Ebola on the horizon?

[T.Lex]

WHO guidance on symptoms:

Sudden onset of fever, intense weakness, muscle pain, headache and sore throat are typical signs and symptoms.

.. The patients become contagious once they begin to show symptoms.

WHO | Frequently asked questions on Ebola virus disease

So. I think that means symptoms are symptoms. One of the symptoms that is also a symptom is a fever. I guess there might be symptoms that aren't really symptoms - like the subjective nature of "sore throat." But a fever is either a fever or it is not a fever. It can be a high fever or a low fever, but it is still a fever. If it is a fever.

She apparently had a fever. That's a symptom. That makes her contagious. Maybe not VERY contagious. Duncan's friends/family were around him when he had a fever but haven't been infected (yet).

Is it too much to ask that they just be honest about this stuff?

ETA: Another FAQ response:

If a person has been in an area known to have Ebola virus disease or in contact with a person known or suspected to have Ebola and they begin to have symptoms, they should seek medical care immediately.

Vinson should have gone someplace immediately (I imagine the Cleveland Clinic probably has isolation areas).

In another link, CDC now says fever of 100.4 is symptomatic. I don't know if that is new or just always been a rule that no one really knew about.

 

[ArcadiaGP]

CDC Director:

https://twitter.com/DrFriedenCDC/status/517351074236076032

"Bottom line on #Ebola in US: we will stop it in its tracks. CDC has 9 person team doing thorough contact tracing & followup."

Nine people. Nine.



Also: http://thescoopblog.dallasnews.com/...r-two-days-while-treating-ebola-patient.html/

 

[T.Lex]

Dude's an idiot.

The "stop it in its tracks" line is getting way old.

 

[dusty88]

WHO guidance on symptoms:



WHO | Frequently asked questions on Ebola virus disease

So. I think that means symptoms are symptoms. One of the symptoms that is also a symptom is a fever. I guess there might be symptoms that aren't really symptoms - like the subjective nature of "sore throat." But a fever is either a fever or it is not a fever. It can be a high fever or a low fever, but it is still a fever. If it is a fever.

She apparently had a fever. That's a symptom. That makes her contagious. Maybe not VERY contagious. Duncan's friends/family were around him when he had a fever but haven't been infected (yet).

Is it too much to ask that they just be honest about this stuff?

I think the honest answer is "uncertainty". A person is far more likely to be shedding virus with more symptoms, but it's possible when they have a fever.

What concerns me is that she tested positive the next day. That means she already had enough virus or antibody (depending which test they used) to test positive, which makes it more likely she was potentially shedding virus.

In the past. Ebola wasn't often cultured from sweat. Saliva is another "maybe".

 

[Expat]

I heard today on the radio (and maybe this was mentioned earlier up thread), of the 4 hospitals set up for handling this disease there are a total of 11 beds... total...

 

[ArcadiaGP]

Josh Earnest: Travel restrictions for West Africa still off the table | Twitchy

 

[ArcadiaGP]

CDC: You Can Give—But Can’t Get—Ebola on a Bus

Now, I'm not the world's most paranoid guy, but I don't want blood dripping out each eye...from ebola. Eb-eb-eb-E-bo-lah...

Decent video


[video=youtube;Z2KBfynW09I]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2KBfynW09I&feature=youtu.be[/video]

 

[jedi]

I heard today on the radio (and maybe this was mentioned earlier up thread), of the 4 hospitals set up for handling this disease there are a total of 11 beds... total...

If you get ebola and live can you get it again?

 

[singlesix]

If you get ebola and live can you get it again?

Supposedly not for the next ten years ... don't ask me why they said ten years

 

[Expat]

If you get ebola and live can you get it again?

I assume not since they are draining our one US survivor of blood to get antibodies to give to some of these others.

 

[ghuns]

If you get ebola and live can you get it again?

Not the strain that you had, at least for a while. Survivors in Africa can make some good money working for medical providers doing the higher risk jobs associated with caring for, and disposing of, Ebola victims.

 

[bwframe]

Questions from hospital to new patients;
Have you been to West Africa?
Have you been to Liberia?
Have you been to Dallas?

Why was that in purple?

Good point!

 

[HeadlessRoland]

I heard today on the radio (and maybe this was mentioned earlier up thread), of the 4 hospitals set up for handling this disease there are a total of 11 beds... total...

You don't even want to know how bad things really are. I'd tell you but then you'd rush to the store and steal my bleach. Okay, I'll tell you.

Negative-pressure truly-isolated rooms/wards are incredibly difficult to engineer and expensive to build. Most hospitals don't even have one, or at most have one or two. In my locality, both major hospitals - and I know this for a fact - could literally not handle more than roughly fifteen to eighteen patients needing total negative-pressure isolation, between the three campuses of both systems. It's simply incredibly complicated to have airlocks and antechambers and HEPA filtration for each and every patient room - expensive, complicated, and generally unnecessary when not undergoing epidemics/pandemics - so they usually aren't built. To the extent that they are, it's an absolute minimum quantity, and not a feature all or even most hospitals have. Those in charge simply never thought and thus never planned that it might ever become necessary to house more than a very few infectious-disease patients in one geographic locality. We are, in every sense of the word, completely unprepared for anything of this potential order of magnitude - not in any sense is virtually any hospital in this country ready for something like this. Depending on how this is handled - even if people don't die, even if Ebola doesn't burn in the population in a wide spread - it could cripple infrastructure in this country and bring the economy to a grinding halt (even moreso than Obama hopes and strives for each day).

As for not being able to catch Ebola for a certain period of time, it's because if you fight it and live, presumably you have lots of very fresh antibodies which would smack it down were you to encounter it again. Ten years is just a guess based on relative immunity in well-studied organisms like tetanus and why you only need a tetanus booster every so often.

 

[ghuns]

Questions from hospital to new patients;
Have you been to West Africa?
Have you been to Liberia?
Have you been to Dallas?

Have you been to Cleveland?
Have you been on a Frontier Air flight?
Did you eat the fish or the chicken?
Do you like gladiator movies?

 

[HeadlessRoland]

I assume not since they are draining our one US survivor of blood to get antibodies to give to some of these others.

Your post just reminded me that we're literally living the plot of my favorite movie:

 

[printcraft]

I assume not since they are draining our one US survivor of blood to get antibodies to give to some of these others.

Imagine being that guy if it works and stuff really goes south? He'll be hunted down and bled dry.

 

[nra4ever]

I'd sell my antibodies to the highest bidders. No freebies!

 

[Darral27]

I didn't read through all the pages here but I have been somewhat keeping up.
question I have is what is going to happen during flu season? From what I have read initial symptoms look a lot like the flu. Are hospitals going to have to treat everybody coming in with a fever as if they have Ebola? With the possible spread having gone so far already it seems reasonable to think when flu season comes around full force Ebola will also be going pretty strong.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

Your post just reminded me that we're literally living the plot of my favorite movie:

Any movie that starts a Smith & Wesson M76 is great in my book.

 

[HeadlessRoland]

Israeli Biopharmaceutical Company Offers To Produce Ebola Drug ZMapp In Large Quantities | LibertyNEWS.com

This is bound to rustle the jimmies of the usual suspects.