Obama should rent a first class Hotel

[Travelman]

83. Leaving aside for the moment whether a quarantine is warranted/needed...

The very practical question is: where?

In the nineteenth century, we had Ellis Island. For better or for worse, virtually the only way into the United States from points on the far side of the Atlantic was New York. We had similar, but not nearly so well-known, sites on the west coast, but immigration from that end of the world was a dribble compared to the numbers we had coming from (mostly) Europe at the time.


Point being that there were inherent logistics there. There was one place where everyone was collected, could be sorted, etc. Today, there are more than thirty cities across the US that accept international flights from Europe. So what do we do? Take out thirty hotels? It's certainly theoretically possible, but it certainly turns into a logistics nightmare in a hurry. We're suddenly spreading a relatively few resources out over thirty sites to handle these people. Just how many world-class epidemiologists and nurses who are trained and experienced in handling seriously infectious diseases does anyone think we have? In the real world, on the ground, in America, we simply don't have that many people who are really all that well-trained and prepared for the kind of round-the-clock care that will be needed if there is some influx of ebola-stricken patients. Remember: it took seventy people to treat Mr. Duncan. Now multiply that by thirty sites around the nation, potentially with dozens or scores or more patients in some sort of hotel utilized as a treatment facility.

Now, that having been said, I think that Obama did a very prudent thing by declaring that there will only be a few "collection points" where people arriving from west Africa may arrive. I question whether this is really enforceable, but I don't question the basic idea.

But there's a question of whether anyone wants Hotel Ebola in their neighborhood. Something tells me that the people living on Boston Commons probably would prefer that the Four Seasons not become the place where infected people go from Logan Airport, for example.

IF you're going to take out a place for these people, then you probably need to take out some winter resort in the White Mountains, or, at this point, some summer retreat that closes in the winter, e.g. some place like Mackinac Island.