Andrew Cuomo, Chris Christie

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, left, listens as New Jersey Governor Chris Christie talks at a news conference, Friday, Oct. 24, 2014 in New York. The governors announced a mandatory quarantine for people returning to the United States through airports in New York and New Jersey who are deemed "high risk." (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan)

(Mark Lennihan)

TRENTON — Leaders of major Ebola relief organizations say their efforts to recruit and retain volunteers to treat patients with the deadly disease in West Africa have been hurt by mandatory quarantines for returning healthcare workers enacted last month by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

In addition, the federal agency that funnels applications from medical personnel seeking to serve in West Africa to dozens of relief organizations tells NJ Advance Media that the number of volunteers who applied decreased 17 percent after the mandatory quarantines were implemented.

“We have seen a reduction in the number of volunteer applications for the Ebola emergency response,” said Jaya Vadlamudi, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles-based International Medical Corps, which has Ebola treatment centers in Sierra Leone and Liberia staffed by more than 300 workers, including about three-dozen American volunteers.

“The quarantines and travel restrictions are seriously hampering the group’s ability to recruit qualified health care workers and volunteers,” said Vadlamudi. “These restrictions will only worsen the outbreak's spread, making it far more difficult to deploy workers to the front lines and combat this devastating disease at its source.”

Doctors Without Borders, which operates six Ebola treatment centers in West Africa, said the mandatory quarantines are affecting its ability to retain vital staff.

“For U.S. staff, especially as state [quarantine] policies changed, some people shortened their assignments due to the restrictions they face when they return home,” said Tim Shenk, a press officer for the organization.

The federal United States Agency for International Development says it received 1,357 volunteer applications to fight Ebola in West Africa in the 18 days prior to the Oct. 24 announcement by Christie and Cuomo. Over the following 18 days, the agency said it received 227 fewer volunteer applications, a 17 percent drop.

"It's fair to say the amount of names that U.S. AID received was one barometer by which to assess the willingness of people in the U.S. medical community to volunteer," said Joel Charny, vice president for InterAction, an alliance of American humanitarian relief organizations.



Matt Herrick, a spokesman for the federal agency, estimated that "at least 1,000 international healthcare workers a month will be needed in West Africa, and more than 5,000 local healthcare workers a month will be needed across the region once all treatment facilities are operating at scale."



The New Jersey and New York policy requires in-home quarantine for healthcare workers, including those without symptoms who've had direct contact with Ebola patients, for three weeks, the virus’ incubation period.

Since those mandatory quarantine polices were set, other states have followed suit – including all the states with airports allowed to accept travelers from West Africa under federal rules.

Christie has said he would "take whatever steps are necessary to protect the public health of the people of New Jersey, and if someone wants to sue me over it, they can."

Christie’s spokesman Kevin Roberts declined to comment for this report.

The new rules were set into motion in response to the case of Craig Spencer, a physician who became infected with the virus while volunteering with Doctors Without Borders in Guinea. He has since recuperated and was released last week. Prior to becoming symptomatic, Spencer was not under mandatory quarantine.

Cuomo said on Oct. 24 that the high population density of New York and New Jersey demanded their actions.

“In a region like this, you go out one, two, three times, you ride a bus, you could affect hundreds and hundreds of people," Cuomo said.

So far, two people have died of Ebola in the United States: On Monday, surgeon Martin Salia succumbed to the disease at Nebraska Medical Center, after having contracted the virus while working in the relief effort in his native Sierra Leone. On Oct. 8, the first Ebola patient diagnosed in the nation, Thomas Duncan, a Liberian, died at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas.



The policy by Christie and Cuomo sparked immediate criticism from medical experts who said it was based more on fear than facts, and prompted Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases to suggest the quarantines could impede the Ebola fight by "dis-incentivizing" health care workers who are already undertaking a six- to nine-week volunteer commitment. He said the "best way to protect us is to stop the epidemic in Africa."

Jeff Marvin, a spokesman for the Boston-based Partners in Health, which operates several Ebola treatment centers in West Africa, said the situation in Sierra Leone was dire enough that any loss of volunteer medical personnel due to mandatory quarantine would have long-term effects on the global effort to combat the deadly disease.

The World Health Organization released a new Ebola Situation Report last week that found Ebola “transmission remains intense in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone,” and took note that “steep increases … persist in Sierra Leone.”

Sophie Delaunay, executive director of Doctors Without Borders in the U.S., said in a statement that her organization is “witnessing rising stigmatization and vilification of health workers, which is creating a chilling effect on efforts to combat the Ebola outbreak at its source in West Africa. Quarantine measures have fed this rising stigmatization by feeding misperceptions that health workers constitute a de facto threat to public health.”

Kaci Hickox, a Doctors Without Borders volunteer nurse, made national headlines when detained in an isolation tent at University Hospital in Newark after a testing positive for a fever – which she maintains was false-positive -- at Newark Liberty International Airport. Three days later, she was released and returned to her home state of Maine, where Gov. Paul LePage sought to ban her from crowded public places and require her to stay at least 3 feet from others until a 21-day viral incubation period ended on Nov. 10.

However, a federal judge ruled there was no need to isolate her or restrict her movements because she had no symptoms of Ebola and was not contagious.

Franklin Graham, president and CEO the International Christian relief organization Samaritan's Purse, which operates an Ebola treatment center in Liberia with 15 volunteer doctors and nurses, said he isn’t sure if the mandatory quarantines are entirely to blame even though he believes the policy is “rash.”

“There’s [been] a drop-off, but I can’t say it’s a result of Gov. Christie or Gov. Cuomo. The nature of what you’re fighting is the number one problem: You’re dealing with the world’s deadliest virus," said Graham.

Late last month, Cuomo and New York Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that the state and city would create a program of financial incentives and other employment protections to encourage health care professionals to travel to West Africa and provide assistance treating Ebola patients to help contain this disease.

New Jersey has not announced any similar financial incentive plans.

Claude Brodesser-Akner may be reached at cbrodesser@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @claudebrodesser. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.

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