NY Doctor Recently Back From West Africa Tests Positive For Ebola 372
An anonymous reader writes An emergency room doctor who recently returned to the city after treating Ebola patients in West Africa has tested positive for the virus, Mayor Bill de Blasio said. It's the first case in the city and the fourth in the nation. From the article: "The doctor, identified as Craig Spencer, 33, came back from treating Ebola patients in Guinea about 10 days ago, and developed a fever, nausea, pain and fatigue Wednesday night. The physician, employed at New York's Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, has been in isolation at Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan since Thursday morning, the official said."
Bennett Haselton on the Ebola outbreak (Score:5, Funny)
I saw the news about the poor doctor in NYC. Yikes, before I draw any conclusions, do we have any pieces by Bennett Haselton on the Ebola outbreak or diseases in general? I'd like to see what his insight is first. He's a frequent contributor.
Re:Bennett Haselton on the Ebola outbreak (Score:5, Funny)
do we have any pieces by Bennett Haselton on the Ebola outbreak or diseases in general?
Indeed, perhaps he could present us with 'A Modest Proposal' that came to him whilst reading the messages in his alphabits.
Re:Bennett Haselton on the Ebola outbreak (Score:4, Funny)
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That "poor" doctor was an irresponsible ass. He was in an area know to have a huge ebola outbreak and flew back to the US in close proximity to others, rode around in cramped subways and dined at restaurants without getting checked out. And it's not like he's some clueless rube, he's a fucking doctor and he attempted to murder many people. I hope he dies.
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Let me quote the article for you:
"He had been checking his temperature twice a day."
"Doctors Without Borders confirmed that the physician recently returned from West Africa and was "engaged in regular health monitoring.""
The dude, being a doctor and all, monitored his temperature and most likely checked himself in to the hospital once he developed symptoms.
It has been stated time and time again, that it's virtually impossible to contract the disease from someone that exhibits no symptoms.
Re:Bennett Haselton on the Ebola outbreak (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Bennett Haselton on the Ebola outbreak (Score:4, Insightful)
So we are now living in a Lewis Carroll world: "I have said it thrice: What I tell you three times is true."
If indeed there was no risk to anyone until the good doctor decided he was beginning to show symptoms, then why is so much money (and other, more valuable than money, resources) being used to trace down all who might have had contact with him? It would seem that the authorities are not as confident about the risks of transmission during the silent incubation period as they would want the public to believe.
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Panic everyone! (Score:5, Funny)
Kent Brockman: Professor, without knowing precisely what the danger is, would you say it's time for our viewers to crack each other's heads open and feast on the goo inside?
Professor: Yes I would, Kent.
Why dont they screen doctors before they come back (Score:4, Interesting)
My friend works at Bellevue, my other friend took the 1 train (train the doctor took to go bowling last night while experiencing "sick symptoms") the same night he did and I take the 1 train every day to and friend work.
There are people who live and are stuck in Africa who have a millions times more the reason to be concerned than I am, I understand this.
What I don't agree with are the people who are using things like Malaria and HIV statistics to try and show how the media is playing up this issue.
Both are less serious and more controllable diseases with much bigger sample sizes. As/if more Ebola cases arise, the contractions will increase exponentially and they'll stop comparing this to "more serious diseases".
What I don't understand is why they are letting doctors who work on Ebola patients back into teh country without being screened?
There are people arguing to shut down all travel from West Africa, even if that's too much in your opinion, at least screen these doctors.
Customs: What was your reason for leaving the country?
Doctor: I was treating patients with Ebola.
Customs: Due to national security, we can not let you into the country until you've been tested and cleared.
Doctor: But I have plans to go bowling in Brooklyn in about week!
Customs: You're retarded.
Chances are, the conversation wouldn't happen like that and the doctor would be understanding of the situation.
So why aren't we just doing that to begin with?
Re:Why dont they screen doctors before they come b (Score:5, Informative)
They are screening and putting every returning health care professional on a health watch. The issue is that the incubation period for ebola can be up to 21 days. The doctor in question arrived at John F. Kennedy Airport on October 17 with no symptoms. Symptoms did not show up until this morning when the doctor followed protocol and was hospitalized. The virus may not even have shown up in his blood on October 17. Remember that infection tests look for antibodies not the virus itself. If the virus had not attacked yet there would be no anybodies.
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One thing that seems very relevant, but never discussed: Why comes first, symptoms, or contagiousness?
If a person isn't contagious until well after showing symptoms, I can kind of see the current lax screening as being reasonable.
But otherwise, it seems inexcusable.
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My friend works at Bellevue, my other friend took the 1 train (train the doctor took to go bowling last night while experiencing "sick symptoms") the same night he did and I take the 1 train every day to and friend work.
It's bad in Africa because they have terrible heathcare. Instead of seeking medical care people get care from friends and family who don't know what they're doing, thus they become infected themselves and the disease spreads.
