I don't want to panic anyone, but Ebola may be coming to a town near you

[Skyy God]

At least we won't have to slog through another 7-9 Chiefs season....

Now there are American casualties.

Not in Gaza, and not on the ill-fated Malaysian airliner. Now there are American casualties in another war very far away so maybe, goddammit, somebody should start paying more attention to it.

Kent Brantly, 33, an American doctor who has been working in Liberia since October for the North Carolina-based aid organization Samaritan's Purse, is receiving intensive medical treatment after he was infected with Ebola, according to a spokeswoman for the group. Melissa Strickland said Brantly, who is married and has two children, was talking with his doctors and working on his computer while being treated. A second U.S. citizen, Nancy Writebol, also has tested positive for Ebola, Samaritan's Purse said. Writebol is employed by mission group SIM in Liberia and was helping a joint SIM/Samaritan's Purse team treating Ebola patients in Monrovia. Writebol is married with two children, the organization said. "Both of them tonight are in stable condition," Ken Isaacs, Samaritan Purse's vice president of programs and government relations, said Sunday. "But they are not out of the woods yet."

That's some serious Damien-at-Molokai hero stuff right there, still being at your computer while you're being treated for one of the most vicious diseases on the planet. Other medical professionals, alas, are not as lucky.

A Liberian government official said Sunday that one of that country's highest-profile doctors has died in what the World Health Organization (WHO) calls the largest recorded outbreak of the disease...The first Liberian doctor to die of the disease was identified as Samuel Brisbane. He was working as a consultant with the internal medicine unit at the country's largest hospital, the John F. Kennedy Memorial Medical Center in Monrovia. Brisbane, who once was a medical adviser to former Liberian President Charles Taylor, was taken to a treatment center on the outskirts of the capital after falling ill with Ebola and died there, said Tolbert Nyenswah, an assistant health minister. He said another doctor who had been working in Liberia's central Bong County also was being treated for Ebola at the same center where Brisbane died. The situation "is getting more and more scary," Nyenswah said.

Yes, you could say that. The disease is now in both Nigeria and Liberia, and not in the backwater places any more, either, but in the capital cities. The ones with millions of people. And airports.

Over the weekend, health officials in Nigeria raced to stop the spread of Ebola after a man sick with the disease arrived on a flight in Lagos, Africa's largest city with 21 million people. He later died. The man's ability to board an international flight raised new fears that other passengers could carry the disease beyond Africa because of weak passenger inspection and the fact that Ebola's initial symptoms can resemble those of other illnesses. Isaacs said in an interview that "where it gets really scary" is that the disease, which was previously seen only "in very remote, small villages in Africa" is now being contracted by people in the capital cities of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone. "Now the disease has been introduced into the big urban areas with millions of people," he said. "In the big cities, people can get on an airplane and fly out." Isaacs does not believe this outbreak his peaked. "I think the worst is yet to come," he said. "I hope I'm wrong."

Meanwhile, the local customs aren't helping a lot, either.

Koroma, 32, a resident of the densely populated Wellington district, had been admitted to an isolation ward while blood samples were tested for the virus, said Sidi Yahya Tunis, a health ministry spokesman. The results came back on Thursday. "The family of the patient stormed the hospital and forcefully removed her and took her away," Tunis said. "We are searching for her."

Jesus save us. I don't mean to sound like a cultural imperialist -- although I seriously doubt that the people in rural Sierra Leone are acting out of what they know about the Tuskegee experiments, or what happened in Guatemala in the 1940's -- but snatching an Ebola patient out of the hospital doesn't sound like a very good way to fight the disease, family networks notwithstanding. (The purloined patient eventually died.) This thing is one airplane flight away from being an international catastrophe, but there is no boom-boom, and without boom-boom, there is no news. However, you know, Americans are getting sick now. Hey, Wolf! Over here?

http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politic...Ebola_Outbreak

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Mr. Laz

until they do

then you will move the goal posts again

I haven't moved anything, laz. All I've said is that we won't have here what is happening in West Africa. I fully expect to see a dozen or so cases here.

[Donger]

(CNN) -- The second Dallas health care worker who was found to have the Ebola virus should not have boarded a commercial jet Monday, health officials say.

