ebola wars


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The Exchange

these idiots are peddling colloidal silver as the cure to ebola

The Exchange

Dallas health worker caught ebola

possible ebola case at Massachusetts clinic


yellowdingo wrote:
these idiots are peddling colloidal silver as the cure to ebola

These idiots also suggest colloidal silver, but with cinnamon and other spices. Also, they know the dark truth why ebola exists.

The Exchange

second Dallas nurse with ebola flew with 131 other people

So ebola protocol needs to now include thirty day on site quarantine for medical personel treating ebola patients and destruction of their single use room if they fall ill. Imagine a specially built facility designed with a kilometre deep hole into which it becomes necessary to drop you and the single use thirty day quarantine exit habitat in which you lived if you die of ebola.

The Exchange

Had strange dream about being led through jungle by kids who wanted to show me something, got to see great apes with faces covered in lesions seen in ebola cases. It will be horrible if Ebola reinfects great apes.


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Yes she did and although they'll be contacted and monitored just to be sure, none of them are going to be infected. That's not how the disease gets transmitted.
Transmission through casual contact with patients in the early stages is incredibly rare.

We definitely need better training and better compliance with the protocols for treating late stage patients. Avoiding any contact while treating/cleaning a patient suffering projectile vomiting and explosive diarrhea is both critical and very difficult.
We might also need stricter protocols and better protective gear, but that's less clear at this point.

Massive quarantines of everyone treating patients is not productive. Not good for staff morale. Not good for finding people willing to do the treatment. And not necessary or even useful to stop the spread of the disease.


well, when you're handling... stuff.... stuff happens. Its simply a fact of life that no matter what procedures you implement they're not really possible to follow 100% of the time by 100% of the people: people are .. well, human.


BigNorseWolf wrote:

well, when you're handling... stuff.... stuff happens. Its simply a fact of life that no matter what procedures you implement they're not really possible to follow 100% of the time by 100% of the people: people are .. well, human.

There are ways to improve that though. You're right, perfection is impossible, but human error can be minimized.

The Exchange

thejeff wrote:

Yes she did and although they'll be contacted and monitored just to be sure, none of them are going to be infected. That's not how the disease gets transmitted.

Transmission through casual contact with patients in the early stages is incredibly rare.

We definitely need better training and better compliance with the protocols for treating late stage patients. Avoiding any contact while treating/cleaning a patient suffering projectile vomiting and explosive diarrhea is both critical and very difficult.
We might also need stricter protocols and better protective gear, but that's less clear at this point.

Massive quarantines of everyone treating patients is not productive. Not good for staff morale. Not good for finding people willing to do the treatment. And not necessary or even useful to stop the spread of the disease.

can you get ebola under control within sixty days?

I'd rather you spend thirty days in isolation in an airlock before you get let back onboard with the rest of us.


thejeff wrote:
BigNorseWolf wrote:

well, when you're handling... stuff.... stuff happens. Its simply a fact of life that no matter what procedures you implement they're not really possible to follow 100% of the time by 100% of the people: people are .. well, human.

There are ways to improve that though. You're right, perfection is impossible, but human error can be minimized.

You're assuming that it already hasn't been.

They can (and probably should) add a decontamination shower. past that , short of inventing a robot nurse or leaving the guy in a plastic room that hoses itself out, this is simply going to be a risk.


BigNorseWolf wrote:
thejeff wrote:
BigNorseWolf wrote:
well, when you're handling... stuff.... stuff happens. Its simply a fact of life that no matter what procedures you implement they're not really possible to follow 100% of the time by 100% of the people: people are .. well, human.
There are ways to improve that though. You're right, perfection is impossible, but human error can be minimized.

You're assuming that it already hasn't been.

They can (and probably should) add a decontamination shower. past that , short of inventing a robot nurse or leaving the guy in a plastic room that hoses itself out, this is simply going to be a risk.