This guy having spread the disease on the train is possible, but very unlikely.
There are people arguing to shut down all travel from West Africa, even if that's too much in your opinion, at least screen these doctors.
They are screened but the virus has an incubation period.
There are people arguing to shut down all travel from West Africa, even if that's too much in your opinion, at least screen these doctors.
Customs: What was your reason for leaving the country?
Doctor: I was treating patients with Ebola.
Customs: Due to national security, we can not let you into the country until you've been tested and cleared.
Doctor: But I have plans to go bowling in Brooklyn in about week!
Customs: You're retarded.
A travel ban is a terrible idea, people will still travel from West Africa but they'll do it from other countries so we won't know to track them. A 3 w
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Chances are, the conversation wouldn't happen like that
Mainly because the USA has signed treaties that make it illegal to refuse entry to a citizen.
That, and when you make a self-report of risk be a metric for spreading the risk, you increase the risk and the amount of lying. But you don't help anyone. So your plan fails for many reasons.
Re:Why dont they screen doctors before they come b (Score:5, Insightful)
Chances are, the conversation wouldn't happen like that
Mainly because the USA has signed treaties that make it illegal to refuse entry to a citizen.
That, and when you make a self-report of risk be a metric for spreading the risk, you increase the risk and the amount of lying. But you don't help anyone. So your plan fails for many reasons.
Wait a minute. The USA ignores treaties left and right and constantly bombs and invades countries because they want to leave the US-dollar as reserve currency. They torture and hold people without trial. They pay millions to destabilize Syria, Ukraine and dozens of other countries.
But they can't refuse entry because of some treaty with Libera?
Since when did the USA care about any treaty?
Proper risk management (Score:3)
1) What is the likelihood of harm?
2) If harm occurs, what is the cost?
3) What is the cost of preventing harm, including the opportunity cost?
And allocate resources accordingly. In this case:
1) Extremely low. Approx. 3 people in the US have Ebola; all were in West Africa or treated someone already very ill. Nobody else in the US has been infected by these people (again, except someone providing health care to one of them). You are at much greater risk of heart disease, cancer, traffic accidents, hospital error, crime, and probably even lightening strikes and bee stings.
2) The cost is very high, including a substantial risk of death.
3) The cost is easily affordable for the US, but the opportunity cost is higher: The United States and the world have limited health care resources. For example, there's a good chance that many of the resources (doctors and money) would save many more lives and better protect US citizens by addressing heart disease (via prevention, treatment, or research) or controlling the outbreak in W. Africa than by responding to public panic.
I think you'll find that many experts in these fields will say that the panic is the greatest risk, greater than the disease.
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How is suspending flights to Liberia a "high opportunity cost"?
Is the economy going to turn down because somebody cannot get to Monrovia?
Gosh, you people are surely crazy.
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Whereas in countries actually physically affected by WWII they had things like the "KEEP CALM" posters. Yes, panic is a massive problem. People aren't rational. As long as people are not rational, and news media makes money from hyping dangers, panic will stay a large issue.
Grow up, read some history, familiarise yourself with basic epidemiology and public health management, and then maybe you'll stop making a fool of yourself. Wishful thinking, I know.
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This.
Since at least August the CDC has been spouting the line "We know how to control Ebola" yet months later we were caught with our CDC protocols around our ankles. So far that mistake appears not to have snowballed in the US.
Meanwhile, no signs of progress controlling Ebola in Africa, despite repeated claims by many that "we know how to control Ebola".
Ebola just keeps on keeping on, doubling and re-doubling and re-doubling. Getting harder and harder to control, if that's even possible at this point.
M
How Contagious? (Score:3)
The ebola outbreak started on March. In 5 months there have been 10,000 cases in countries known for their low health care and sanitation standards. Considering that in many places the population is very crowded and many cases of infection do not get reported until the symptoms get very bad I bet that every person in infected areas would have been in close proximity with at least one ebola infected person. If ebola was as contagious as some people think don't you think a lot more than 0.045% of the population of those countries would be infected by now?
What may be a source of the concern is all the pictures of people in suits carrying body bags. This skews perception as those people are in contact with a corpse that has ebola laden excretions all over it. When an ebola victim has just died that is when they are the most contagious.
They Misspelled "Vectors" (Score:2)
CNN Reports: "A Vectors Without Borders physician back from West Africa tests positive for Ebola at a New York hospital."
OK, not annoyed about the Liberian guy any more (Score:2, Insightful)
...after all, he was just an ignorant shlub that brought Ebola here.
This dipshit however was a MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL, coming back from TREATING PEOPLE WITH EBOLA who 'felt like crap' for several days (enough so that he was taking his temp regularly) and couldn't apparently be trusted to quarantine himself out of basic precautionary concern. Nope, he had to maintain his urbanite/hipster lifestyle - jogging, taxis, bowling, etc.
