Ebola volunteers wrestle with quarantine mandates

As Ebola-related quarantine policies have arisen around the United States, some health workers are reassessing whether they can be among the hundreds that officials say are needed.

Aid organizations say it’s too soon to tell whether quarantine rules are significantly shrinking the number of volunteers. But they say the measures are complicating an already challenging search for help treating a disease that has killed nearly 5,000 people.

Some would-be volunteers say they can’t get enough time off from work to add a potential three-week quarantine to several weeks in the field. Some others are anxious about what they might come back to, after seeing new rules arise rapidly. Others are facing family qualms.

But doctors and nurses still are offering to help, and planning ahead to seclude themselves.