Above the (Public Health) Law: Healthcare Worker Deception and Disobedience in a Time of Distrust

By Michelle Meyer

[Author’s Note: Addendum and updates (latest: 4  pm, 10/31) added below.]

A physician shall… be honest in all professional interactions, and strive to report physicians… engaging in fraud or deception, to appropriate entities.
AMA Principles of Medical Ethics

This is a troubling series of news reports about deception and defiance on the part of some healthcare workers (HCWs) in response to what they believe to be unscientific, unfair, and/or unconstitutional public health measures (to be clear, the text is not mine (until after the jump); it’s cut and pasted, in relevant part, from the linked sources):

(1) Ebola Aide Doc: I’m Not Telling My Team To Tell The Truth

Gavin Macgregor-Skinner, an epidemiologist and Global Projects Manager for the Elizabeth R. Griffin Foundation, who has led teams of doctors to treat Ebola in West Africa, reported that he “can’t tell them [his doctors] to tell the truth [to U.S. officials]” on Monday’s “CNN Newsroom.”

“At the moment these people are so valuable . . . I have to ensure they come back here, they get the rest needed. I can’t tell them to tell the truth at the moment because we’re seeing so much irrational behavior,” he stated. “I’ve come back numerous times between the U.S. and West Africa. If I come back now and say ‘I’ve been in contact with Ebola patients,’ I’m going to be locked in my house for 21 days,” Macgregor-Skinner said as his reason for not being truthful with officials, he added, “when I’m back here in the US, I am visiting US hospitals everyday helping them get prepared for Ebola. You take me out for three weeks, who’s going to replace me and help now US hospitals get ready? Those gaps can’t be filled.

He argued that teams of doctors and nurses could be trusted with the responsibility of monitoring themselves, stating, “When I bring my team back we are talking each day on video conferencing, FaceTime, Skype, text messaging, supporting each other. As soon as I feel sick I’m going to stay at home and call for help, but I’m not going to go to a Redskins game here in Washington D.C. That’s irresponsible, but I need to get back to these hospitals and help them be prepared.

UPDATE: Here is the CNN video of his remarks.

(2) Ebola Doctor ‘Lied’ About NYC Travels

The city’s first Ebola patient initially lied to authorities about his travels around the city following his return from treating disease victims in Africa, law-enforcement sources said. Dr. Craig Spencer at first told officials that he isolated himself in his Harlem apartment — and didn’t admit he rode the subways, dined out and went bowling until cops looked at his MetroCard the sources said. “He told the authorities that he self-quarantined. Detectives then reviewed his credit-card statement and MetroCard and found that he went over here, over there, up and down and all around,” a source said. Spencer finally ’fessed up when a cop “got on the phone and had to relay questions to him through the Health Department,” a source said. Officials then retraced Spencer’s steps, which included dining at The Meatball Shop in Greenwich Village and bowling at The Gutter in Brooklyn.

Update 11PM, 10/30: A spokesperson for the NYC healh department has now disputed the above story, which cites anonymous police officer sources, in a statement provided to CNBC. The spokesperson said: “Dr. Spencer cooperated fully with the Health Department to establish a timeline of his movements in the days following his return to New York from Guinea, providing his MetroCard, credit cards and cellphone.” . . . When CNBC asked again if Spencer had at first lied to authorities or otherwise mislead them about his movements in the city, Lewin replied: “Please refer to the statement I just sent. As this states, Dr. Spencer cooperated fully with the Health Department.”

(3) Ebola nurse in Maine rejects home quarantine rules [the WaPo headline better captures the gist: After fight with Chris Christie, nurse Kaci Hickox will defy Ebola quarantine in Maine]

Kaci Hickox, the Ebola nurse who was forcibly held in an isolation tent in New Jersey for three days, says she will not obey instructions to remain at home in Maine for 21 days. “I don’t plan on sticking to the guidelines,” Hickox tells TODAY’s Matt Lauer. “I am not going to sit around and be bullied by politicians and forced to stay in my home when I am not a risk to the American public.”

Maine health officials have said they expect her to agree to be quarantined at her home for a 21-day period. The Bangor Daily News reports. But Hickox, who agreed to stay home for two days, tells TODAY she will pursue legal action if Maine forces her into continued isolation. “If the restrictions placed on me by the state of Maine are not lifted by Thursday morning, I will go to court to fight for my freedom,” she says.

Some thoughts on these reports, after the jump.  Read More

Ebola Quarantines: Remembering Less Restrictive Alternatives

By Wendy Parmet

The heartfelt letter issued by Kaci Hickox, the nurse being held in quarantine in a New Jersey hospital, calls into question the surprising decision by Governors Christie and Cuomo to quarantine health care workers returning from West Africa. It also shines a spotlight on the all-important, but largely unexplored, question of how the less restrictive “alternative test” applies to quarantine. In her letter, Hickox describes being treated in a shockingly harsh and unsupported manner, being kept for hours in isolation at Newark International Airport, and then in a tent outside of University Hospital in Newark, given only a granola bar to eat. Even after she tested negative for Ebola, and her purported fever had vanished, she remains confined in the hospital. How, she asks, will returning health care workers be treated when they return from Africa?  “Will they be made to feel like criminals and prisoners?”