Doc: "DO NO HARM" applies just as much to the millions of people around you, as to
Re:OK, not annoyed about the Liberian guy any more (Score:4, Insightful)
'felt like crap' for several days (enough so that he was taking his temp regularly)
Actually, he was supposed to be taking his temperature regularly even if he felt fine. That was part of the protocol for coming back from an Ebola outbreak.
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Doc: "DO NO HARM" applies just as much to the millions of people around you, as to your actual patient.
As far as we can tell, he did absolutely zero harm to the millions around him. Some people are panicking anyway.
Tell me again... (Score:3)
Why it's wrong that we don't require a mandatory 21 day quarantine for anyone travelling from these countries if we truly want to stop the virus from ever getting a hold?
Top it off - this guy went bowling while starting to show symptoms (thus, contagious). Who is going to replace and pay for EVERY bowling ball? What about decontamination of the facility? If I were the owner, I'd be pretty pissed off.
Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Funny)
Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Insightful)
cover all the angles (Score:2)
i guess you can say i was going for "doing an idiotic thing" not "inherently an idiot"
maybe "being an idiot" or "made an idiotic mistake"
idk...but this isn't a cup of hot green tea here...the whole idea is they're supposed to cover all the angles!
Re:my thoughts (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Insightful)
Except that's what doctors and other healthcare workers do every day. They put their lives in danger by treating people with diseases that, if they aren't careful, they could catch. Firefighters also knowingly risk their lives to save people. They will go running into a burning building just to try to pull someone out.
Risking your life to try to save someone else - when you are a trained professional - isn't idiot-territory. These aren't random people jumping into a raging river to save a drowning victim who wind up also drowning. These are people who take all available precautions, realize there is still a danger, and still try to save lives. These people are heroes.
Now if some news reports are right and the doctor interacted with people after showing symptoms, I'd agree that THAT was an idiot move.
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> Knowingly and needlessly risking one's life is squarely in idiot-territory.
No, your SENTENCE is squarely in idiot-territory.
Heroism evolved for a very solid reason: it's a survival benefit. It probably originated with "if I save my child, my genes live longer than if I save myself" but it expanded into what we know because it's a good thing. It's the difference between self-interest and ENLIGHTENED self-interest.
The more doctors offer to help in Liberia, the less people in Liberia get infected. The les
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IMHO, either Ebola is easier to transmit than we are being told _OR_ these Ebola doctors who get the disease are FSKING IDIOTS
if it is so damn hard to get, how the hell do Doctors who should be the best at following procedure can get?
i think people are just morons, no matter what degrees they have
The only people telling you that Ebola is hard to transmit are the ones that want you to stay calm so that you are easier to control.
Most viruses (even HIV) have low transmission rates (below 30%) when the virus is exposed into the body. Relative to other viruses, Ebola seems to have an exceptionally high transmission efficiency. So if you perform any protocol wrong, you will likely contract it.
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...provided you're in the presence of something or someone that can transmit it. Before you go full bore on panic mode, realize that we are talking about a low single digit cases in the US and that Ebola is, at least to our current knowledge, only contagious when symptoms are displayed.
In other words, as long as you're not an idiot you should be fine. As for the rest, well, Darwin should be allowed to be right from time to time.
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we are not even in single digit cases.
330 million people in the usa. and the only fatality has been a non american whom the hospitals should never of let go home.
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'Seems to have'? That needs a [citation needed].
And don't send idiots in to a highly infectious area. Give them a 2 minute test to ensure they can actually follow protocol without screwing up.
Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Interesting)
Or maybe the limited resources in the area of the outbreak make it impossible to be 100% perfect in your procedures and you do the best you can in a difficult situation.
The answer to stemming the tide of people taking Ebola elsewhere is to get it under control in Liberia/Sierra Leone/Ghana so there's no Ebola to take elsewhere. Until we do that the danger to other countries will continue regardless of what you do.
Another thing, it's starting to look like if you discover and start treating it early and aggressively that you have a good chance of surviving Ebola. If L/SL/G had as good a medical system as the US I suspect the survival rate would be much better.
Re:my thoughts (Score:4, Informative)
... get it under control in Liberia/Sierra Leone/Ghana ...
Guinea, not Ghana. Ghana has been unaffected by the outbreak. It is as different as night and day from Guinea. Ghana has four times the GDP, a far higher literacy rate, functional institutions, and a democratic government that answers to the people.
Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Funny)
functional institutions, and a democratic government that answers to the people.
Are they accepting US immigrants?
Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Funny)
No. They are afraid of lowering their literacy rate.
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LOL Well played.
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:^)
It does sound like a nice place though.
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Guinea, not Ghana.
Oops, right. Thanks for the correction. I get those little African countries mixed up sometimes.
