JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – After nearly two hours on Wednesday afternoon, Missouri lawmakers left a Senate hearing with more questions than answers about the state’s plan to respond to Ebola if a case is ever found here.
The leaders of the Missouri Department of Public Safety and Department of Health and Senior Services faced a slew of questions about the state’s plan during a hearing orchestrated by Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Kurt Schaefer, a Columbia Republican.
Schaefer said he left the hearing wondering who was actually in charge of the state’s response and whether health care officials have the resources they need if, in fact, Ebola reaches Missouri. So far, there have been no identified cases of the virus since it reached the United States last month.
Schaefer, an announced Republican candidate for attorney general in 2016, said he had two concerns about Ebola: Avoiding it coming to Missouri in the first place and managing the response if the deadly virus does make its way here.
To the first concern, Andrea Spillars, deputy director of the Missouri Department of Public Safety, said her agency is leading training exercises for first responders to help them prepare for what they would do if a case is reported in their area. The preparedness unit is being ran out of the State Emergency Management Agency, she said.
Schaefer interrupted, asking what it was the state was doing to actually stop someone with Ebola from coming into the state in the first place. He suggested Gov. Jay Nixon, a Democrat, has the authority to stop someone with the virus from entering the state by stopping them at the airport.
Spillars pointed to the fact that the Obama administration already has in place restrictions on travel from the countries most effected by the virus. All passengers from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea are being routed through five airports where federal authorities have established new enhanced health care screening methods in an effort to prevent someone – like Thomas Eric Duncan in Dallas – from entering the country with the virus.
“That has been the venue of the federal government,” she said. “There has certainly been a considerable effort (on our end) to make sure we have the information disseminated to prevent and detect any kind of Ebola outbreak.”
Sen. Rob Schaaf, R-St. Joseph, also pressed on whether Missouri officials were monitoring those who have traveled from the southern border of the United States – including migrant children — for symptoms, and whether the state saw any risk of a terrorist from the Islamic State “infecting themselves” with Ebola making his way into the state.
Spillars responded, “We’ll be prepared should that happen.”
Schaaf, a medical doctor, also questioned whether the state was doing anything to prepare for a possibility that Ebola might go airborne. Currently, the virus is only able to be contracted by being into contact with an infected patient’s bodily fluids.
“As Ebola goes through generations of development from patient to patient, it is more likely to become airborne,” Schaaf said.
Spillars, echoing reports from the CDC and health care professionals, said, “the likelihood of it being airborne is very, very minimal.”
Schaefer pointed to another study and said, “there is no evidence that it is not transmitted through the air.”
Spillars was not the only state official on the hot seat Wednesday. Following her testimony, lawmakers asked a similar line of questions to Gail Vasterling, director of the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services. She said that her department’s role was mainly discriminating information to first responders at the county level.
Schaefer asked whether Vasterling, who was appointed to the role in January, had any medical experience. She said no — like Schaefer, she is a lawyer. Schaefer said he was supportive of requiring some medical experience for the job, to which she responded: “You confirmed me.”