An extra level of screening at major airports will reach more than 9 of 10 people traveling to the US from Ebola-ravaged countries in West Africa, the White House announced on the same day that the first person to be diagnosed with Ebola in America died.
About 150 travelers a day will have their temperatures checked using no-touch thermometers. Health officials expect false alarms from fevers due to malaria.
The extra screening likely wouldn't have singled out Thomas Eric Duncan when he arrived from hard-hit Liberia last month, because he had no symptoms while traveling. Duncan, died today in Dallas.
The disease has killed at least 3,800 people in West Africa with no signs of abating. Today, the presidents of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, the countries hardest hit in the outbreak, were appealing to the World Bank for more help for their nations.
"What we're paying for now is our failure to have invested in those countries before," said Francisco Ferreira, the World Bank's chief economist for Africa. They had only minimal health facilities even before Ebola hit.
In Washington yesterday, Secretary of State John Kerry made a plea for more nations to contribute to the fight against Ebola, saying the international effort was USD 300 million short of what's needed.
He said nations need to step up quickly with a wide range of support, from doctors and mobile medical labs to basic humanitarian aid such as food.
The US military is working to build medical centers in Liberia and may send up to 4,000 soldiers to help with the Ebola crisis. Meeting at the Pentagon with Gen David Rodriguez and other top commanders, President Barack Obama said a top priority is to ensure the safety of those troops.
"We have unique capabilities that nobody else has," Obama said. "Our military is essentially building an infrastructure that does not exist in order to facilitate the transfer of personnel and equipment and supplies."
The new US airport screening will begin Saturday at New York's JFK International Airport and then expand to Washington Dulles and the international airports in Atlanta, Chicago and Newark.
"We expect to see some patients with fever. That will cause some obvious and understandable concern at the airport," said Dr Tom Frieden, director of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
While the government is strengthening its response, Frieden sought to tamp down expectations.