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The answer to stemming the tide of people taking Ebola elsewhere is to get it under control in Liberia/Sierra Leone/Ghana so there's no Ebola to take elsewhere.
So your plan is to send dozens of thousands of people over there, go from village to village and test millions of people?
And in the meantime keep all flights open, because cancelling flights would be such a terrible tragedy?
Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Informative)
There is a huge difference between being in a room with someone with early stages of ebola for a few minutes and working in a hospital. Here are some factors when working in a hospital with ebola patients;
1. Much longer contact periods. Many health workers in Africa work 18 hour days.
2. Much closer contact. Health workers touch ebola patients much more often than the general public.
3. Contact later in the disease progression. Ebola is transmitted by bodily fluids. As the disease progresses more bodily fluids are secreted, it is a hemorrhagic disease, and more pathogen is present in the excretions.
If one works long hours and their suit is covered in ebola laden fluids it is quite probable that a small mistake can cause infection. Even the fatigue factor may cause errors in protocol.
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There is a huge difference between being in a room with someone with early stages of ebola for a few minutes and working in a hospital. Here are some factors when working in a hospital with ebola patients; 1. Much longer contact periods. Many health workers in Africa work 18 hour days. 2. Much closer contact. Health workers touch ebola patients much more often than the general public. 3. Contact later in the disease progression. Ebola is transmitted by bodily fluids. As the disease progresses more bodily fluids are secreted, it is a hemorrhagic disease, and more pathogen is present in the excretions.
If one works long hours and their suit is covered in ebola laden fluids it is quite probable that a small mistake can cause infection. Even the fatigue factor may cause errors in protocol.
The nurses in Texas who contracted Ebola from Duncan, do you believe that they had "prolonged" contact with him?
The Ebola virus spreads through bodily fluids including saliva (aerosolized when sneezing) and sweat. I think it is easier to spread than is currently believed, especially because fluids are more readily spread than is understood even by health experts.
Also, the Ebola virus apparently can live outside the body for several days if encapsulated in body fluids.
Anyone can verify these facts about abou
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The nurses in Texas who contracted Ebola from Duncan, do you believe that they had "prolonged" contact with him?
Duncan was in the hospital from September 28 to October 8. That is ten days which would mean 8 shifts of 8 hours for a total 64 hours where the nurses may have had contact with Duncan. I would call that extended.
The Ebola virus spreads through bodily fluids including saliva (aerosolized when sneezing) and sweat.
If you are close to someone with late stage ebola, don't wear protective gear and are sneezed on it is your fault for being infected. One of the issues in East Africa is families trying to care for sick relatives when ther caregivers have no training or protective gear.
Also, the Ebola virus apparently can live outside the body for several days if encapsulated in body fluids.
Those bodily fluids would have
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Those bodily fluids would have to be encapsulated in something else, a vial for example, or they will dry up and the ebola will die in hours.
Then why is it so important to burn the bedsheets?
Seems like they could just let them dry, then wash them with the rest of the linens. The ebola virus is dead, right?
Re:my thoughts (Score:4, Informative)
Because bed sheets are soaked in virus laden excretions making them an extreme hazard and anyone handling them is at risk. Ebols is a hemorrhagic disease which means lots of fluids escaping especially in the later stages of the disease. Also when bed sheets are removed from the bed they are usually crumpled in a ball which creates areas that take a very long time to dry. It is much easier and safer to just burn them.
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Safety? I mean, duh, we're talking about a potentially lethal disease and bedsheets worth a few cents.
Come back when they start burning the mattresses.
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The nurses were working dedicated 8 hour shifts inside of his room. They were handling bedpans and puke buckets full of infectious material.
if you know this... (Score:2)
thanks for the response...
my point is, that if YOU know this then the people who make the procedures must also...and therefore there already be adaptations/improvements to procedures OR if that can't happen then quarrantine
if we know the threat exists, that's enough information to mitigate it in SOME way
that's the problem here IMHO...
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The obvious issue is that doctors are constantly in contact with infec
Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Insightful)
*sigh*
The guy in Texas who had Ebola transmitted it to exactly two people, both of which were caring for him while sick. He didn't transmit it to ANY of his family members. I'd say that's a good indicator that the virus really is very hard to catch.
As far as your "idiot" theory goes, smart people screw up, and constant vigilance is hard, especially in an environment like in west Africa. At the moment, you're thinking with the fear generating part of your brain, not the thinking part of your brain. That's very bad, and causes more harm than good. Health officials are telling you it's hard to get because it IS hard to get. The average number of people that Ebola is transmitted to is about 2. That's a very low number. AIDS, which is also hard to catch is transmitted to an average of 4 people. Measles, which is very contagious is 18.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/healt... [npr.org]
So please stop with the conspiracy theory. It's a disease, not a government secret. You can't keep a tight lid the real facts about a disease that people study and publish papers about in medical journals.
