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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Thursday, May 8, 2003

Airport workers trained to spot SARS symptoms

Advertiser Staff and News Services

WASHINGTON — Thousands of customs and immigrations inspectors and other federal homeland security workers are being trained to spot symptoms of SARS, and they have orders to detain people with symptoms of the highly contagious illness.

The training is part of the government's effort to prevent an outbreak in the United States of severe acute respiratory syndrome.

Officials said travelers would be detained if they had possible signs of SARS, including high fever, dry cough, breathing trouble, or if they said they are experiencing these symptoms. A public health official would be summoned to give a medical evaluation.

Homeland Security Department spokesman Dennis Murphy said 22 major U.S. airports, including Kennedy International in New York and Los Angeles International, have public health officials on site. Murphy did not provide a list of the airports, but he said others among them were Seattle, Chicago, Miami and Dulles, outside Washington, D.C. Other airports, he said, have health officials on call.

Federal officials have said that Honolulu International Airport is one of the eight U.S. airports with quarantine stations staffed year-round by CDC workers. These quarantine inspectors routinely respond to illness in arriving passengers and and work to ensure that appropriate medical action is taken.

Murphy said he was not aware of a traveler being detained against his or her will for a suspected case of SARS as a result of his department's heightened vigilance.

Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said quarantine officials have been stationed at airports for decades to detect disease and are sensitive to the inconvenience of detention. "We really do try to be respectful of citizens' rights," she told a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee.

Robert Bonner, commissioner of the department's Bureau of Customs and Border Protection, said special attention was being given to passengers arriving into the United States on 51 daily flights from Asia, including Hong Kong, Singapore and Beijing.

In Hawai'i, federal officials have been handing out health alert notices to travelers who are making connecting flights from those areas hit hardest by the disease.

"We have the authority to detain any individual who appears to have SARS, and we can, will and should exercise that authority," Bonner said.

Advertiser health writer Robbie Dingeman contributed to this report.