Screeners with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention asked their supervisors this week to change official protocols and require stronger masks, according to an internal document reviewed by Reuters. On Friday evening, they learned their worst fears were realized: Two screeners, both working
- As coronavirus cases exploded across the world, federal medical workers tasked with screening incoming passengers at U.S. airports grew alarmed: Many were working without the most effective masks to protect them from getting sick themselves.“Sad news,” a senior quarantine official at the CDC wrote in an email Friday evening to colleagues about the two workers. The email, reviewed by Reuters and not previously reported, said the two screeners will be quarantined until March 17.
U.S. doctors, nurses, emergency responders and government health workers say they are increasingly concerned at what they see as inadequate protections and preparation for workers in the trenches. Many complain of poor training and communication in the workplace as well as insufficient equipment and staffing.
N95 masks are designed to protect screeners from the smaller pathogens such as coronavirus which can penetrate deeper into the lungs. According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, surgical masks are not designed to block very small particles, such as those transmitted by coughs and sneezes, and do not provide complete protection because of the loose fit.
Not preparing more respirators for an outbreak like coronavirus was a “little bit of an oversight and has significant implications for today,” Kadlec testified. The CDC’s airport screeners are part of the healthcare workforce at risk. But a health expert involved in the U.S. government response said the problem was more widespread. State and local first responders - firefighters, emergency medical services personnel and police - are expressing the same alarm.
NNU has petitioned the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration to adopt an emergency temporary standard to require protections for health care workers in an infectious disease epidemic.Around the globe, there are now nearly 102,000 confirmed coronavirus cases in 94 countries, with close to 3,500 deaths, most of them still in China, the WHO reports. But already the relatively small number of cases in the United States is testing the limits of the country’s preparations.
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