The governors of New York and New Jersey announced late Friday that all travelers who had contact with Ebola patients in West Africa will be placed under a mandatory 21-day quarantine once they arrive on U.S. soil, the New York Daily News reports.
The travel restrictions come as New York City confirmed its first Ebola patient on Thursday, Dr. Craig Spencer, who arrived from treating Ebola patients in Guinea, used the city's public transportation and went to other public places in the days before his diagnosis.
Though New York Governor Andrew Cuomo initially didn't think a mandatory quarantine was necessary, he later changed his tune and agreed with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie to impose the restrictions.
"A voluntary Ebola quarantine is not enough," said Cuomo, according to The New York Times. "This is too serious a public health situation."
The restrictions - which Cuomo imposed before telling New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio - go above and beyond guidelines laid out by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which calls for travelers to monitor their own health and temperatures for 21 days and contact officials if they have a fever.
"We are no longer relying on CDC standards," Christie, a Republican, said according to The NY Times.
Under the guidelines, health care workers who arrive at New York's Kennedy International Airport and New Jersey's Newark Liberty International Airport will go under mandatory quarantine at their homes for 21 days, the maximum incubation period for the deadly virus that has no proven cure.
Those who are not health care workers but still came in contact with those infected are also subject to the quarantine, the Daily News reported. Health officials will make visits to those quarantined to ensure they stay inside.
If the traveler lives outside the state, the quarantine will most likely take place at a hospital.
Health officials have continuously tried to calm the anxiety in New York City sparked by news that Spencer, who was in stable condition on Friday, rode the subway, took a cab and visited the city's High Line park among other public areas before he was rushed to Manhattan's Bellevue Hospital with a fever on Thursday.
De Blasio, once he learned of the governor's restrictions, said that while he agrees with them, he worries they might have a "chilling effect" on those who risk their lives to go to West Africa to help battle the virus that has killed over 4,500 people and counting.
One nurse who arrived at Newark on Friday after treating Ebola patients in the region has already been subject to the mandatory isolation. She developed a fever after her arrival and was tested for the disease, but the results came back negative, The NY Times reported.
The nurse was transported from the airport to University Hospital in New Jersey and will continue to be quarantined for 21 days.
