Australia Ban

From Yahoo:
"Australia issues blanket visa ban on Ebola-hit countries"

Australia came under fire on Tuesday from health experts and rights advocates after it issued a blanket ban on visas from West African nations affected by the Ebola outbreak, making it the first rich nation to shut its doors to the region. Australia has not recorded a case of Ebola despite a number of scares, and conservative Prime Minister Tony Abbott has so far resisted repeated requests to send medical personnel to help battle the outbreak on the ground. The decision to refuse entry for anyone from Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia, while touted by the government as a necessary safety precaution, was criticised by experts and advocates as politically motivated and shortsighted. "The government has strong controls for the entry of persons to Australia under our immigration programme from West Africa," Immigration Minister Scott Morrison told parliament on Monday.

"These measures include temporarily suspending our immigration programme, including our humanitarian programme from Ebola-affected countries, and this means we are not processing any application from these affected countries."  All non-permanent or temporary visas were being cancelled and permanent visa holders who had not yet arrived in Australia will be required to submit to a 21-day quarantine period, he added. The Ebola outbreak that began in March has killed nearly 5,000 people, the vast majority in West Africa. The disease has an incubation period of about three weeks, and becomes contagious when a victim shows symptoms. Ebola, which can cause fever, vomiting and diarrhoea, spreads through contact with bodily fluids such as blood or saliva.

 

 ^ I see no issue with Australia banning people from the affected areas from entering their country. With that said, Australia should send aid to western Africa to help stop the spread. I also believe every country should quarantine anyone who has been to the affected areas (whether it is western Africa, Texas, New York, etc.) There was some stupid case of a nurse in NJ claiming her basic civil rights were being violated because she had been to western Africa and now NJ wanted to keep her under quarantine to make sure she didn't spread Ebola to anyone here. It's not as though she was going to be kept in a dark basement with no food  or water. I saw the tent she was in on TV. The US isn't doing enough or the right things to stop Ebola from spreading. If unchecked it could lead to the disaster of the 1918 Spanish Flu epidemic. The US,  and other countries, needs to do the following: ban all civilian travel to/from the affected areas (regardless of citizenship), quarantine those that have been exposed for at least 21 days and send more medical aid and support to the affected areas to help stop it's spread. Anyone who doesn't like these measures should stay away from those that have Ebola. Also Obama should replace his Ebola czar with someone who actually has a medical background in dangerous diseases. That is just plain stupid. No wonder no Democrats want him to help them on their campaigns. ^



http://news.yahoo.com/australia-issues-blanket-visa-ban-ebola-hit-countries-022047232.html