The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday said that it currently does not plan to raise the travel warning for the US, which saw its first imported case of Ebola confirmed on Tuesday.
“Judging from the quality and standards of the US’ public health and medical systems, the centers do not see the need to raise the travel notice for the country at the moment,” CDC Deputy Director-General Chou Jih-haw (周志浩) said.
Chou said that the infected patient has been kept in isolation and the possibility of the highly contagious disease spreading across the US seems rather low, adding that the centers would only consider issuing a travel warning if US-based Taiwanese or Taiwanese visitors to the country were at risk of contracting Ebola.
According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the patient was confirmed to have Ebola through laboratory tests after he traveled to Dallas, Texas, from Liberia, where an outbreak of the virus has killed about 1,830 people.
The person developed symptoms about four days after arriving in the US on Sept. 20, before seeking medical care at the Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital of Dallas on Friday last week and being admitted on Sunday.
The US agency does not advise people on the same flight as the ill person to undergo monitoring, as Ebola is only contagious when an infected person is exhibiting active symptoms.
The WHO statistics show that as of Monday, a total of 6,572 cases of Ebola have been reported, including 3,459 in Liberia, 2,021 in Sierra Leone, 1,071 in Guinea, 20 in Nigeria and one in Senegal.
In response to the quickly spreading outbreak, Taiwan’s CDC set up an emergency task force on Aug. 8. It has also issued a level-3 warning against travel to Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, as well as a level-2 alert for Nigeria.
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