“Our concern is that this is being done with the interest of the Americans, and there’s no interest of the Kenyan citizens.”
By Catholics for Catholics
A court in Kenya on Friday postponed a U.S. plan to implement a quarantine center for Americans who have been exposed to a rare type of Ebola virus spreading in northeastern Congo, after a reaction by medical workers and activists.
On Thursday, U.S. administration officials said that the U.S. was planning, instead of flying them home, to send Americans who are exposed to Ebola while abroad to a new center in Kenya. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to share the administration’s plans.
The officials said the facility would be at Laikipia Air Base and would be operational with 50 quarantine beds by Friday.
The ruling of the Kenyan court came just as U.S. officials said the field hospital at Laikipia Air Base in central Kenya was set to start operations.
Issued by Kenya’s High Court, the temporary restraining order, pending a June 2 hearing, halts the establishment and operation of the facility after legal activists contended the agreement imperiled Kenyan citizens and needed public transparency
“At its core, the case is about preserving constitutional accountability, protecting public health, and ensuring that no government may place expediency above the lives and safety of the people of Kenya,” the Katiba Institute, the legal advocacy group behind the lawsuit, wrote in a statement on X.
Also voicing concerns over the quarantine plans was Kenya’s medical community. Some doctors and union officials argued the facility could in fact create an Ebola entry door inside a country that has not yet reported any confirmed cases.
“Our concern is that this is being done with the interest of the Americans, and there’s no interest of the Kenyan citizens,” Kenya doctors union secretary general Davji Atellah told reporters.
The facility was envisioned to quarantine and treat American citizens exposed to Ebola during the ongoing outbreak centered in the Democratic Republic of Congo. U.S. officials said the site would at first hold up to 50 patients, with plans to possibly expand capacity to 250 beds.
On Wednesday, the Trump administration showed the Kenya plan as part of a broader effort to prevent Ebola from coming into the United States. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said during a White House Cabinet meeting that the administration “cannot and will not allow any cases of Ebola to enter the United States.”
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