RFK Jr. orders hantavirus cruise passenger to remain in secure facility, overrules federal medical review
Healthbeat reports:
“The order from Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was slipped under Angela Perryman’s door Monday afternoon inside the secure National Quarantine Unit in Nebraska. This is where she and other former cruise ship passengers have been held since last month because of possible exposure to a dangerous type of hantavirus.
The order signed by Kennedy requires Perryman to stay inside the locked Nebraska facility through June 21, the end of the 42-day quarantine period — even though an HHS-appointed medical review determined last week that Perryman could safely finish her quarantine at home in Florida.
“It has nothing to do with public health at all,” Perryman told Healthbeat Monday evening. “They’re using administrative orders to detain American citizens with no judicial oversight.”
HHS officials did not answer Healthbeat’s questions about the reasons behind Kennedy’s order and why it appears to contradict the findings of the federal government’s own medical review of her detention.
A copy of the order, provided to Healthbeat by Perryman, only says generally that he finds that requirements for federal quarantine continue to be met.
The day after this article was published, HHS said in an emailed statement: “In the absence of proper home monitoring by state authorities, the Administration’s quarantine order is necessary to ensure both Ms. Perryman’s and her community’s wellbeing.”
HHS did not address the detailed findings in the medical review that said the monitoring would be appropriate and protective.
What began as a medical evacuation of Americans from a deadly outbreak aboard an international nature adventure cruise has raised increasing concerns from some public health and legal experts about whether the U.S. government has failed to properly balance protecting public health with ensuring people are quarantined in the least restrictive setting that is safe.
Neither Perryman nor any of the 17 other U.S. passengers who were sent to the Nebraska quarantine facility after leaving the M/V Hondius cruise ship have shown any signs of infection with Andes virus. This type of hantavirus typically spreads through contact with South American rodents, but also is the only hantavirus known to have the potential to spread from person to person.
Of the nearly 150 passengers and crew who were aboard the M/V Hondius, there have been 13 cases of Andes virus, including three deaths, according to the World Health Organization.
Person-to-person spread of Andes virus is “relatively rare and generally associated with prolonged close contact” with a person who is sick, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said in its interim emergency guidance for the public health management of people who have been exposed.
Recently, HHS has allowed some passengers to leave the facility and finish their quarantines at home – but often under requirements that state and local health departments ensure 24/7 monitoring.
But while Perryman’s home state of Florida is willing to supervise her quarantine at home, it won’t agree to 24/7 monitoring.
“At this time the assessment of the Florida Department of Health is that it is not necessary to implement the federal conditions of 24/7 continuous surveillance and twice daily in-person monitoring of the individual at their residence,” according to a May 28 letter Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladopo sent to Dr. David Fitter, the hantavirus response incident manager at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Perryman provided a copy of the letter to Healthbeat.”
My comments:
Yet another poor decision based on his own ignorance of public health, virology, and epidemiology. RFK, Jr needs to be removed as the head of HHS.
“The order from Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was slipped under Angela Perryman’s door Monday afternoon inside the secure National Quarantine Unit in Nebraska. This is where she and other former cruise ship passengers have been held since last month because of possible exposure to a dangerous type of hantavirus.
The order signed by Kennedy requires Perryman to stay inside the locked Nebraska facility through June 21, the end of the 42-day quarantine period — even though an HHS-appointed medical review determined last week that Perryman could safely finish her quarantine at home in Florida.
“It has nothing to do with public health at all,” Perryman told Healthbeat Monday evening. “They’re using administrative orders to detain American citizens with no judicial oversight.”
HHS officials did not answer Healthbeat’s questions about the reasons behind Kennedy’s order and why it appears to contradict the findings of the federal government’s own medical review of her detention.
A copy of the order, provided to Healthbeat by Perryman, only says generally that he finds that requirements for federal quarantine continue to be met.
The day after this article was published, HHS said in an emailed statement: “In the absence of proper home monitoring by state authorities, the Administration’s quarantine order is necessary to ensure both Ms. Perryman’s and her community’s wellbeing.”
HHS did not address the detailed findings in the medical review that said the monitoring would be appropriate and protective.
What began as a medical evacuation of Americans from a deadly outbreak aboard an international nature adventure cruise has raised increasing concerns from some public health and legal experts about whether the U.S. government has failed to properly balance protecting public health with ensuring people are quarantined in the least restrictive setting that is safe.
Neither Perryman nor any of the 17 other U.S. passengers who were sent to the Nebraska quarantine facility after leaving the M/V Hondius cruise ship have shown any signs of infection with Andes virus. This type of hantavirus typically spreads through contact with South American rodents, but also is the only hantavirus known to have the potential to spread from person to person.
Of the nearly 150 passengers and crew who were aboard the M/V Hondius, there have been 13 cases of Andes virus, including three deaths, according to the World Health Organization.
Person-to-person spread of Andes virus is “relatively rare and generally associated with prolonged close contact” with a person who is sick, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said in its interim emergency guidance for the public health management of people who have been exposed.
Recently, HHS has allowed some passengers to leave the facility and finish their quarantines at home – but often under requirements that state and local health departments ensure 24/7 monitoring.
But while Perryman’s home state of Florida is willing to supervise her quarantine at home, it won’t agree to 24/7 monitoring.
“At this time the assessment of the Florida Department of Health is that it is not necessary to implement the federal conditions of 24/7 continuous surveillance and twice daily in-person monitoring of the individual at their residence,” according to a May 28 letter Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladopo sent to Dr. David Fitter, the hantavirus response incident manager at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Perryman provided a copy of the letter to Healthbeat.”
My comments:
Yet another poor decision based on his own ignorance of public health, virology, and epidemiology. RFK, Jr needs to be removed as the head of HHS.
