Ukraine in Arabic | Australia suspends visas for people from Ebola-hit countries
KYIV/Ukraine in Arabic/ 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.
Immigration Minister Scott Morrison told parliament that Australia would suspend its immigration program for such travelers.
The restriction comes after an 18-year-old who arrived from West Africa earlier this month was admitted to hospital with a fever.
She later tested negative for Ebola.
Mr. Morrison said on Monday that those who have received non-permanent or temporary visas and who have not yet left for Australia will have their visas cancelled.
Those with permanent visas can enter the country, but have to be quarantined for 21 days prior to arriving.
Mr. Morrison said that since August, more than 830 people arriving in Australia have been referred for further assessment after the government introduced a new screening system.
None of them were admitted to hospital, he said.
There are currently 19 people from West Africa who are in "home-isolation" in Queensland, after they arrived in Australia under a humanitarian program earlier this month, according to the AAP.
One of them was the 18-year-old who later tested negative for Ebola.
More than 10,000 people have contracted the Ebola virus, with 4,922 deaths, the World Health Organization says. All but 27 of the cases have occurred in West Africa - inside Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea.
The UK and US have asked for Australia's help to fight the spread of Ebola in West Africa.
Australia has contributed millions to combat Ebola, but will not send Australian medical teams to Africa until an "iron-clad" agreement on evacuating health workers who may become infected is reached. The government wants a third country to provide assistance as Australia is too far for a direct medical evacuation.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott's government has been criticized by the opposition for not doing enough to combat the crisis.
Purely a political decision?
The risks to Australia are small due to its geographical isolation, said Dr Adam Kamradt-Scott, a senior lecturer at the University of Sydney's Marie Bashir Institute for Infectious Diseases and Biosecurity.
The visa ban, he said, would do nothing to protect the country from Ebola while potentially having a negative public health impact by unduly raising fears about the disease and creating a general climate of panic.
"This is purely just a political decision," Kamradt-Scott said. "There is very little scientific evidence or medical rationale why you would choose to do this, and this is the type of politics we find starts to interfere with effective public health measures."
Australia's "narrow approach" to Ebola makes no sense from a health perspective, given that applicants for humanitarian visas are already screened and monitored for illnesses, said Graham Thom, a spokesman for Amnesty International Australia.
"There are ways and means in which people can be monitored, quarantined to insure that those who come are free from the disease," he told.
"All it does insure that already exceedingly vulnerable people are trapped in a crisis area and sends a signal about Australia's commitment to actually dealing with this crisis in a responsible way as a member of the international community."