MSF has had 2 cases of infection in months of work under much worse conditions in Liberia. The Dallas hospital had 2 cases with their first patient. From what the nurses have said, they were very slow to put Duncan into isolation, even when he came back the second time after having been sent home once. Even after he was in isolation management didn't properly equip the attending staff right away. They slowly ramped up to something close to the full CDC recommendations. The changing approach is itself a danger, since it means a lack of training in whatever the standard happens to be today.

The CDC protocols may well minimize human error theoretically, but if the hospital administration isn't implementing them, it won't help. There will always be risk involved. We can do far better than Dallas did.

The Exchange

Definatly single use thirty day habitats. Nurses and doctors will need to be cycled out through a thirty day quarantine single user/single use hab.


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yellowdingo wrote:
Definatly single use thirty day habitats. Nurses and doctors will need to be cycled out through a thirty day quarantine single user/single use hab.

You can use shipping containers for those habitats!


thejeff wrote:
yellowdingo wrote:
Definatly single use thirty day habitats. Nurses and doctors will need to be cycled out through a thirty day quarantine single user/single use hab.

You can use shipping containers for those habitats!

Where would the homeless live then?


thejeff wrote:
yellowdingo wrote:
Definatly single use thirty day habitats. Nurses and doctors will need to be cycled out through a thirty day quarantine single user/single use hab.

You can use shipping containers for those habitats!

And feed them on mangoes! They might help fight off ebola(TM)! Just make sure the mangoes are fine.

Quote:

In rainy season, bats feed on mangoes. Do I stop eating mangoes?

No, you can continue eating mangos but they properly need to be washed before eating. However, you should avoid the mangoes which bat has bitten (bat mot).

The Exchange

yeah...you is all dead.

now panic over kids who were on plane with patient alpha

The Exchange

yellowdingo wrote:
Is it now a matter of time befor isis sends 'suicide bombers' into africa to get infected by ebola and spread it world wide?

I might have sent an email to a paranoid politician...my bad.


Personally...I am kind of getting annoyed at the fear tactics being employed about Ebola right now, both in the media and by politicians. I wish both groups would for instance freak out more about declining vacination rates, which have killed/hurt far more people in the USA than Ebola has so far. Or really any of the dozens of other health issues that are solvable but ignored.

The Exchange

do you still think people working with ebola shouldnt be locked in a glass room for thirty days before being alowed out?


yellowdingo wrote:
do you still think people working with ebola shouldnt be locked in a glass room for thirty days before being alowed out?

Yes I do.

Get back to me if people actually start getting infected during the time you would have locked them up. Which they won't because Ebola doesn't work like that.


In worse news, there's a case in Mali now. An orphan girl who came back from Guinea. Hopefully they caught it in time and are on top of it enough to prevent an actual outbreak there.


If you lock people in a room and tell people they're going to die, oddly enough they run away from being locked in the glass room and then infect more people.


yellowdingo wrote:
do you still think people working with ebola shouldnt be locked in a glass room for thirty days before being alowed out?

Well, if I wasn't sure before, your support of that idea has definitely convinced me it's a bad idea that will do more harm than good.


Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber

According to the CDC, 108 pediatric deaths occurred in the USA from 2013-2014 from influenza. This does not count adults that died from it.

I'm not trying to scar people, just trying to shed perspective on matters.

Ebola is a very painful and frightening virus, yet people should not panic and head for the doomsday shelters yet.

We DO need to strengthen efforts to assist Africa in their crisis. We also have to keep perspective in order to live a balanced life rather than survive by huddling in a bomb shelter.

The Exchange

We should however take to doctors and nurses - who having been exposed to ebola think: there is no way I could have been exposed so i'll pop off to heavily populated places rather than play it safe for the safety of others just in case - with a baseball bat.

Treat them as bioterrorists.


yellowdingo wrote:
We should however take to doctors and nurses - who having been exposed to ebola think: there is no way I could have been exposed so i'll pop off to heavily populated places rather than play it safe for the safety of others just in case - with a baseball bat.

Well, my days of believing that if you support an idea, it's therefore terrible have definitely come to a middle.


