US Ebola quarantine facility in Kenya to open Friday

Trump administration officials confirmed Thursday that they will not allow any American who was exposed to Ebola back into the country. 

A 50-bed field hospital quarantine facility for Americans that is being constructed in Kenya will be operational on Friday, according to senior administration officials. 

If someone tests positive or develops symptoms, they will be sent elsewhere for advanced care. Officials weren’t clear where such patients would be sent but said it will not be the U.S.  

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the State Department are working to identify tertiary care facilities that could take Americans if needed, officials said. 

The facility will be located at the Kenyan air force’s Laikipia Air Base, outside the city of Nanyuki. It will eventually include a number of biocontainment and isolation units to hold people who test positive or develop symptoms until they can be transported to more specialized facilities, though the officials did not say when those units would be operational. 

Officials said the unit will initially be staffed by 30 U.S. public health officers, who trained for three days earlier this week and are now en route to Kenya. The deployed officers include physicians, nurses, therapists and technologists, one of the officials said.

Officials pushed back on criticism that the public health officers’ training was not thorough enough.  

They stressed that some of the team includes staff who........

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