Canada announced Sunday that it will temporarily turn away foreign nationals who have traveled to Congo in the last 21 days, implementing new border measures aimed at preventing the spread of Ebola.
The decision puts Canada at odds with the World Health Organization, which has specifically advised countries not to impose travel or trade restrictions on Congo, where authorities are currently battling a significant Ebola outbreak. The U.N. health agency has warned that such restrictions can fuel stigma and actually make outbreaks more difficult to manage.
“People from affected regions and African communities have faced unfair suspicion,” WHO said in a statement last month. “The spread of Ebola is not determined by nationality or ethnicity.” The agency currently considers the risk of Congo’s Ebola outbreak spreading to other countries to be low.
Canada’s Public Health Agency defended the decision in a Sunday statement, saying that “limiting entry of foreign nationals who have been in (Congo) in the previous 21 days may reduce public health risks for Canadians.”
The new restrictions are scheduled to go into effect Monday, July 20, at 11:59 p.m. EDT, according to the Public Health Agency of Canada. The agency did not respond to a request for additional comment.
Ebola is primarily transmitted through direct contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person. As of July 15, Congo had recorded more than 2,100 Ebola cases, with 828 of those resulting in death.
Canada’s announcement follows a similar move by the United States last week, which blocked Americans who had recently been in Congo from returning home through commercial flights. Seven American aid workers who traveled to Congo to help fight the outbreak are currently in quarantine at a facility in Kenya.