Also, consider there's thousands of health care workers in west Africa. There's been a handful of American healthcare workers who've caught the disease, but MANY OTHERS who haven't.
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Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Informative)
Some types of mutation are fantastically unlikely - by one account, Ebola would have to mutate into a form that only weighs about 20% or even 10% of what it now does, change from a long, twisted rod to something more like a sphere, and switch the conditions it actually grows under from inside the bloodstream to in the alveolar structures of the lungs to become the sort of threat some people are worried about. There are big differences between viruses frequently mutating and that mutation leading to fast evolutionary selection, but I've tried to explain that on Slashdot too many times to keep hammering at that particular type of ignorance - some people just need to sit down and read a whole good college textbook on Evolution. It may be somewhat reasonable to worry that some mutation in the direction of drug resistance is likely, especially if we don't get this strain under control quickly, but some people are basically describing having a smallish frilled lizard sneak into the country on a piece of driftwood, and six months later, it's stomping buildings flat and breathing radioactive plasma on Mothra, and those same people are too busy spreading rumors to learn anything at all. As they panic at the drop of a hat, people who are actual experts (and not just armchair biology hackers like me) are getting very afraid to say anything at all, because when they give an honest answer that sholdn't cause panic, and might even be a bit reassuring, they expect to be misquoted as saying Ebola will make the Nemesis black hole wander into the inner solar system early and reverse all our magnetic poles, and Raptor riding Jesus will come back and eat our heads, so panic now and avoid the rush!!!
Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Informative)
Yep, that's all true, but there are other options, possibly no less scary.
This virus is well established in humans now in this outbreak, whereas before it was mostly a zoonosis (caught from animals). Mutations will now be being selected by their efficacy in prospering in us, not in the original host(s).
Some scientists believe this is already happening, we know it is mutating and there is evidence that it is mutating to become more infectious, to us: http://www.businessinsider.in/... [businessinsider.in]
If it is true that viral loads are coming up earlier and higher than before, then it could be shedding before symptoms. Wouldn't be entirely surprising - containing it through hazmat-after-symptoms will probably select for strains that infect before symptoms. That would screw up all our containment measures rather well. Even if it just accelerates symptoms it could get a lot harder to contain - if first symptoms are a fever _and_ the infected is monitoring and gets themselves straight into care, further infection can be limited, but if first symptoms are fever and projectile vomiting you have much more of a problem.
All that said, scariest thing to me is that this is an African zoonosis that hasn't been out of Africa before except in the lab. We have no idea what hosts it may find in the non-African animal population, should it get the opportunity. If it finds an easy first-world reservoir host (maybe it likes our bats, or our foxes, or our rats) then it will become endemic, rapidly. Endemic ebola (in the absence of vaccine or cure) will be a game changer for 1st world medicine - think about every fever case to be isolated and treated using hazmat until tested negative (probably twice X days apart). Africa's health system, such as it is, is already feeling that pain - Ebola may well kill (already) more people via malaria than it does directly: http://www.reuters.com/article... [reuters.com]
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>This virus is well established in humans now in this outbreak, whereas before it was mostly a zoonosis (caught from animals). Mutations will now be being selected by their efficacy in prospering in us, not in the original host(s).
Indeed, where you're wrong is thinking that's a BAD thing -that's exactly what we, as the humans, WANT.
Almost every mild ailment we get from a virus today was once a plague far scarier than ebola.
They are mild ailments now because we, and the virusses, have both been evolving t
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Boo !
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The risk factor is non-zero regardless of what procedures are followed. Even if ebola is not generally transmissible by air it's not quite against the laws of nature for the virus to find itself in some liquid drop which just happens to follow the right air currents in the right time frame to get taken up in an orifice etc. Then there's the possiblity of tears and defects in protective equipment, etc. The fact he spent so much time near ebola patients may have turned a one in a million risk to a one in a
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That's because you use ridiculously vaguye language like "easy to transmit". You need to specify the conditions under which the potential transmission takes place. What peoiple don't realize is just how primitive conditions are in Africa, and what a difference it makes. These are countries where medical providers re-use latex gloves, sometimes even hypodermic needles. Granted, this guy was part a medical mission that probably had all the protective equipment, but you have to keep in mind that the primitiv
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IMHO, either Ebola is easier to transmit than we are being told _OR_ these Ebola doctors who get the disease are FSKING IDIOTS
It's easy to transmit if there is Ebola-infected blood, shit and vomit everywhere; you know, as there often is when you are a doctor caring for people in the late stages of Ebola.
It's not so easy to transmit outside of that situation. I highly recommend avoiding that situation if at all possible.
i think people are just morons, no matter what degrees they have
I think you may be suffering from Dunning-Kruger. You might want to get that looked at.
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Doctors and nurses treating Ebola patients are getting vastly more exposure time than your average American.