It's also possible that they know the medical science on Ebola and know they're not contagious until they're symptomatic, so there's no point in quarantining themselves. And that Ebola doesn't spread by the kind of casual contact we're talking about here and that even when the earliest symptoms show up, they're only a threat if you're dealing with blood or maybe vomit and feces, and they're not yet dealing with vomiting and diarrhea.

Again, Duncan was wrongly sent home from the Dallas hospital with a fever of 103 and spent another 2 days with his family before coming back and being admitted. He was much more symptomatic than this doctor was when he was out. None of his contacts were infected, even those he was living with.

No one is going to come down with Ebola from Dr Spencer's bowling trip or subway rides. No one is going to come down with Ebola from nurse Vimson's flight or shopping. Hopefully, Bellevue is better prepared than Dallas Presby was and none of the staff will be infected. They're off to a better start at least.

The only person I'm at all concerned about would be Dr. Spencer's girlfriend. I believe they're already monitoring her. That's still very unlikely.

Edit: As I understand it, he was following MSF's protocol which requires self-monitoring, but does not suggest quarantine.


KestrelZ wrote:

According to the CDC, 108 pediatric deaths occurred in the USA from 2013-2014 from influenza. This does not count adults that died from it.

I'm not trying to scar people, just trying to shed perspective on matters.

Ebola is a very painful and frightening virus, yet people should not panic and head for the doomsday shelters yet.

We DO need to strengthen efforts to assist Africa in their crisis. We also have to keep perspective in order to live a balanced life rather than survive by huddling in a bomb shelter.

Well, until now the drug companies have had no economic incentive to develop a vaccine. Had there been profit in curing these people they would have done it.


jocundthejolly wrote:
Well, until now the drug companies have had no economic incentive to develop a vaccine. Had there been profit in curing these people they would have done it.

At least for the moment there is profit in producing a vaccine. I wonder how long this will last.

In the example of Diabetes, there will never be a cure because all the
profit is in treating it, not curing it.

.


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Electric Wizard wrote:

In the example of Diabetes, there will never be a cure because all the
profit is in treating it, not curing it.

I wonder in what world this is true. Certainly not the real one. If Pfitzer could develop an anti-diabetes vaccine, it would make them trillions on a high-margin patentable drug instead of competing with Novartis, Roche, Sanofi, &c. on lower-margin me-too drugs.


I think the fear with Ebola right now is different than that from the flu.

Currently in the Western world, flu has a fatality rate of something like .001% vs. ebola which has a higher percentage overall (though in the US for those in the past month it's like .25% currently...still far higher than flu).

In african nations, flu still has a fatality rate lower than 1% from what I know, but as we see, the fatality with ebola is 50% to 70%...which is far deadlier.

People are afraid because there's a MUCH higher chance of dying if you catch ebola, than if you catch the flu.

right now the hospitals are not overrun, so they can spend more time and attention on those who have ebola in the west. You get a couple hundred to a couple thousand cases and care could decrease, meaning the fatality rate would spike higher (possibly to the African levels).

That's what people are afraid of...not that it's spread everywhere yet...but if it is allowed to, the ramifications are regarding a disease which has a FAR higher fatality rate than flu.

If you had as many infected with Ebola in the US as you do the flu each year, you are probably looking at something on the scale of several million, perhaps dozens of millions of people dead.

People are afraid of the worst case scenario, and appearances are that the US isn't doing all that much to prevent the spread of the disease and has not taken as stringent actions as some other nations (including other western nations).

It's no surprise that the US and Spain were some of those with the first cases of Ebola in the West, considering they really have NO sanctions or things to stop Ebola from entering their nation...not even really questionnaires (I hear these policies are changing after public outrage though, New York just instituted mandatory quarantines) or anything other than that given before people leave the nations that have ebola already.

So yes, there are panics over nothing thus far...but there is a reasoning behind it...in that if it DOES spread and creates an epidemic, it's something that basically has a VERY high mortality rate relatively speaking.


Orfamay Quest wrote:
Electric Wizard wrote:

In the example of Diabetes, there will never be a cure because all the
profit is in treating it, not curing it.

