BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Jeri
Date: 29 Sep 14 - 07:10 PM

Of course, the word "vector" isn't being used correctly. I think he just meant to say it was a contributing factor.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Sep 14 - 05:56 PM

Flu epidemics spread at the same speed now as they did 100 years ago says the above. The question is where the PEOPLE to whom it spread can go which is way, way farther than THEY could 100 years ago.

First case in the US.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 30 Sep 14 - 07:50 PM

As guest said - http://www.theverge.com/2014/9/30/6875311/first-case-of-ebola-diagnosed-in-the-us-cdc-reports

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 30 Sep 14 - 09:20 PM

Flu epidemics spread at the same speed now as they did 100 years ago says the above. The question is where the PEOPLE to whom it spread can go which is way, way farther than THEY could 100 years ago.

The point is the speed of transport makes no difference. Compare the current ebola epidemic to the 1918-19 flu pandemic: there were tens of millions dead all round the globe within six months from the first known cases (about the time that's elapsed since the ebola epidemic started). Steam was plenty fast enough. The only places to escape were islands that shut themselves off, like American Samoa.

I suspect the very worst measure that could possibly be taken would be to involve the military, as some control freaks here are suggesting. Historically soldiers have been among the worst disease vectors ever to prey on humanity. It only takes one psycho uniformed rapist thinking "that one's too cute to waste" and down goes a regiment.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Ebbie
Date: 30 Sep 14 - 09:23 PM

Has it been definitively established that Ebola contamination is NOT airborne? Seems like that knowledge would have to be one of the first lines of defense.

If it is not airborne concerts and plane and train travel would still be OK. If an occasional case contracts it through someone's cough or sneeze or just plain breathing, I should think that staying away from crowds or close quarters would be a first step.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Oct 14 - 12:19 AM

It is definitively established it is NOT airborne.

Infected fluids during symptomatic phase like Saliva, urine, fecal fluid, mucosa or sweat must come into direct contact with your mouth, wet eye areas, nostril or a micro abrasion or cut in your skin to pass on the infection.

The virus does not survive long outside the body or body fluids dry However once a fluid dries it is still important to help the virus die with bleach. Toilet water for example can be safe to flush with bleach.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Oct 14 - 12:22 AM

there is ABSOLUTELY nothing to worry about.
The Secret Service has been tasked with tracking down possible Ebola contactors.


wha... too soon?

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 01 Oct 14 - 05:11 AM

Not too soon.
In Texas now.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 01 Oct 14 - 03:37 PM

The US case is put in a different light now officials have admitted that the Ebola patient was sent home by medical staff despite telling them of his recent return from Liberia:

Ebola patient told hospital staff about his travel to Liberia but was allowed home

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,Mrr
Date: 01 Oct 14 - 05:58 PM

That Guest above was me, sorry.

Yeah, it's here, now we care.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 03:10 AM

Apparently 18 known contacts in the USA - but what about passers-by? This could easily get out of hand.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 03:30 AM

Just goes to show you can have the finest quarantine facilities, it's the human failure that will turn out to be the weakest link.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,donuel needs a cookie
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 12:42 PM

I think we are all on board the ship that will not allow rational fear or irrational conspiracy theory to sink our spirit or live in panic mode that would cause us to make bad choices.

I am not a Johnny come lately on this subject nor am I a professional epidemiologist.

The four ongoing concerns are:


1 Treatment and emerging cures.

2 Where is Ebola in humans and animals today?

3 Best and worst case scenarios

4 Social and Economic effects caused by Ebola


The issues of who caused this, who will prosper from this and who will who will suffer intentionally are in my opinion conspiracy theories that will not help anyone.

My opinion on how and why is economic. The US has not even paid all their dues to the World Health Organization. Back in April was the time we could have invested half a million dollars to end the outbreak.

In May for the price a rich person spends on restoring a 57 Chevy Belaire, we could have stopped the epidemic.

By August the money a wealthy person spends to restore a classic car could have supplied the infrastructure and supplies to stop the outbreak.

By September a well organized Army could have slowed the epidemic to a controllable level.

