As fears of an outbreak of Ebola spread across the country this week, the president and his administration have tried to get ahead of the crisis in an attempt to calm the national anxiety. Photo: AP

A PASSENGER died on a Nigeria-to-JFK flight after a vomiting fit on Thursday — and a top lawmaker said officials gave the corpse only a “cursory” exam before declaring that the victim did not have Ebola.

US congressman Peter King said in a letter to Homeland Security and Customs and Border Patrol that the handling of the remains exposed serious flaws in airport preparedness for an Ebola outbreak.

Between 70 and 100 passengers a day arrive at JFK from the Ebola epicentre countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, King noted, and they have access to public rest rooms and mingle with other travellers before their first screening.

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The US have upgraded their protocols governing the protective clothing health workers need to wear, while Australia’s national guidelines remain unchanged.

“Given the high volume of travellers at JFK, it is essential that extraordinary measures are taken to intercept possible Ebola-infected passengers,” while keeping the public and first responders safe, Mr King (a Republican from Louisiana) wrote to US Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson and Customs Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske.

“These individuals transit the airport with the rest of the travelling population, including using the rest rooms,” Mr King wrote.

“It is only after they arrive at the Customs and Border Patrol primary screening location that they are separated and sent to secondary inspection for a medical check and to complete the questionnaire,” he wrote to Mr Johnson.

His letter demands Homeland Security immediately beef up protocols for potentially infected passengers both in flight and at the terminal itself, prior to their reaching the screening location.

The letter also demands better training and safety equipment for the Port Authority police and Customs and Border Patrol officials who can come into contact with high-risk passengers.

The unnamed passenger, age 63, had boarded an Arik Air plane Wednesday night out of Lagos, Nigeria, which has had 19 Ebola cases this year though no new cases in the past month.

He was vomiting in his seat and died sometime before the plane landed around 6am, the source said. The crew contacted the CDC, whose officials boarded the plane as about 145 worried passengers remained on board, a federal law-enforcement source said.

“The door [to the terminal] was left open, which a lot of the first responders found alarming,” said the source.

“The CDC went on the plane, examined the dead body and said the person did not have Ebola,” Mr King told The New York Post. “It was, what I was told, a cursory examination. The Port Authority cops and personnel from Customs and Border Protection were there ... Their concern was, how could you tell so quickly? And what adds to the concern is how wrong the CDC has been over the past few weeks.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) declined to comment on the passenger.

Pentagon Ebola scare

Part of the Pentagon was shut down after officials feared a case of Ebola had arrived at their doorstep.

A parking lot and building entrance was shut down for a large part of the day after a woman was found “ill and vomiting” in the Pentagon parking lot.

The woman told emergency workers that she had recently visited West Africa, the Defence Department said.

As a precaution, Pentagon police closed an entrance and a part of the department’s vast parking lot, while the woman was taken to a local hospital.

But doubts emerged later as to whether she ever had travelled to Africa and authorities found no evidence that she had contracted the virus.

The woman worked for a lobbying firm in Washington, Total Spectrum, and the company said she had never been sent to Africa on business.

“She’s never been to Africa for pleasure or work,” a representative of the company, who asked not to be named, told AFP.

The firm also did not have any projects in Africa and its work was focused on lobbying and public relations in the US capital, the official said.

The incident -- which created a stir online for several hours -- underscored mounting anxiety over the deadly virus, which has killed more than 4,500 people in West Africa.

A US defence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the woman was on a shuttle bus that was heading to a ceremony at the US Marine Corps barracks in Washington, attended by top brass and Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel.

Following the incident, the passengers on the shuttle bus were kept isolated for a few hours before officials determined there was no health risk

Australia’s Ebola guidelines

Australia’s Ebola guidelines remain unchanged after a meeting of chief medical officers even though Queensland and the US have upgraded their protocols governing the protective clothing health workers need to wear.

After a phone hook up with state medical officers Australia’s Chief Medical Officer, Professor Chris Baggoley, says he is confident that State and Territory health authorities have well developed systems in place to fight Ebola.

But Queensland’s Chief Health Officer Dr Jeannette Young yesterday upgraded her state’s response and will require anyone travelling to Ebola-affected West Africa to notify the state’s health department.

Queensland is also likely to upgrade the protective clothing guidelines for its health workers and recommend they wear gear that completely covers their skin after criticism of the flimsy protective gear recommended in national guidelines.

This equipment left skin on a health workers neck and chin exposed.

A spokeswoman for the federal Department of Health and Ageing said Queensland was not out of step with other states and that they were free to devise their own guidelines on Ebola.

“Other states may follow,” she said.

“The national guidelines are always under review particularly in light of overseas experience and may change at any time,” she said.