Nature: Trump immigration ban upends international work on disease
“Diseases don’t respect borders, laws or walls. And efforts to combat them rely on networks of scientists to detect outbreaks early, understand how the diseases operate, and then intervene. Researchers say that President Donald Trump’s travel ban challenges that process, putting the United States at risk. The policy, enacted on 27 January, bars refugees from entering the country for 120 days, except those from Syria, who are banned indefinitely. Citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen are banned for 90 days. On 1 February, the White House said that the order did not apply to people from those countries who hold U.S. permanent-resident visas, or green cards. Still, ‘the ban could hamper our ability to learn about the epidemiology of neglected diseases emerging out of conflict zones,’ says infectious disease expert Peter Hotez at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas…” (Maxmen, 2/1).