Five passengers with flu-like symptoms were removed from a commercial Emirates airliner, which arrived at Boston’s Logan Airport from Dubai on Monday. Later, officials said the patients, who were immediately quarantined, didn’t have Ebola and their condition wasn’t considered a public health concern.
Emirates Flight EK 237 traveled from Dubai to Boston with 187 passengers and 19 crew members onboard. During the flight, five of the passengers exhibited flu-like symptoms, so as a precaution, the crew alerted Boston authorities, says an Emirates spokesperson. Although none of the five individuals had gone to West Africa, the current epicenter of the Ebola outbreak, they were immediately escorted upon arrival by emergency responders wearing Hazmat suits and protective masks.
Two of the passengers were transported by ambulance to Boston Medical Center, while the other three were isolated in Massachusetts General Hospital, according to a statement by a Massachusetts State Police spokesperson David Procopio. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says that the patients’ risk of having Ebola is actually “exceedingly low”, as they didn’t traveled recently to the Ebola affected countries and had no contact with anyone from there. Even though, health authorities decided to isolate them and evaluate their condition.
Late on Monday, it was announced none of the patients, including a family of three, contracted Ebola. It is just another case in a series of false alarms at airports, caused by the increasing fears of the deadly virus. According to latest numbers, the outbreak has infected around 8,500 people and killed at least 4,399, which makes it the worst Ebola epidemic in history. The CDC has even concluded that the real number of infections might be in fact much higher, as there is underreporting of cases in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
For now, there are no Ebola infections in Dubai or the region and experts explain that the risk is very low.
