Australia closes doors on Ebola-affected countries

Australia played a game of “That’s not a knife. That’s a knife” with Ebola and lost. Immigration Minister Scott Morrison announced on Monday that Australia will impose a visa ban on Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia, making it the first developed country to turn its back on the Ebola-hit region of West Africa. Morrison told Australia’s parliament that the ministry was “not processing any application from these (Ebola) affected countries,” and that the government was suspending its humanitarian program. Prime Minister Tony Abbott has previously refused pleas to deploy health staff to help fight the epidemic, even though the country has not recorded a case of the virus and the risk of the disease entering its soil is very low, Australian Medical Association (AMA) president Brian Owler told CNN.

In addition to having “slammed the door on West African refugees,” as immigration spokesperson for the Australian Greens party Senator Sarah Hanson-Young put it, Morrison added that people based in the West African countries who hold permanent Australian visas would be subject to a mandatory, three-week quarantine process prior to their departure. Visitors approved to travel to Australia will also go through additional screening and follow-up checks as they arrive. Owler called the decision not “a very well-focused” one. “The bigger picture needs to be on our preparedness at home but more importantly our involvement in West Africa itself, putting doctors and nurses and other logistical elements in place and trying to combat the crisis there,” he said.

Owler remarked that the government requested the advice of “very few people,” and that the AMA was not included. Apparently the administration also ignored the WHO and the CDC, which “have indicated that the worst thing you want to do is close off the borders and come up with this sort of restrictions and scare away potential help,” former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan told CNN. “Our concern should be with the public safety and public health but we have to accept that the only way we can deal with it in the medium to long term is to stop the epidemic.” On a related note, current Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has criticized the restrictions enforced by some U.S. states on healthcare workers returning home from the affected area.

“Returning health workers are exceptional people who are giving of themselves for humanity,” the Secretary’s spokesman Stephane Dujarric said. “They should not be subjected to restrictions that are not based on science. Those who develop infections should be supported, not stigmatized.” The CDC announced new guidelines on Monday requiring returning doctors and nurses to be monitored daily without mandatory isolation. However, the guidelines themselves are not mandatory either, and individual states have the prerogative of imposing tighter controls.

Back in Australia, Abbott defended the country’s visa ban saying that the “government are taking very serious steps to address the Ebola crisis,” such as contributing $15.9 million to fight the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, and that authorities “are continuing to talk to our friends and partners about what more might be done to address the situation in West Africa,” not ruling out “Australia doing more.” Mad Max he isn’t. Meanwhile, the outpouring of local and international criticism hasn’t taken long to be felt. “There have been people here in Australia that have been asking for this kind of approach and I think the main drive is political,” said Owler. “Of course it will always be dressed up as a solution to keeping Australians safe but in actual fact the people who are coming from West Africa, a number of them are coming on humanitarian grounds so there are concerns about why their visas are being denied, and for what period of time they’ll be denied for.”

Senior lecturer at the University of Sydney’s Marie Bashir Institute for Infectious Diseases and Biosecurity Adam Kamradt-Scott said that the ban would not only fail to protect Australia from Ebola but might actually have a negative impact on public health by promoting fear. Ugandan government spokesman Ofwono Opondo agreed. “Western countries are creating mass panic which is unhelpful in containing a contagious disease like Ebola,” he said. “If they create mass panic … this fear will eventually spread beyond ordinary people to health workers or people who transport the sick and then what will happen? Entire populations will be wiped out.”

But Labor’s foreign affairs spokesman Matt Thistlethwaite put it better when he said (as quoted by the ABC of Australia) “we need to be absolutely certain that this government isn’t being tough but dumb when it comes to protecting Australians from the risk of Ebola infection at home.”

Related Read:

Australia instigates Ebola-prompted ban on travel from West Africa.

Australia bans travel from Ebola-hit countries; U.S. isolates troops.

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