Hickox’s question points to the critical flaw in the decision by Governor’s Cuomo and Christie to quarantine asymptomatic health care workers returning from Africa. By using the “big gun” of quarantine, the most restrictive public health law we have, rather than a less restrictive approach, the Governors seek to show an anxious public that they’re being tough on Ebola. No doubt this is a politically popular stance. But, as many public health experts have noted, the Governors’ approach can only impede efforts to convince health care workers to go to Africa, where they are desperately needed if the world is to be freed of Ebola. The quarantines may also discourage US-based health care workers and first responders from caring for those who are stricken stateside. If 21 days of confinement in a hospital is demanded for those who care for patients in Liberia, why won’t the same approach be used here? And if so, who will answer the 911 call?

The dangers posed by the Governors’ draconian approach demonstrate the public health importance of the basic constitutional principles that guide the law of quarantine: while governments have the right, if not the duty, to impose quarantine in appropriate circumstances to protect the public’s health, individuals can only be detained when doing is the least restrictive alternative. Exactly what that means has not been fully explored by the courts, in part because quarantine cases are relatively rare. Most modern cases concern patients with tuberculosis. These cases, including ones from New York and New Jersey (e.g., City of New York v. Doe, 205 A.D.2d 469, 614 N.Y.S.2d 8 (N.Y. App. Div., 1 Dept. 1994); City of Newark v. J.S., 652 A.2d 265 (N.J. Super. Ct. Law Div. 1993)), suggest that detention is permissible, but only upon a showing that the patient has been non-complaint with less restrictive approaches (such as directly observed therapy). Courts have also made clear that prisons are not appropriate placements for patients, and that decisions must be based on the best medical and public health evidence. And although courts have not explored these issues, it seems clear that states must provide care and support for those are unable to care for themselves due to public health orders. People who are quarantined are serving the public. We need to treat them accordingly.

In the face of Ebola, fealty to the least restrictive means principle as well as sound public health policy requires that policymakers proceed with a far more nuanced approach than we have seen from the Governors of New York and New Jersey. Without question, public health controls are appropriate, indeed necessary, in response to this awful disease. In Dallas, health officials required health care workers to sign documents agreeing to self-monitor and avoid public transportation. Because Ebola cannot be spread before someone becomes ill, even the latter may be excessive. But these measures were far less restrictive and more tailored than those now being employed in New Jersey and New York. Indeed, a wide range of measures lie between the neglect the public fears, and the over-reaction that the Governors have instituted. Both public health and the Constitution demand we explore them.

Art Caplan on Ebola Quarantines

Over at his NBC News column, Art Caplan proposes a different approach to quarantining ebola “heroes.”

How to combat fear? Honor these heroes by giving them paid R &R, with their partner if they so choose, for 21 days. Give them a vacation in the guise of quarantine. Give them a reason to want to go back to fight Ebola. Give other doctors and nurses a reason to emulate them. Build or buy a nice hotel for these heroes.

And more, on why a general quarantine is a bad idea:

When officials respond to panic with quarantine they basically say they can’t trust public health officials, science and the ethics of doctors and nurses. There is no substitute for that trust. None. If state and city officials undermine trust out of panic or politics, then they destroy the best weapon we have to control Ebola — good science implemented by heroes.

The Ebola “Czar”

By David Orentlicher
[Cross-posted at Health Law Profs and PrawfsBlawg.]

In the wake of Craig Spencer’s decision to go bowling in Brooklyn, governors of three major states—Illinois, New Jersey, and New York—have imposed new Ebola quarantine rules that are inconsistent with national public health policy, are not likely to protect Americans from Ebola, and may compromise the response to Ebola in Africa, as health care providers may find it too burdensome to volunteer where they are needed overseas. Don’t we have an Ebola czar who is supposed to ensure that our country has a coherent and coordinated response to the threat from Ebola?

Of course, the term “czar” was poorly chosen precisely because Ron Klain does not have the powers of a czar. He will oversee the federal response to Ebola, but he cannot control the Ebola policies of each state. Unfortunately, on an issue that demands a clear national policy that reflects medical understanding, public anxieties will give us something much less desirable.

Ebola and the Return of Quarantine

By Wendy Parmet
[Ed. Note: Cross-posted from HealthLawProf Blog.]

Last month’s riots in an Ebola-infected slum in Monrovia, Liberia demonstrated anew the perils of relying on quarantine, and similar highly coercive public health laws, to contain highly contagious diseases.

At first blush, Ebola viral disease (EVD) is exactly the type of disease for which broad quarantines (more precisely, sanitary cordons) would seem appropriate. Transmitted through direct contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person, EVD can spread rapidly through a community, as it has done in several West African nations. Although experimental treatments and vaccines offer promise for the future, they have not yet been shown to be effective in humans; nor are they readily available. As a result, health officials are forced to rely on tried and true public health strategies, such as identifying cases, isolating and treating them with strict infection control measures, and monitoring their contacts. Needless to say, doing so is very challenging and very expensive, especially in highly urbanized areas, with weak health systems.

Given the challenges, health officials and government leaders are often tempted to call in the troops, and rely on more heavy-handed measures, such as imposing sanitary cordons around whole towns or neighborhoods, quarantining those who have had contact with patients, and restricting travel into and out of affected regions. Although the impetus for these measures is understandable given the magnitude of the EVD threat, history suggests that such highly coercive tactics frequently backfire. Like the military-style show of force employed by the police department in Ferguson, Missouri earlier this summer, highly coercive public health measures can undermine the public’s trust in authorities. Thus, rather than reduce travel, identify contacts, and come forward if they show symptoms, individuals are more apt to try to leave affected areas and avoid the health care system. Or they riot, as they did in Monrovia and China during the SARS outbreak. In any case, the problem is made worse not better. Read More