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IMHO, either Ebola is easier to transmit than we are being told _OR_ these Ebola doctors who get the disease are FSKING IDIOTS
It's neither.
You still can't get it through the air, it has to be contact with the fluids of a sick person. But once you contact those fluids transmission is very easy.
if it is so damn hard to get, how the hell do Doctors who should be the best at following procedure can get?
i think people are just morons, no matter what degrees they have
They got it by treating very sick people who were covered with highly contagious fluids. Unless you've never made an error in your work I'm not sure you can rightly call them morons/
your thoughts ... (Score:5, Insightful)
IMHO your "opinion" is very very humble indeed and belongs in the category of "uneducated careless speculation with a sensationalist bent".
It may have escaped your notice, but doctors who help out in West-African hospitals come into close contact with a constant stream of very ill people who are in the stadium where they really are contagious, every day for months at a stretch.
Their protective clothing prevents transmission in the vast majority (say 99,9%) of cases (something you can tell by the fact that we still have doctors left treating Ebola patients). The real danger comes when you take off your protective suit. That has to be done carefully so as not to touch the splatters of blood, muckus, tears, sweat etcetera that very ill patients secrete and if possible it has to be decontaminated first.
Now I'm sure your "humble" and uneducated opinion never has been schooled in elementary probability so you wouldn't understand things like P(contagion_after_100_days) = 1 - [P(no_contagion_after_1_day)]^100, but try it this way.
Playing the lottery every day makes it unlikely that you won't win a single prize.
And so it is with medical personnel who treat Ebola patient for months. They run a risk.
So it's no conspiracy (I can feel your incredulity and disappointment) and no case of "fsking idiots" (a term which I'd like to reserve for you personally).
It's easy to shout your (thoroughly humble) head off about stuff you don't understand, but it's not helping anybody and it stands in the way of a rational attitude towards Ebola.
P.S. there is absolutely nothing "insightful" about your post. On the other hand it's revealing. Revealing of a mindset that couples a penchant for conspiracy theories with a complete lack of understanding of risk and a disdain for plain ordinary everyday scientific commonsense that seems to have whizzed over your (so very humble) head.
Re:my thoughts (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not easy to catch for the average person. Hmm... how to draw a parallel that the average /. reader can understand...
If your job is to solder tiny parts into electronics, getting burned by a soldering iron is quite easy if you're not careful. It's rather unlikely to impossible for the average person on the street to get a soldering burn.
Likewise, if you're working with people who are infectious on a daily base and have to handle their highly contagious blood, urine, feces, saliva and other stuff the average person not only finds yucky but wouldn't want to get near if paid to do so, you can get infected easily if you're not careful, while for the average person who has zero if not less contact to either contagious people or their bodily substances the risk is far lower, if not nonexistent.
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Exactly my thoughts. We are constantly being told that it is very hard to transmit and then when it does happen to trained medical personell with years of experience we are told that they made some minute mistake in procedure and that's the reason. But an infected taking the subway? - No problem, it's "virtually impossible" to get infected.
Re:my thoughts (Score:4, Informative)
Ebola is impossible to catch unless you are directly exposed to someone who is symptomatic. That is why the people treating the victims wear the space suits. The reason those not directly exposed don't need to worry is that the virus dies within an hour or two of leaving the victim's body, I suppose when it dries out. The flu virus on the other hand can survive for days or weeks on a door handle or on dust particles in the air.
I'm still trying to figure out what it has to do with politics.
in favor of "space suits" (Score:2)
i'm all for an abundance of caution...let them wear the HAZMAT stuff....
what kills me is that I've worked with hazardous materials in a construction setting, and there's always a trade-off between being bulky safety equipment and time
but...there is sort of a line you don't cross...like hard hats...some job sites are "Hard Hat Only" as soon as you enter the property...which is a bit silly...but you're an idiot if you are guiding a crane placing I-beams and don't have your Hard Hat on
see what I mean?
i just do
Re:in favor of "space suits" (Score:4, Insightful)
Becaues the average I-beam is more easy to spot than the average virus. It's trivial to know whether you're protected from an I-Beam (is that hard hat on? Yes? You are), but not whether you're protected against viral matter (is your hazmat suit tight? You sure? Are you?)
Re: (Score:2)
what about my post makes you think i'm advocating using hard hats to fight Ebola?
do you know what an analogy is?
my comments about using hard hats were an analogy, to make about point about lines you simply do not sensibly cross
Re: (Score:2)
By the way, a hard hat does not protect against an I-beam that weighs several tons. If a cable breaks and the beam drops on your head, that plastic cap isn't going to save your life.
Re:in favor of "space suits" (Score:4, Interesting)
Afaict in the core countries of the epedemic the problem is a lack of resources. Ideally you would use a new protective suit each time to minimise the risk of material transferring from outside to inside and you would work very slowly and carefully to make sure you didn't puncture the protective suit (remember medical treatment almost inevitablly involves sharp objects coming into contact with patients bodilly fluids but when you are short of time and materials you can't do that and still treat all your patients.
