Ebola outbreak - general thread #3

[SStarr33]

Looking at his FB, it seems he was in Monrovia, Liberia:

https://www.facebook.com/ashoka.mukpo

The reports and photos on his FB regarding Ebola are shocking and heartbreaking! Mukpo went as well inside hospitals where Ebola was treated.

Thank you--I was wondering if it was Monrovia which made me wonder if Mukpo was cleaning out the car of someone related to the Duncan fiasco.

 

[SStarr33]

Since when are ER patients responsible for diagnosing themselves?

The hospital had been trained to be on the alert for patients from certain parts of West Africa presenting flu like symptoms. Not told to listen for the key word Ebola.

Actually, according to a video with Rachel Maddow (can't post, since she is political), yes, they were trained for the keyword ebola:

"the hospital had just gone through a drill to learn how to deal with the possibility of an ebola case. Even though the whole state had just had its entire health dept certified on how to deal with ebola and the individual hospital had just had a drill to learn how to deal with this....."

Of course, she does not tell the part about him lying because she is political

You can go to youtube and search Rachel Maddow--Texas ebola case marred by missteps

 

[Yoda]

I do believe he lied. There is 0% chance, MOO, that he was unaware of the ebola crisis. They went to three hospitals and were turned away because they were full. It had to have crossed his mind, "what if she had ebola?" Also, I find would find it hard to believe that his relatives in the US were not checking on him, relaying their concern for him, and encouraging him to come to the US.

JMO

 

[SStarr33]

Sacra didn't have Ebola again.

Correct, but they thought he might.

 

[SStarr33]

I disagree. All the info that has been published says that he mentioned that he had just come from West Africa, and the hospital did not take the information into account. Can you please provide a link for your statement?

Please refer to my original reply.

 

[SStarr33]

Yikes:

Ebola researcher says he would not rule out possibility that the virus spreads through air in tight quarters

'There are too many unknowns here,' a virologist says of how Ebola may spread

Ebola researcher says he thinks there is a chance asymptomatic people could spread the virus

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-ebola-questions-20141007-story.html#page=1

 

[SStarr33]

There are some people who work in this hospital who are posting on the reddit ebola thread and I read about this last night. Didn't want to post all of it because I was not sure if they were telling the truth, but it looks like they were and, actually, there is even worse stuff than this. I highly recommend NOT reading it before you try to go to sleep.

Spanish nurse’s Ebola infection blamed on substandard equipment

Staff at Madrid’s Carlos III hospital say protective suits do not meet WHO standards as second nurse undergoes tests for virus

Staff at the hospital told El País that the protective suits they were given did not meet World Health Organisation (WHO) standards, which specify that suits must be impermeable and include breathing apparatus. Staff also pointed to latex gloves secured with adhesive tape as an example of how the suits were not impermeable and noted that they did not have their own breathing equipment.

Staff at the hospital said waste from the rooms of both patients was carried out in the same elevator used by all personnel and, in the case of the second patient, the hospital was not evacuated.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/oct/07/ebola-crisis-substandard-equipment-nurse-positive-spain

 

[Redux]

Respectfully, I disagree. The truth, be it one way or the other, does matter. He lied about not having contact with a sick person before boarding the plane and that was wrong. But there is a big difference between lying because he didn't think he was sick and he just wanted to cut corners to get here to see his fiance or lying because he knew he was sick and he didn't care who he infected because he wanted to get here for treatment no matter what and to he** with anyone he infected along the way.

Knowing the difference would help to know his intent, if there was any.

Thing is, those links state that the healthcare form on leaving Liberia asked if he had been cared for an Ebola patient or touched a body in an affected area. Not whether he had been around any sick people in general. So the posters who are saying that he lied about being around anyone sick are technically wrong, because he wasn't asked that question, according to those links. For him to have outright right lied, he would have had to know or suspect the pregnant lady had Ebola. We can debate whether he knew till the cows come home, but there is no concrete evidence that he knew and so we can still only speculate whether he lied on the healthcare forms in Liberia.

Thank you for pointing this out. I made that error in my post above but it's too late to go back and edit it.

 

[Redux]

Yikes:

Ebola researcher says he would not rule out possibility that the virus spreads through air in tight quarters

'There are too many unknowns here,' a virologist says of how Ebola may spread

Ebola researcher says he thinks there is a chance asymptomatic people could spread the virus

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-ebola-questions-20141007-story.html#page=1

From the article:

"At this point there is zero risk of transmission on the flight," Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said after a Liberian man who flew through airports in Brussels and Washington was diagnosed with the disease last week in Dallas.

Sorry, but never say never dude or you're likely to be eating crow!

Even if asymptomatic people aren't a risk, what about that short time frame between when they've moved into being symptomatic and when they're so ill they aren't mobile? Some say that by the time a person is symptomatic, they are so sick they're not going to want to be out in public and so won't be exposing people, but we know Duncan was out in public when he had a fever and vomiting, etc.

 

[SCHMAE]

From the article:



Sorry, but never say never dude or you're likely to be eating crow!

Even if no one on the plane got it, that would not mean there was zero RISK. That would be there was plenty of LUCK.

 

[SStarr33]

From the article:



Sorry, but never say never dude or you're likely to be eating crow!

That guy is beyond irresponsible. He is still talking about taking temperatures at the airport. IMO, he needs to be FIRED.

 

[Ladylub]

Even if no one on the plane got it, that would not mean there was zero RISK. That would be there was plenty of LUCK.