We are at a stage now that as little as 3 carriers could inflict pandemic effects upon our nation.

It was the LACK of money that allowed this plague to get a foothold.
Drug companies do not invest in R&D for tropical diseases. It is up to the Government. But the Government has been struck with a Sequestration that has crippled everyone in the Government from the Secret Service to CDC.

If you think a republican Congressman understands the gravity of the work the NIH and CDC does, you are mistaken.


So I will limit my contribution to
1 Treatment and emerging cures.

2 Where is Ebola in humans and animals today?

3 Best and worst case scenarios

4 Social & Market effects




OCT 2 2014
1 (((( We are doing vaccine trials. We have tried about a dozen times so far. We have a couple anti viral serums we are very hopeful about. It may have helped half the people who returned to the US for treatment so far to survive but we are not sure yet. Treatment is palliative and a strong push of fluids. Part of treatment should be quarantine after flights. Hell they quarantine fruits and Bonsai trees until they die or become inedible but we don't have routine quarantine for people yet.

2 (((( Ebola victims are currently confirmed in the US, Spain, Saudi Arabia, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Nigeria. The animals such as African bats and Bonobo monkeys have tested positive but the bigger threat is the importation of African bush meat to every cultural mom and pop market across the US and many other countries thus infecting people in their own neighborhoods.

3 (((( The best case scenario for the one and only US Ebola victim is not to have infected anyone while he was sick with symptoms of nearly 5 days.
For every victim the likely infection rate is 2 more people infected. If a priest for example giving communion infected all the wafers from a cut on his fingers the rate of infection would be of course much more. Transmission is not guaranteed.
It will take about a year for all transmission to be stopped in the best case. In the worst case it will go around the world in 3 waves and burn out after killing over 3 billion people. If/when the Ebola virus mutates it could lose its fatal characteristics or become airborne and become worse for humans.

4(((( The news of Dallas exposure to Ebola could have stock market effects but it can not be proved. So far all goods and services are unaffected in the US but is disrupted in All but Nigeria in Africa.



Conspiracy theories that make the epidemic worse are:
The government wants our blood
Its all to make big Pharma richer
They are lying about Ebola not being air born.
They have a cure but will only give it to the rich.



The above current observations are subject to change.
Best case is it gets better in 6 months, worst case the death toll toll reaches 1.2 million people principally in Africa. If it hits Hong Kong Cairo or Mexico City before Christmas...game over since infrastructures will worsen all responses to the epidemic and become a true pandemic.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 01:17 PM

By September a well organized Army could have slowed the epidemic to a controllable level.

Bollocks. Armies always spread epidemic disease. The Scottish army brought the Black Death to Scotland after a raid on England, the armies sacking Italy around 1500 spread syphilis round Europe, 19th century armies spread typhus, the Americans spread gonorrhoea round South-East Asia in the Vietnam War.

Soldiers are rapists and looters, however "well organized". That is not safe behaviour in an epidemic.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: olddude
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 05:43 PM

CDC lady said they are working on other vaccines... getting them from tobacco cells of all things ... go figure huh

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 05:47 PM

A well-regulated force of strong nurses? With the ability to enforce quarantine?

I have been saying all along that people coming out of Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia should have a month's quarantine, most easily done by WHO or MSF or the UN between nations, in the transit areas of the airports. It takes up to 3 weeks to show symptoms if you, say, got exposed on your way out of the country at the last possible second; give it an extra week to be sure. The clock resets when any individual gets sick, if any. If it inconveniences a lot of people, that's a lot better than a lot of alternatives... anybody hear about hysteria in Texas? How would you feel if your kid was on a team sport with poor someone whose poor dad got sent home, sorry oops by mistake, with ebola leaking out of his every pore and then some new holes too? I'd be terrified.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Greg F.
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 06:08 PM

Yup - now that U.S. white folks have been potentially exposed, they're startin' to pay attention.

God bless Amerika.

(PS: been paying attention to what passes for a "hospital" in Africa?)

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 06:08 PM

I am dumbfounded that someone could go to an ER, say they have been to Liberia, and not be quarantined. Why should America tremble?