In cases like texas the problem seems to be that there is a delay between the infected patient showing up and the hospital realising what they are dealing with and how seriously they need to take things.
Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Interesting)
Technically, yes. As doctors define direct exposure that's true. However, doctors and normal people don't define it the same way. If I have Ebola and get bodily fluids on a doorknob, then you come along an hour later, touch the doorknob and then rub your eyes... you can become infected. That fits the CDC's definition of "direct exposure", because you've been directly exposed to my bodily fluids.
So don't get complacent thinking as long as you don't actually touch an infected person you can't become infected.
Re: (Score:2)
Politicians ultimately run our countries and therefore utlimately decide the strategy we take against such things.
Right now they are adopting a relatively light touch strategy, they are tracking known infected people and their contacts, setting up special precautions in hospitals and sending people to help treat the outbreak but they are not putting in place total travel bans or mandatory quarantines on people who have recently visited infected countries.
If the epidemic spreads to the west on a significant
Re:my thoughts (Score:5, Insightful)
Has anyone who flew on an airliner with someone who subsequently came down with Ebola gotten sick from it yet? Not that I've heard of but it's possible I suppose. The two people who got sick from Thomas Eric Duncan were directly involved with caring for him at the hospital and obviously didn't follow the procedures well enough to keep from getting infected. But now that the 21 day period has passed none of the people he was living with in Dallas got infected. That has to say something about how hard it is to get infected. It looks to me like Obama is following sound scientific advise and it's working so far. It's possible there may be some others who get it but we know how to control it and with our medical system I just don't see Ebola as a significant threat to the US.
hard hat (Score:2)
well that's real talk...i can understand "circumstances" i suppose...it is still a dumb mistake IMHO
as i was saying above in another comment, I've worked with hazardous construction materials...nothing like Ebola obv...but we had to wear protective gear and it got annoying
ex: Hard Hat...some jobs require hard hats everywhere, even outdoors in the open air...it's not crazy to cheat a bit in that area...however, only an idiot would go into an area with heavy work being done above them w/o the hard hat...in fa
Re: (Score:2)
Common sense isn't very common. At least not in 21st Century America.
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Obama should have listened to his Kenyan brethren who cancelled all flights and implemented a 21-day quarantine period.
Why can they do it and we can't?
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Enforce a 21 day quarantine and you won't be getting any travellers from ebola countries. Instead you'll get travellers from the neighbouring countries
Nope, because ALL neighboring countries have closed the borders.
Why can a country that borders on Libera/SL/Guinea close the border while a country half away can't? Care to explain that one?
or some convenient 3rd country where it's easy to switch flights. And no, there is no way to know who came from the ebola country.
Well, quite a lot of countries are cancelling flights so it will get harder and harder for that. And in fact it is possible to know from where one came - and if the person has a Liberan passport it's a no-brainer.
So some ebola-carrier would have to:
- take a flight to some moronic country that still allows flights
Re: (Score:3)
No, a flight ban would be all airlines just temporarily suspend all flights to the three West African countries until the epidemic has subsided enough, only then the flights can continue. During the epidemic only military flights can fly into the affected countries, with tightly restricted passenger and cargo access. That way health care supplies etc. can be sent to the affected countries, and health care workers can fly between countries and back (after a 21 day waiting period) to whichever country they came from. Other travel restrictions may apply as well, but the sooner it's done the better, before the epidemic is completely out of control. The dimwits in this administration have it backwards.
And who would enforce the ban? Last I checked the U.S. constitution doesn't give the government the power to ban foreign airlines from flying to a foreign country.
From a practical standpoint, I'd point out that there really aren't that many military transport aircraft in the world, that a great many of them are American, and that they are blocked out literally months in advance. Would your 21-day waiting period also apply to aircrew? That will really bollix things up.
I strongly suspect (but do not know f
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
"Is it time to put up a wall to quarantine texass? They've wanted a wall for some time. Should texass be allowed to infect good American blue states?
Red state texass let an Ebola patient out on the streets with some tums or antibiotics....
Epic healthcare failure." - muhutdafuga
http://blogs.westword.com/late... [westword.com]
Re: New York (Score:4, Insightful)
They were following CDC guidelines which apparently were contradictory and incomplete.
Basically what everyone is realizing is that the CDC is fucking clueless and everyone has to just use their own best judgement on the matter.
Beyond which... basic quarantine procedures would deal with this problem.
Nigeria is doing that and they're basically free from infection despite being right next to effected countries.
The US used to have such policies in the old days. Ellis Island had extensive quarantine facilities for example.
