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New York City is bracing for impact as more than a million foreign soccer fans are about to descend on the nation for the upcoming FIFA World Cup \u2014 and could bring hundreds of infectious diseases with them.<\/p>\n
Medical professionals and infectious disease experts have been preparing for the major event for weeks, knowing that the large numbers of fans in close proximity will create a perfect breeding ground for contagion \u2014 and some of those fans could be carrying diseases that are not common in the United States.<\/p>\n
A report<\/a> from The New York Post stated that the medical community was preparing for exposure to everything from the common cold and a resurgence of COVID-19 to Ebola. The list includes, but is not limited to, \u201cviral hemorrhagic fevers, RSV, tuberculosis, measles, varicella, hepatitis A, typhoid, malaria, SARS, hantavirus and even \u2018high consequence\u2019 diseases with high mortality rates, like cholera and Ebola.\u201d<\/p>\n Bellevue\u2019s critical care chief Dr. Vikramjit Mukherjee told Healthbeat New York that the city was basically planning for something akin to a mass immigration due to the number of foreign nationals who would be traveling to and through the city.<\/p>\n \u201cThe whole health care system in New York City will be on the alert for ALL of these events,\u201d he explained, noting that officials also had to be prepared for intentional disruptions such as shootings or other attacks. \u201cWe\u2019re looking at it like a huge migration event.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBecause of what we\u2019ve seen in the last few years \u2014 Ebola, Covid, and mpox \u2014 we feel that we will be the ones who will be affected first for the next outbreak, and therefore have an additional responsibility of keeping prepared,\u201d Mukherjee added.<\/p>\n One recent training exercise saw some 500 medical professionals from New York and New Jersey acting out a potential emergency transport \u2014 from nearby FIFA host city Toronto to New York City \u2014 using a mobile bio-containment unit.<\/p>\n \u201cThat was the biggest drill we\u2019ve done, because that involved local, state, federal, and international partners,\u201d Bellevue spokesman Noel Alicea explained.<\/p>\n The White House has also created a FIFA task force \u2014 headed by former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani\u2019s son Andrew Giuliani \u2014 promising \u201cthe federal government\u2019s\u00a0<\/a>extensive efforts to ensure that the largest World Cup in history will also be the safest.\u201d<\/p>\n Training and preparation among medical professionals for major events such as the FIFA World Cup often takes months, if not years.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n