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: olddude
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 06:27 PM

He lied three times to the airport authorities and said he wasn't exposed. Today we find out he was caring for an ebola patient and living with him. should have terrorism charges against him I think

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Greg F.
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 06:36 PM

Stupidity hasn't been criminalized, Dan, More's the pity.

We really do need a criminal stupidity statute on the books, especially in light of Rick Perry, Rand Paul, and a host of others.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: olddude
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 08:32 PM

Suppose you are right. Go figure I hope they have it secured sounds like they do

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 09:40 PM

Still, the hospital sending him home after he DID say he'd been in Liberia, I mean, really.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: olddude
Date: 02 Oct 14 - 10:22 PM

For sure that's insane..

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,Stim
Date: 03 Oct 14 - 12:07 AM

When public officials start telling us that they are in control of the situation, it it is time to worry.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 03 Oct 14 - 04:55 AM

Yes, communications breakdown within a complex team prevented the information that the patient had just returned from Liberia filtered through. An Ebola checklist was completed during the assessment.

I read this Reuters article yesterday. The way this case has been handled, you have a problem there.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 03 Oct 14 - 05:17 AM

Sorry, this was the article I was thinking of above.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Oct 14 - 10:12 AM

I heard the situation described on a radio interview yesterday. The four were coming and going and not always available for the twice-daily check on their temperatures. So now they're confined to one apartment where now they are sleeping on mattresses on the floor and I wonder if someone is delivering food and other requirements? This story is evolving. They're talking about this on the Diane Rehm show (NPR) right now.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Oct 14 - 11:58 AM

Supreme stupidity or as I call it human nature has always defeated some of our best intentions.

We* did not think through a proper procedure to quarantine or even who would ever clean up exposed linens and furniture. (* the corporate we or the wealthiest we)

As long as Isis seems to be a priority Ebola will not get the attention it deserves.

Beheadings be damned ! Saudi Arabia had several dozen of their own this year, Americans have seen plenty of beheadings. Ghostbuster 2 had 11 beheaded victims on pikes as they entered the subway river of slime. OK but real or not I don't think our leadership is focusing the public on the REAL threat.

The new American    $$$$ conspiracy anti Obama conspiracy theory   $$$$$    is that big pharma has plenty of vaccine and are in fact rife with cures but African markets can't afford the price drug companies want to get. Only after America gets truly desperate will drug companies sell the vaccines at huge profit to the government.
Again this conspiracy theory is whacko. What is true is that Drug companies run with a new drug after the Government has painstakingly developed it such as the new malarial cure. Drug companies do not spend $ on R&D today the way they once did.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Oct 14 - 12:12 PM

Kudos to the great posts by; mg, Richard Bridges, Mrrzy and Q.
These people I could understand. The silent ones baffle me.
Recent events have made my Ebola song in the thread 'Ebola songs' even creepier.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Oct 14 - 12:58 PM

GOOD NEWS


Dr. Robert Garry of Tulane University has made a test for Ebola infection that works in as little as 10 minutes even on asymptomatic patients.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Oct 14 - 04:53 PM

BAD NEWS

npr just reported 2 men in the DC Metro area are now in hospitals after traveling from West Africa with Ebola symptoms

A Nigerian man is at Shady Grove Hospital and the other is at Howard University.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Greg F.
Date: 03 Oct 14 - 05:27 PM

As long as everyone is getting hysterical over Ebola, remember that there are 7 or 8 cases of BUBONIC PLAGUE!!!!!!! in the U.S. every year & also one or two of pneumonic and/or septicemic.

BE AFRAID!!! BE VERY AFRAID!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Elmore
Date: 03 Oct 14 - 08:37 PM

Thought it was kind and caring of Sarah Palin to extend condolences to the people of Ebola.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,Mrr
Date: 03 Oct 14 - 08:51 PM

White folks don't get plague, though, unless we have AIDS. So we're not afraid, not very afraid. Sigh.

And the handling by Dallas authorities is scarily bad. The nephew is who called the CDC to say My uncle has Ebola and the hospital just sent him home!