I wonder in what world this is true. Certainly not the real one. If Pfitzer could develop an anti-diabetes vaccine, it would make them trillions on a high-margin patentable drug instead of competing with Novartis, Roche, Sanofi, &c. on lower-margin me-too drugs.

.

Hurray for Public School

.


GreyWolfLord wrote:

I think the fear with Ebola right now is different than that from the flu.

Currently in the Western world, flu has a fatality rate of something like .001% vs. ebola which has a higher percentage overall (though in the US for those in the past month it's like .25% currently...still far higher than flu).

In african nations, flu still has a fatality rate lower than 1% from what I know, but as we see, the fatality with ebola is 50% to 70%...which is far deadlier.

People are afraid because there's a MUCH higher chance of dying if you catch ebola, than if you catch the flu.

right now the hospitals are not overrun, so they can spend more time and attention on those who have ebola in the west. You get a couple hundred to a couple thousand cases and care could decrease, meaning the fatality rate would spike higher (possibly to the African levels).

That's what people are afraid of...not that it's spread everywhere yet...but if it is allowed to, the ramifications are regarding a disease which has a FAR higher fatality rate than flu.

If you had as many infected with Ebola in the US as you do the flu each year, you are probably looking at something on the scale of several million, perhaps dozens of millions of people dead.

People are afraid of the worst case scenario, and appearances are that the US isn't doing all that much to prevent the spread of the disease and has not taken as stringent actions as some other nations (including other western nations).

It's no surprise that the US and Spain were some of those with the first cases of Ebola in the West, considering they really have NO sanctions or things to stop Ebola from entering their nation...not even really questionnaires (I hear these policies are changing after public outrage though, New York just instituted mandatory quarantines) or anything other than that given before people leave the nations that have ebola already.

So yes, there are panics over nothing thus far...but there is a reasoning behind it...in that if it DOES spread and...

I agree to an extent and think some of the comparisons made with flu and other things are unwarranted - though flu can be bad too. There's always the chance of a new, bad flu strain, like the one back in 1917. Wouldn't be as bad today, but could still sweep through the country far faster than Ebola could.

Most of the fear of Ebola is ignorance. Yes, it's deadly. Yes, it would be really bad if we had a serious epidemic in the US. But that's not going to happen unless the US healthcare system, bad as it it, crashes to closer to Liberian levels.

As far as how we're handling it here: The Dallas hospital fell down on the job. Badly. Very badly. They sent Duncan home with a 103 fever. That should never have happened. It caused a huge stink and it's much less likely to happen again. They also didn't follow protocol and didn't have trained staff to take care of him, so 2 nurses got sick. That also shouldn't have happened, caused a huge stink and is much less likely to happen again.

OTOH, despite that: Duncan infected no one in the time before he was finally admitted to the hospital. Both nurses were monitored and caught early. Both are apparently now recovered.
The doctor in NY was self-monitoring and was admitted early on. Bellevue's been training and preparing for this. The odds are good they'll be able to handle him without contamination. The chances he's infected anyone else are minimal - he was brought in far earlier than Duncan, so he was much less contagious.

We're now imposing more travel restrictions and monitoring than is really medically needed in hopes of calming people. I suspect it's having the opposite effect, since it makes people think it's really necessary.

Frankly, other than the initial screwup in Dallas, we're handling it just fine. I hope we don't go much farther in overreaction.
Maybe even roll some stuff back once it becomes clear that neither the doctor or the nurses infected anyone else.

The Exchange

Orfamay Quest wrote:
Electric Wizard wrote:

In the example of Diabetes, there will never be a cure because all the
profit is in treating it, not curing it.

I wonder in what world this is true. Certainly not the real one. If Pfitzer could develop an anti-diabetes vaccine, it would make them trillions on a high-margin patentable drug instead of competing with Novartis, Roche, Sanofi, &c. on lower-margin me-too drugs.

Diabetes is a symptom of things like calcium saturation of the adrenal cortex through the use of powdered milk. It means you are messing with adrenalin and cortesone production as well as the processing of incomming sugars.