Because she had helped care for Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan, and because another health worker who cared for Duncan had been diagnosed with Ebola, the worker was not allowed to travel on a commercial plane with other people, said Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The worker had a temperature of 99.5 Fahrenheit (37.5 Celsius) before she boarded her flight, he added.

Health care workers who had been exposed to Duncan were undergoing self-monitoring. They were allowed to travel but not on a commercial plane with other people, Frieden said.

Moving forward, the CDC will ensure that no one else in such a situation travels outside of a closed environment, he said.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Mr. Laz

although getting aids or ebola on your keyboard would have some serious upside

I don't see the upside of that.

[kepp]

Originally Posted by Donger

There's no way Ebola doesn't end up killing tens of thousands of Americans on the low side

That wasn't me.

[Discuss Thrower]

Originally Posted by kepp

That wasn't me.

Nope, but don't let that stand in the way of someone's narrative.

[kepp]

Originally Posted by Donger

(CNN) -- The second Dallas health care worker who was found to have the Ebola virus should not have boarded a commercial jet Monday, health officials say.

Because she had helped care for Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan, and because another health worker who cared for Duncan had been diagnosed with Ebola, the worker was not allowed to travel on a commercial plane with other people, said Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The worker had a temperature of 99.5 Fahrenheit (37.5 Celsius) before she boarded her flight, he added.

Health care workers who had been exposed to Duncan were undergoing self-monitoring. They were allowed to travel but not on a commercial plane with other people, Frieden said.

Moving forward, the CDC will ensure that no one else in such a situation travels outside of a closed environment, he said.

I'm sure glad the CDC put her in a time-out and asked her not to travel. I bet they shook a finger at her in shame after it happened. "Don't make us pull this pandemic over!" For sure, the hospital and (at least some of) the care workers have shown ZERO common sense, but the lack of oversight and control is shocking, even for this administration.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by kepp

That wasn't me.

My apologies. I stand corrected.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Discuss Thrower

Nope, but don't let that stand in the way of someone's narrative.

Do I really have a narrative? You certainly do.

[Discuss Thrower]

As much as I can't believe I'm saying this, but you can't claim incompetence from the executive branch at this time unless you have issue with whom was selected as head of the CDC.

However you can claim incompetence with the status quo of the health care industry as a whole in that nurses are in short supply, overworked and are not trained for the type of decontamination protocols necessary to stave off ebola. As well as find an issue with America's working culture that leads people to drag their asses to work whilst sick for fear of being fired at worst or miss out on career advancement at best.

[Discuss Thrower]

Originally Posted by Donger

Do I really have a narrative? You certainly do.

You tell me; I didn't try to pin a "conspiratard" comment to a poster who staked the middle ground in an argument.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Discuss Thrower

You tell me; I didn't try to pin a "conspiratard" comment to a poster who staked the middle ground in an argument.

And I did? Who?

[kepp]

Originally Posted by Discuss Thrower

As much as I can't believe I'm saying this, but you can't claim incompetence from the executive branch at this time unless you have issue with whom was selected as head of the CDC.

However you can claim incompetence with the status quo of the health care industry as a whole in that nurses are in short supply, overworked and are not trained for the type of decontamination protocols necessary to stave off ebola. As well as find an issue with America's working culture that leads people to drag their asses to work whilst sick for fear of being fired at worst or miss out on career advancement at best.

I think the lackadaisical attitude of the CDC is what has allowed this to get as far as it has. The rank-and-file care worker won't have the knowledge or training to handle these cases safely. It's the CDC's job to prepare the healthcare system for these situations.

[L.A. Chieffan]

So how exactly does not one, but two nurses who are working at a high level hospital with first world resources and procedures end up infected? Dallas is in the United States still isn't it?

[loochy]

Originally Posted by L.A. Chieffan

So how exactly does not one, but two nurses who are working at a high level hospital with first world resources and procedures end up infected? Dallas is in the United States still isn't it?

They didn't wear protective equipment for the first two days that they cared for ebola-man.

That involved lots of barf and spray poop.

[L.A. Chieffan]

Why weren't they?