Military officials believe the risk is low of Gulfport Seabees contracting or even coming in contact with the Ebola virus in Africa.
Service members dispatched to Liberia as part of Operation United Assistance include 15 Gulfport Seabees with Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 133.
Africa Command spokesman Chuck Prichard reiterated the belief in an email to the Sun Herald on Thursday. Army Maj. Gen. Darryl Williams, commander of the joint task force operation, did the same to media at the Pentagon.
In his correspondence, Williams said service members are being monitored regularly.
"Yesterday, I had my temperature taken, I think, eight times, before I got on and off aircraft, before I went in and out of the embassy, before I went out of my place where I'm staying," he said by phone from the Liberian capital of Monrovia.
As long as service members exercise basic sanitation and cleanliness protocols, such as using chlorine wash on hands and feet, regularly checking temperature, limiting exposure -- like not shaking hands -- Williams said the risk of contracting the virus remains low.
Williams also hammered home that there are no plans for U.S. soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines to directly handle Ebola patients.
Should a service member contract Ebola, Williams said, "we have quarantine protocols that we would enact. … They would be quarantined and we would put on the appropriate gear to take care and stabilize that patient until we could arrange for transportation to move them back to a facility. That would be done here."
Gulfport's Seabees were dispatched from Djibouti on Sept. 23 and are assisting about 500 U.S. military personnel in the region who are building up to 17 Ebola treatment units and 65 community care centers.
Two laboratories are already in place, with four more on the way, to provide training for both local and international staff who will remain at the Ebola treatment centers. Vertical construction of the Monrovia medical unit, a 25-bed hospital meant for treatment of health care workers, is also complete.