The Exchange

compulsory quarantines for anyone exposed to someone with ebola


yellowdingo wrote:
compulsory quarantines for anyone exposed to someone with ebola

Yeah. Overreaction for PR reasons.

Hope it doesn't discourage people from treating Ebola patients. Also hope it doesn't discourage people from reporting contacts.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
yellowdingo wrote:

ebola outbreak in italy

Is it now a matter of time befor isis sends 'suicide bombers' into africa to get infected by ebola and spread it world wide?

Do you understand how hard you'd have to work to actually catch it here? There's a reason that all American cases so far have been medical workers.

Ebola is not exactly a weaponisable disease. That's what anthrax is for.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

If Nigeria, of all places, can contain this, we should manage.


GreyWolfLord wrote:

I think the fear with Ebola right now is different than that from the flu.

Currently in the Western world, flu has a fatality rate of something like .001% vs. ebola which has a higher percentage overall (though in the US for those in the past month it's like .25% currently...still far higher than flu).

In african nations, flu still has a fatality rate lower than 1% from what I know, but as we see, the fatality with ebola is 50% to 70%...which is far deadlier.

People are afraid because there's a MUCH higher chance of dying if you catch ebola, than if you catch the flu.

right now the hospitals are not overrun, so they can spend more time and attention on those who have ebola in the west. You get a couple hundred to a couple thousand cases and care could decrease, meaning the fatality rate would spike higher (possibly to the African levels).

That's what people are afraid of...not that it's spread everywhere yet...but if it is allowed to, the ramifications are regarding a disease which has a FAR higher fatality rate than flu.

If you had as many infected with Ebola in the US as you do the flu each year, you are probably looking at something on the scale of several million, perhaps dozens of millions of people dead.

People are afraid of the worst case scenario, and appearances are that the US isn't doing all that much to prevent the spread of the disease and has not taken as stringent actions as some other nations (including other western nations).

It's no surprise that the US and Spain were some of those with the first cases of Ebola in the West, considering they really have NO sanctions or things to stop Ebola from entering their nation...not even really questionnaires (I hear these policies are changing after public outrage though, New York just instituted mandatory quarantines) or anything other than that given before people leave the nations that have ebola already.

So yes, there are panics over nothing thus far...but there is a reasoning behind it...in that if it DOES spread and...

I don't know if the percentages you are using to compare fatality rates between influenza and Ebola are statistically valid. Yes, Ebola (especially if poorly treated) has a higher risk of death, but what needs to be factored in there is how contagious it is. Influenza and similar diseases are far more contagious, as well as being much more prone to mutation.

So yeah, if you get Ebola, you very well stand a risk of dying. But the odds of an average person in the USA contracting Ebola is so miniscule its not really worth the panic that some segments have been displaying.

I am not saying we shouldn't screen passengers or have quarantines. But it would certainly be nice if people consider all the other health hazards that kill far more people a year as well

The Exchange

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LazarX wrote:
yellowdingo wrote:

ebola outbreak in italy

Is it now a matter of time befor isis sends 'suicide bombers' into africa to get infected by ebola and spread it world wide?

Do you understand how hard you'd have to work to actually catch it here? There's a reason that all American cases so far have been medical workers.

Ebola is not exactly a weaponisable disease. That's what anthrax is for.

given africans originally caught it from eating 'bush meat' easier than you think. New york is one contaminated meal away from ebola.

The Exchange

LazarX wrote:
If Nigeria, of all places, can contain this, we should manage.

Nigeria is a commonwealth nation with socialized medicine. The usa is still struggling with equality of healthcare.

The Exchange

australia criticised over response

The Exchange

infected reaches 10,000


yellowdingo wrote:
infected reaches 10,000

Another sign that what we need to do, instead of freaking out about the handful of cases that reach the US and trying to lock down our borders, is commit massive resources to fighting the epidemic in West Africa.

The Mali situation looks bad. The girl died the day after being found, which almost certainly means she was sick enough to be very contagious. There will be more cases. Potentially a lot of them.


