INDIANAPOLIS – U.S.  Rep. Todd Rokita speculated during a radio interview on Monday that some of the unaccompanied immigrant children from Central America who are streaming across the nation’s southern border may be carrying the deadly Ebola virus.

Rokita, an Indiana Republican, said the undocumented children could pose a serious health concern for American citizens, and cited a recent conversation he had with fellow U.S. Rep. Larry Bucshon, who is a heart surgeon, according to NWITimes.com.

“(Bucshon) said, look, we need to know just from a public-health standpoint, with Ebola circulating and everything else – no, that’s my addition to it, not necessarily his – but he said we need to know the condition of these kids,” Rokita said during an interview on Indianapolis’ WIBC-FM.

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Reports NWITimes.com:

No human Ebola illness ever has been contracted in the Western Hemisphere and none of the 30,340 unaccompanied minors released this year to relatives or sponsors, including the 245 children placed in Indiana homes, have Ebola, according to the U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement.

The refugee agency notes on its placement-reporting website that all children receive vaccinations and medical screenings before being released to a relative or sponsor, and no child is released who has a contagious condition.

Rokita is skeptical of that claim and would like to see all of the children who are entering the country illegally kept in one location.

“If we believe that a majority of them should be reunited with their parents in their countries, letting them diffuse into the community is just going to be harder to get them to the hearing, harder to find out where they are, who they are,” Rokita said, according to the news site.

An Ebola outbreak in West Africa has claimed the lives of nearly 900 people, according to the Associated Press.