In this case we have a full blown Ebola outbreak and the fucking retarded administration wants to keep open transport because they're afraid it would look like discrimination. Let me be clear, if the damn outbreak were in the middle of Sweden, I'd still want quarantine procedures. This has nothing at all to do with race but rather everything to do with a very scary virus that isn't playing around.
Now am I actually worried about a mass outbreak in the US? No. I find that unlikely. However, this virus has a 50-70% mortality rate and there is no vaccine.
This is not something you take lightly. You pay this sort of virus the respect it deserves and enact BASIC quarantine procedures. Rudimentary.
Nothing fancy. You come back from one of these countries, your passport gets checked, they see the stamp, they have a blood sample taken or whatever is needed. Then depending on the relevance, you might need to wait for that to come back clean.
Sound inconvenient? It is a fucking plague. Tough shit.
Obola (Score:2, Funny)
In this case we have a full blown Ebola outbreak and the fucking retarded administration wants to keep open transport because they're afraid it would look like discrimination.
What you're describing is Obola.
Re: New York (Score:5, Funny)
However, this virus has a 50-70% mortality rate and there is no vaccine.
Does that mean it has a 30% - 50% immortality rate? Hmm....
Re: New York (Score:5, Informative)
You can find more about what Nigeria has done here:
http://www.latimes.com/world/a... [latimes.com]
Nothing they did was especially innovative. Their response was textbook. You quarantine anyone infected, you question anyone infected about everyone they've come in contact with, you investigate all of those people, and you do not take the virus lightly.
None of this is new. It is basic.
The people saying we can't have screening or quarantine procedures for political reasons don't seem to grasp that viruses don't care about your politics. It is like when Achilles says to Hector "there are no pacts between lions and men"...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
The virus will show no pity, no hesitation, and no remorse. It exists to eat and spread.
Just as we have procedures for dealing with forest fires or other natural phenomenon. You don't let politics dictate how you deal with them. There is a correct way and an incorrect way. If you choose the incorrect path because it is politically more correct, then that natural phenomenon will exploit your arrogance and do what it does.
Again, I'm not worried about an outbreak in the US. I am however concerned about the glaring and obvious incompetence of the government. I am routinely shocked by how stupid they are on so many issues.
Re:Responses: for New York etc (Score:5, Insightful)
3. Flush anybody questionable with 2-5 days of IV vitamin C 80,000 mg tid, 50,000 iu vitamin D3 per day, selenium and zinc. These kill viruses.
Hahaha. :D [xkcd.com]
Re:Mind Numbing Stupidity (Score:5, Informative)
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Strictly speaking, he was not asymptomatic when he took the subway rides. He was not yet febrile, but "felt run down".
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I just wonder how long it will be until the virus "discovers" a carrier..
Someone who is immune enough to not show symptoms, but can still carry the virus enough to infect others.
See typhoid Mary.
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In fact South Africa did implement such a window.
But you are right, we are screwed. Politicians care a lot more about political correctness than deadly viruses. They (and their mindless TV-educated zombies like "Nemyst") will tell us how it's "unlikely" that it will become a problem and that not a single flight to Liberia must be cancelled, because ... well just because we "can't leave West Africa". What happened to "yes we can"?
Re: (Score:2)
Medical Screener: So I see you've been treating people infected with the Ebola virus
Dr. Ebola; Yup
Medical Screener: Are you infected?
Dr. Ebola: Nope
Medical Screener: Ok, ok enjoy your subway ride back to Manhattan.
If this is how we're going to manage this outbreak, we are completely screwed.
And it's likely already too late. That Dr took a few subway rides and likely infected at least a couple dozen people in the process.
Thats more than enough to start a substantial outbreak of panic around the US and likely the entire planet.
FTFY
Re: (Score:3)
That Dr took a few subway rides and likely infected at least a couple dozen people in the process.
Lets wait the 21 days before making outlandish claims.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
That Dr took a few subway rides and likely infected at least a couple dozen people in the process. Thats more than enough to start a substantial outbreak around the US and likely the entire planet.
I don't know what's worse, that you think this is how Ebola works, or that someone modded you up for your clueless opinion.
Re: (Score:2)
How about here [cnn.com]. Another point is that Mali is next door to Guinea, where the outbreak this year is believed to have started. Is it really news that a disease crossed a border? Another case is the US is different because it is on a different continent and indicates that WHO is having difficulty containing the outbreak
Re: (Score:2)
“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.”
Frank Hebert - Dune
Re: (Score:3)
Well, Nigera, Kenya, South Africa, and many more countries have cancelled all flights. But Obama said that he "can't" do that. Why he can't do that he didn't say though.
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He won't do it because it would be stupid.
Right now if they ask you at the airport if you've been to Liberia, Sierra Leone or Guinea, people have no incentive to lie, so don't. If you make that illegal, it won't stop them from flying out of somewhere else, it will just make them lie to the immigration officials, making the problem worse, not better.