I wasn't following this tread for a while but I think there are quite a few good news since last month.

Even if ebola virus is killing less people in Africa than hamburgers and soda in the US it's still quite a threat. But the very good news is that a treatment seems to work.
Actually, ebola virus might be the first positive side effect of terrorism wars. Until the mid-2000s ebola was nothing but a virus killing poor Black Africans, which means far from enough to finance the research for a cure.
But the fear of a terrorist use of the virus (against western countries) financed many research programs to find a cure and, we're very close to get it.

Most probably Africans will continue to die of ebola but we won't. The world is back to perfection, we are safe!


KestrelZ wrote:

According to the CDC, 108 pediatric deaths occurred in the USA from 2013-2014 from influenza. This does not count adults that died from it.

I'm not trying to scar people, just trying to shed perspective on matters.

Ebola is a very painful and frightening virus, yet people should not panic and head for the doomsday shelters yet.

We DO need to strengthen efforts to assist Africa in their crisis. We also have to keep perspective in order to live a balanced life rather than survive by huddling in a bomb shelter.

Influenza figures are hard to get, but on average influenza kills around 20k people in the U.S. annually. The highest recorded year was 49k, the lowest around 2600.

As far as Africa, in 2012 malaria killed 500k. Or, looking at worldwide issues, also in 2012 1.6 million people worldwide died of aids/hiv related illness.

So yes, the ebola panic is due more to it being a scary foreign illness that the 24 hour news cycle can hype. If we can get functional medical infrastructure in place in the affected countries, we can stop the spread. Nigeria did it.


Scythia wrote:
KestrelZ wrote:

According to the CDC, 108 pediatric deaths occurred in the USA from 2013-2014 from influenza. This does not count adults that died from it.

I'm not trying to scar people, just trying to shed perspective on matters.

Ebola is a very painful and frightening virus, yet people should not panic and head for the doomsday shelters yet.

We DO need to strengthen efforts to assist Africa in their crisis. We also have to keep perspective in order to live a balanced life rather than survive by huddling in a bomb shelter.

Influenza figures are hard to get, but on average influenza kills around 20k people in the U.S. annually. The highest recorded year was 49k, the lowest around 2600.

As far as Africa, in 2012 malaria killed 500k. Or, looking at worldwide issues, also in 2012 1.6 million people worldwide died of aids/hiv related illness.

So yes, the ebola panic is due more to it being a scary foreign illness that the 24 hour news cycle can hype. If we can get functional medical infrastructure in place in the affected countries, we can stop the spread. Nigeria did it.

Though frankly, Ebola is scary. Those others kill a lot more people right now, but they've been doing that for a long time and they're not going to spike.

Ebola's numbers are low, but it's potentially a fast moving disease with a very short doubling time (on the order of weeks at the moment). Unlike those others, it's still very localized and contained, which is why it's numbers are so low. If that changes and it absolutely will if we don't get on the ball in West Africa, it could easily be a top contender next year. The potential for those numbers to go up is huge.

And the more it spreads within Africa, the harder it will be to contain there. The US and other better off nations will probably do well, but it could easily become established in other poor parts of the world and at that stage it will be very hard to maintain any kind of quarantine.

In other words, stopping it now in West Africa is vital. It would have been much cheaper and easier a few months ago, but it's still doable.

The Exchange

nurse returning from working with ebola in sierra leone inconvenienced by compulsory quarantine once back in usa

Because somehow her medical protocols were better than the doctor who caught ebola...


yellowdingo wrote:

nurse returning from working with ebola in sierra leone inconvenienced by compulsory quarantine once back in usa

If you think being imprisoned for three weeks for a disease you provably don't have is an "inconvenience,"....


yellowdingo wrote:
LazarX wrote:
If Nigeria, of all places, can contain this, we should manage.
Nigeria is a commonwealth nation with socialized medicine. The usa is still struggling with equality of healthcare.

It is much smaller and easier to manage. Socialism is not the answer every time

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