“This is just mind-boggling: This is the mother of all quarantines,” said University of Michigan medical historian Howard Markel. “I could never have imagined it.”ADCordoning off a region like China’s Hubei province pens the sick together with the uninfected. And it sows distrust in government at a time when public support is essential, prompting people to evade the restrictions or refuse to report their symptoms, experts said. When that occurs, the success of a geographic quarantine would be “profoundly limited,” effectively making it a remote option for curbing a pandemic. “If directed by the President pursuant to the Insurrection Act, the military may suppress domestic unrest associated with resistance to a state quarantine,” the document stated, referring to the 1807 law that outlines presidential power to combat domestic unrest.

Source: Washington Post January 24, 2020 19:41 UTC