Ron Paul slams Rand's 'politically motivated' Ebola travel ban: It has no 'medical purpose'

When it comes to dealing with Ebola in the United States, former Congressman Ron Paul (R) and his son, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), don't see eye to eye.

In an interview with Fox News radio host John Gibson last week, Rand Paul argued that a ban on people traveling from west African "ought to be considered."

"It's not like AIDS," he explained. "AIDS is difficult to transmit. You're not going to go into a cocktail party and have someone cough and get AIDS. If you are in a cocktail party with someone with Ebola and they cough, you are at risk for getting Ebola."

The Kentucky senator said that a "temporary hiatus on flights" was "only reasonable."

But as BuzzFeed pointed out on Monday, Ron Paul urged people to put the situation in "perspective."

"For a government to just ban all travel, I'm not much interested in that," the former Republican presidential candidate told Newsmax. "You've got to put it in perspective. What if you wanted to save 15,000 deaths from AIDS this year. Why don't you ban certain practices that spreads AIDS? So, we're talking about one person that's died [of Ebola in the U.S.] and we want to close down the world travel system."

Ron Paul, who is a medical doctor, pointed out that an estimated 3,000 to 49,000 people died every year from influenza, but no one was considering a travel ban to stop the flu from spreading.

"So right now, I would say a travel ban is politically motivated more than something done for medical purposes," he concluded.

Watch the video below from Newsmax, broadcast Oct. 20, 2014.