Informative Essay On Ebola

Over the past few months, Ebola has captured global attention due to the mass amounts of media coverage swarming the topic. As a result of this sudden outburst of attention to Ebola, the general public might believe this recent pandemic to be the first of its kind: however, there have been several reported cases of the Ebola virus disease that date back to 1976 in the Democratic Republic of Congo. One contested issue that emerges from the current outbreak of the Ebola virus disease in West Africa is the treatment of health care workers who are returning to the United States after working with the infected people. Upon their return from Africa, state officials from New York, New Jersey, Illinois, and Florida, have mandated that the health care

Dr. Fauci, a respected immunologist and director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, appeared on multiple news outlets to voice his concerns about the mandatory Ebola quarantine. Dr. Fauci said that he was “concerned of the disincentive for the health care workers”. He warned that caution should be made when implementing policies, so as not to have unintended consequences and not group everyone in the same category—in this case, labeling all returning health care workers as a threat to the community. Dr. Fauci agues that this “blanket quarantine” applied to all health care workers is consequential, and that there are better ways of monitoring them that are more dignified, such as passive or active monitoring depending on the viral load that is present in the bodily fluids of the individual. In his conclusion, Dr. Fauci stresses the importance of educating the American people about the Ebola virus disease. While an epidemic of Ebola is waging in Africa, an epidemic of fear is emerging in the United States, and it is this fear that underlines many of the policy decisions regarding processing of those coming from Ebola-stricken