Via his blog Operational Biosurveillance, Dr. James Wilson posts: Review: The Novel Coronavirus Warning Sequence (Jordan). Excerpt:
Some in the security field would understandably suggest that, with tensions in the Middle East being high we should not "rock the boat" over confusion regarding attribution. As we have pointed out multiple times with the full weight of years of operational experience monitoring and assessing the world for infectious disease events, crises, and disasters, this is a poor strategy. Investigation of attribution is rarely relevant to pre-emptive warning and awareness of front line medical responders.
Rolling the dice in the hope an unrecognized traveler, infected with a previously uncharacterized infectious agent, from Jordan would not arrive in New York City or other US megalopolitan area is gambling with the lives of not only the Jordanian patient but everyone in the emergency department waiting room and all of the medical staff who would have unknowingly come into contact with the patient.
Needless to say, had novel coronavirus entered the US in April 2012, we might have seen a nosocomial outbreak as the Jordanians saw - an outbreak that would have proceeded unchecked with a substantial amount of social disruption thanks to the tagline, "unknown" and "killed". In short, this was a foolish and reckless gamble.
