Ebola Fever Screenings to Start at Five U.S. Airports

In the wake of the death of the first person on U.S. soil to die from Ebola, the Obama administration announced new measures of prevention against Ebola getting into the U.S.

Wednesday afternoon at the White House, spokesman Josh Earnest said an additional layer of screening would begin at New York's JFK International and the international airports in Newark, Washington Dulles, Chicago O'Hare and Atlanta Hartsfield. He said the new steps would include taking temperatures and would begin Saturday at JFK.

Earnest said the five airports cover the destinations of 94 percent of the people who travel to the U.S. from the three heavily hit countries in West Africa -- Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea. He estimated that about 150 people would be checked a day under the new procedures.

Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said Customs and Border Protection agents are handing out information sheets to travelers with details of what symptoms to look for and directions to call doctors if they become sick within 21 days -- the incubation period for Ebola.

Department of Homeland Security agents at airports and other ports of entry already had begun observing travelers coming into the United States for potential signs of Ebola infection.

According to the Associated Press, the fact sheet to be given to arriving travelers says: "You were given this card because you arrived to the United States from a country with Ebola." It tells passengers to "please watch your health for the next 21 days" and to "take your temperature every morning and evening, and watch for symptoms of Ebola," which are listed on the sheet.

42 year-old Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person diagnosed in the U.S. with Ebola, died Wednesday morning from the disease.

Information from the Associated Press used in this report