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Oct 14 - 01:11 AM

New numbers as of beginning of October:

Total Case Count: 7470 + 20 in Nigeria, 2 in Senagal and 1 in US=7493
Total Deaths: 3431 + 8 + 0 + 0 = 3439
Laboratory Confirmed Cases: 4087 + 19 + 2 + 1 = 4099

Reminder of end of September case count:
Total Case Count: 6263
Total Deaths: 2917
Laboratory Confirmed Cases: 3487

So we'vegone up in a couple of weeks by 1230 cases, roughly 100/day.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 04 Oct 14 - 01:51 AM

More than a hundred a day just in Sierra Leone
BBC.
A leading charity has warned that a rate of five new Ebola cases an hour in Sierra Leone means healthcare demands are far outstripping supply.

Save the Children said there were 765 new cases of Ebola reported in the West African state last week, while there are only 327 beds in the country.

Experts and politicians are set to meet in London to debate a global response to the crisis.

It is the world's worst outbreak of the virus, killing 3,338 people so far.

There have been 7,178 confirmed cases, with Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea suffering the most.

Save the Children says Ebola is spreading across Sierra Leone at a "terrifying rate", with the number of new cases being recorded doubling every few weeks.

It said that even as health authorities got on top of the outbreak in one area, it spread to another.

The scale of the disease is also "massively unreported" according to the charity, because "untold numbers of children are dying anonymously at home or in the streets".
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-29453755

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Greg F.
Date: 04 Oct 14 - 10:12 AM

Get a grip.

"More than 226,000 Americans are hospitalized with flu and approximately 36,000 die from flu-related complications every year, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention."

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Oct 14 - 02:44 PM

Just because something else is worse doesn't mean something isn't bad.

The flu has vaccines. THe flu has treatments that work. Ebola has neither.

Besides, *this* *isn't* *about* *Americans* *it* *is* *about* Guineans, Liberians, Sierra Leonians, and so Ivorians, Malians, Nigerans (not Nigerians), Senegalese, and Guinea-Bassauans first and foremost. The West African nations in or bordering the current outbreak/epidemic.

The idea that now that there is a case in the US we should care more, or that diseases that kill more Americans are more important, sickens me,

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Greg F.
Date: 04 Oct 14 - 03:07 PM

The idea that now that there is a case in the US we should care more, or that diseases that kill more Americans are more important, sickens me

Me too - but it is what it is.

Dead wogs don't signify.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Oct 14 - 06:26 PM

Ugh. yeah, I know. But ugh.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 05 Oct 14 - 12:44 PM

Up to 100 contacts of the first US case, now, and he is critical. So much for the US's ability to treat Ebola. Or to contain it.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Oct 14 - 01:58 PM

Your turn's coming, RB. Let's see how well you handle it.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 05 Oct 14 - 02:37 PM

And now there is a homeless man who rode in the ambulance with the first US Ebola case - and he is missing. Not a good scenario.

Well, Ebbie, the BIG difference with the UK is that we have a National Health Service (until the fucking conservatives finish selling it off) so people are not afraid to go to hospital in case they get bankrupted. Bear in mind that the general assumption is that people who are asymptomatic are not infectious, so if people go straight to a doctor or hospital (and do not lie, for fear of cost, that they have not been exposed) when symptoms show, the prospects for containment are better.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 05 Oct 14 - 03:39 PM

Just so as we don't get complacent here in the UK, the victim changed flights in Brussels. That put him one contact and one Eurostar journey from London.
The simple reality is that this will get out sooner or later, either by stupidity or malevolence. It has already escaped from its first locus into the rest of West Africa, and this Texan incident was just a taster of what happens when, sooner or later, someone knows better. The UK is very much in common with the rest of Europe, although our longer-term provision is better, in that if you even think you have a problem, you see the quack for nowt.
On the other hand, the question then might arise about the scale of the epidemic overwhelming the medical resource. That may lead to neighbourhood quarantine: we nearly had to go there in the Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918, indeed within a quarter of a mile of where I write this in London is an entire housing estate which has only just been returned to private use by the NHS, inside the last 10 years, which was built for these victims. It still has just two entrances, supermarket and medical centre. One wonders if it is still on the books as a reserve...at least the local kids would be happy, as the troops enforcing the enclave would have to be based in the school opposite.
1918 was bad, coming on the heels of the death toll of WWI. But it was not as bad as the death toll of the cumulative waves of plague in the 50 years which followed on the Black Death of 1347-9, which caused complete economic collapse in some parts of Europe, and therefore came within a hair's breadth of doing so across the entire continent. Between 50 and 75% of the population died, more slowly, and the way found out of the economic collapse was specialisation, a policy which we have continued since. However, we have taken it far further: what would happen, say, if the whole of Silicon Valley died?
Or the people who keep a continual process plant running smoothly?
It may be we have futures as acoustic performers after all...

