Greek security services on alert for ebola

The aim is to protect personnel on the front lines and quickly identify any infected individuals who may carry the disease into Greek territory.

The Health Service of the Greek Police is reportedly liaising with the Hellenic Center for Disease Control and Prevention in order to establish procedures for health screens of travelers and immigrants from affected countries in order to head off any potential outbreak. Similar processes have been implemented in the recent past due to fears of the spread of SARS and swine flu.

Preventative Measures

Instructions have been issued by the Command of the Hellenic Police for procedures police personnel must follow to protect themselves from potential infection if they come into contact with individuals who have recently arrived from countries such as Liberia, Nigeria, Ghana and Sierra Leone where there have been Ebola outbreaks.

Officers are advised to wear masks and gloves, to wash their hands frequently and to expose potentially contaminated clothes to the sun after washing them at high temperatures.

 They have also been given detailed information regarding the symptoms of Ebola, its incubation period (about 20 days), its transmission and the quarantine and treatment of potentially infected individuals. Particular care must be exerted by those officers who come into frequent contact with visitors to Greece from the affected countries.

These include security personnel at airports, ports, border checkpoints and other entry points to the country that may be used by legal visitors or irregular immigrants. It is also described as ‘obligatory’ for police patrol cars to be supplied with the necessary first aid kits required to deal with potentially infected individuals.

Guarding the borders against Ebola

The Department of Border Protection of the Hellenic Police has also issued specific instructions for personnel conducting passport control checks. According to these, when individuals arrive from West and Central African countries (either with Greece as a final destination or as a stop-over) local health authorities must be alerted in order for a health professional to be present during passport checks. They will conduct on-the-spot assessments and take the necessary measures in the event that a person is suspected to be infected with the Ebola virus.

Additionally immigration control officers and any other security officials who locate irregular immigrants from Ebola stricken countries – with a focus on the Evros border region and the Aegean islands – must take preventative measures and collect information to try and determine the likelihood that the immigrants may have been exposed to the virus.

However the Health Department of the Greek police, in a circular issued at the beginning of August has stressed that, as things stand, the danger of an Ebola outbreak in Greece remains very low.

The heightened health screens and protective measures must also be implemented in police stations and holding centers where irregular immigrants may be detained.

However that may well be far easier said than done. Police officer unions have stressed that there continue to be major shortages of the necessary materials such as gloves and masks.

Furthermore the conditions in many facilities for the detention of irregular immigrants continue to be deplorable, lacking even rudimentary levels of sanitation.