow fever and smallpox were stopped from spreading widely in the U.S. and Europe by travel bans.

For example, ships from Europe with cholera on board were forced to remain anchored in the East River right near Bellevue Hospital, where I work.

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel had it right when he placed a quarantine on U.S. troops who are assisting the Ebola effort in West Africa. Troops will be detained in what the Pentagon calls "controlled monitoring" for 21 days before returning home — even though the troops are not expected to treat patients directly.

The model is a good one that should be used for other health care workers.

If the U.S. wants to win the war against Ebola, we should follow the practices already in place for our military.

Dr. Gerald Weissmann is a research professor of medicine at New York University's Langone MedicalCenter.

Featured Weekly Ad