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Oct 14 - 04:58 PM

They found the homeless guy in Dallas.

One guy who got all better is now back in hospital, but they say it's a diffeent flu so far, although I bet having just gotten over Ebola isn't very good for your upper respiratory system.

If he changed planes in Brussels he probably didn't go through Customs, plus, he didn't have it yet so they'd be fine even if he had sweated, profusely, on them. You aren't contagious till symptoms and he didn't show symptoms till he'd been Stateside for days.

Only another couple of weeks till we know if it spread anywhere.

The only people likely are the EMTs and the immediate family, who may have gotten into bed with him while he was sick. I wouldn't even worry about the guy who cleaned up the barf, or the fact that the barf was simply hosed off into the neighborhood street.

But what really frosted my buns this morning was the headline on the Sunday Washington Post first page - how "they" "failed" to stop the epidemic, now that there is ONE case in the US suddenly it is not contained? SOMETIMES I (delete a lot of stuff) mean really! The they in question being the international health people, btw.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Greg F.
Date: 06 Oct 14 - 10:21 AM

On the other hand, the question then might arise about the scale of the epidemic overwhelming the medical resource.

Not likely, since the Flu was airborne transmission & the Plague either airborne(pneumonic) or transmitted by flea bites. Ebola requires direct contact with bodily fluids.


what would happen, say, if the whole of Silicon Valley died?

The world would be considerably better off overall and I wouldn't have to constantly deal with oblivious idiots barking into their cell phones & texting in their vehicles.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 06 Oct 14 - 01:53 PM

The "Spanish Flu" was an H1N1 avian virus, according to current research. The severity is suspected to be the result of cytokine storms affecting the immune system.
See Medscape.com article on Influenza Transmission, from American Journal of Epidemiology.
Person-to-person transmission seems to be low compared to seasonal influenza transmission.

As noted in previous posts, it is spread by contact with bodily fluids rather than through the air like Spanish Flu.
However, aid workers need masks and protective clothing, because patients coughs spread fluids to those in contact.

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 06 Oct 14 - 03:45 PM

Emphasising again the risk to medical staff caring for Ebola patients, the first known infection outside Africa: a nurse who was looking after a repatriated missionary in a Madrid hospital.

Nurse in Spain tests positive for Ebola

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 06 Oct 14 - 06:22 PM

One of my flags just got tripped (and I used to be a manager in the European crisis management centre): the Spanish nurse who picked it up from the Priest brought back from Liberia nursed him, cleaned up the room after he died, AND THEN WENT ON HOLIDAY. They don't know for sure that it isn't communcating by air, its incubation period can be between 2 and 21 days, and it was only when she became symptomatic - ie transmissible - that she sought help. How long was she contageous before that: and among holidaymakers. Yet the Spanish Minister of Health continues to be proud of her Sector's professionalism. That kind of pride, continuing in the face of the evidence that they cocked up in the most dangerous way possible, is a recipe for disaster: should they even have repatriated the priest in the first place, even? That's wisdom after the event, but now the risk is they've let it out of a medical environment and into holidaymakers. Next stop Rochdale or Eltham?
Now we must pray for the next three weeks. Oh, and in passing, a male who recovers still has infectious semen for up to eight weeks...

Subject: RE: BS: Anybody else watching Ebola break out?
From: GUEST,Mrr
Date: 06 Oct 14 - 09:31 PM

8 weeks, great, does the wife of the texas case know that or the people monitering her?