Their zero risk is driving me insane. We all might have been zero risk had he not lied, had the hospital not majorly screwed up, had unprotected police and health officials not go into the apartment, and had the men not cleaned up the vomit without protection. I think we are very lucky that no one has gotten sick thanks to all the incompetent people that had their hands in this.

 

[WideOpen]

Yes, I am a person who never remembers dreaming but this am, I was shocked awake to be having an "ebola" dream.

What is really bothering me is the response of our country, or lack of preparedness. I am a patriotic person and love this country. I am more than disappointed and disgusted.

The Obama administration is talking about ramping up screening of travelers who come from Ebola-infected countries.

They'll question travelers about where they have been and take their temperatures.

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/eb...ma-ready-ramp-ebola-airport-screening-n219811

JMO

 

[nightwatch]

Saw this this morning. So far I'm able to practice keeping my mouth shut on him coming to do whatever he thinks he can do. I'm sure that will change once he tries to speak but as long as I can hold out it will be a good thing.

Move over I'm sitting next to you [emoji18] disabling my keyboard app.

ciao

 

[Redux]

......

Spanish nurse’s Ebola infection blamed on substandard equipment

Staff at Madrid’s Carlos III hospital say protective suits do not meet WHO standards as second nurse undergoes tests for virus

Staff at the hospital told El País that the protective suits they were given did not meet World Health Organisation (WHO) standards, which specify that suits must be impermeable and include breathing apparatus. Staff also pointed to latex gloves secured with adhesive tape as an example of how the suits were not impermeable and noted that they did not have their own breathing equipment.

......

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/oct/07/ebola-crisis-substandard-equipment-nurse-positive-spain

Snipped by me.

This is what is concerning to me about the potential of this outbreak. Frieden and others are saying that it will be easily contained in the U.S. because of our superior medical infrastructure etc., but what about all the other countries in the world? Do they have what we have in terms centralized disease control, isolation procedures, hospital facilities? For every country that is advanced, there is likely another that is not so much.

How many other countries will be able to contain it once an infected person arrives from Africa? And when it happens, we're not looking at just worrying about who's coming here from Africa, but every other country as well.

 

[SStarr33]

From the article:




Even if asymptomatic people aren't a risk, what about that short time frame between when they've moved into being symptomatic and when they're so ill they aren't mobile? Some say that by the time a person is symptomatic, they are so sick they're not going to want to be out in public and so won't be exposing people, but we know Duncan was out in public when he had a fever and vomiting, etc.

Exactly!! That is even mentioned in the article and is just common sense:

CDC officials also say that asymptomatic patients cannot spread Ebola. This assumption is crucial for assessing how many people are at risk of getting the disease. Yet diagnosing a symptom can depend on subjective understandings of what constitutes a symptom, and some may not be easily recognizable. Is a person mildly fatigued because of short sleep the night before a flight — or because of the early onset of disease?

Moreover, said some public health specialists, there is no proof that a person infected — but who lacks symptoms — could not spread the virus to others.

"It's really unclear," said Michael Osterholm, a public health scientist at the University of Minnesota who recently served on the U.S. government's National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity. "None of us know."

Russell, who oversaw the Army's research on Ebola, said he found the epidemiological data unconvincing.

"The definition of 'symptomatic' is a little difficult to deal with," he said. "It may be generally true that patients aren't excreting very much virus until they become ill, but to say that we know the course of [the virus' entry into the bloodstream] and the course of when a virus appears in the various secretions, I think, is premature."

It is beyond offensive to me that the CDC is spewing this stuff that anyone with common sense knows cannot be true.

 

[jjenny]

Correct, but they thought he might.

It was a precaution. They said from the start they don't believe he had a relapse.

 

[SStarr33]

Found this link in a comment at the LA times story. It has driven me crazy how the CDC says ebola cannot be transmitted via the air when it is common sense that secretions can be aerosolized:

http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-pers...ers-need-optimal-respiratory-protection-ebola

COMMENTARY: Health workers need optimal respiratory protection for Ebola

 

[effervescent]

Found this link in a comment at the LA times story. It has driven me crazy how the CDC says ebola cannot be transmitted via the air when it is common sense that secretions can be aerosolized:

http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-pers...ers-need-optimal-respiratory-protection-ebola

COMMENTARY: Health workers need optimal respiratory protection for Ebola

They could do a better job of explaining the difference between airborne transmission and droplet, but technically they are correct. It is not airborne.
For airborne, a pathogen needs no vehicle (mucus, blood, water,) in order to spread. It is able to go through the air all on its own - it does not need to be aerosolized into a liquid in order to be spread.
For droplet, a pathogen has to have that liquid (again, muscus, blood, water...) in order to spread. It is not exhaled into the air, but instead sent out into the air via a liquid (aerosol).

With droplet, there is a chance you'd know you were exposed. With airborne, there is no way to know until you show up positive for whatever you were exposed to (say chicken pox, or TB).

 

[jjenny]

What family members are in Texas? Is the out-of-state family coming to Texas to meet with Jackson? It just irks me that Louise and her family are considered family members.

When is Al Sharpton going to arrive?

I believe Duncan has a sister living in US? Also he has a son.
I presume Jackson is not going to meet with the family members who are under quarantine, but what do I know.
If they are going to develop symptoms, the highest likelihood is about now. If he wants to meet with them, the way this has been going, he will likely be allowed to. Considering CDC apparently decided one of close Duncan's contacts should be allowed back to work, it certainly doesn't appear they are prevented from meeting new people.