Languish.org

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 23, 2014, 04:48:59 PM
This could be quite bad, if they don't get on top of it, soon.

QuoteDeadly Ebola virus reaches Guinea capital Conakry - UN

An outbreak of the Ebola virus - which has already killed 59 people in Guinea - has reached the capital Conakry, the UN's children agency has warned.

Unicef said the haemorrhagic fever had spread quickly from southern Guinea, hundreds of kilometres away.

Scores of cases have been recorded since the outbreak began last month. There is no known cure or vaccine.

It is spread by close personal contact with people who are infected and kills between 25% and 90% of victims.

Symptoms include internal and external bleeding, diarrhoea and vomiting.
Sprawling city

"At least 59 out of 80 who contracted Ebola across the West African country have died so far," a Unicef statement quoted by the AFP news agency.

"Over the past few days, the deadly haemorrhagic fever has quickly spread from the communities of Macenta, Gueckedou, and Kissidougou to the capital Conakry."

Conakry is a sprawling port city, where up to two million people currently live.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 23, 2014, 04:56:59 PM
Yikes! The thing about Ebola is that it usually burns itself out because it's too fast and deadly and thus fails to spread too far. If it actually gets established in a major city we could see a disaster on the scale of the epidemics that decimated the New World.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 23, 2014, 04:56:59 PM
Yikes! The thing about Ebola is that it usually burns itself out because it's too fast and deadly and thus fails to spread too far.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on March 23, 2014, 07:38:42 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 23, 2014, 04:56:59 PM
Yikes! The thing about Ebola is that it usually burns itself out because it's too fast and deadly and thus fails to spread too far.

The rural and remote African villages and communities that have seen Ebola over and over deal with it the same way they have for centuries;  when a villager is seen with the early symptoms, they wind up confined to their hut.  Food and water is left at the hut entrance for them every day, and if they recover, good for them;  but the day after the food and water is no longer touched, it's time to burn down the hut. 

That's what keeps Ebola at bay, and has worked for centuries: proactive, communal and localized public health awareness.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 23, 2014, 04:56:59 PM
Yikes! The thing about Ebola is that it usually burns itself out because it's too fast and deadly and thus fails to spread too far. If it actually gets established in a major city we could see a disaster on the scale of the epidemics that decimated the New World.

Quote from: Fate on March 23, 2014, 11:39:39 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 23, 2014, 04:56:59 PM
Yikes! The thing about Ebola is that it usually burns itself out because it's too fast and deadly and thus fails to spread too far. If it actually gets established in a major city we could see a disaster on the scale of the epidemics that decimated the New World.

Meh. Since the initial 1967 outbreak Ebola and Marburg have only killed 3000 people. Ebola doesn't spread quickly because it requires direct contact with the host's fluids to become infected. You don't need Outbreak style spacesuits to prevent spread. Gloves and gown are enough.

It'd be much more contagious if it spread via a fecal-oral route like polio or respiratory droplets like influenza.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on March 23, 2014, 07:38:42 PM
That's what keeps Ebola at bay, and has worked for centuries: proactive, communal and localized public health awareness.

Quote from: derspiess on March 24, 2014, 08:34:02 AM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on March 23, 2014, 07:38:42 PM
That's what keeps Ebola at bay, and has worked for centuries: proactive, communal and localized public health awareness.

And a massive federal bureaucracy overseeing it all.

Quote
Virus in Guinea capital Conakry not Ebola

Tests on the suspected cases of deadly Ebola virus in Guinea's capital Conakry are negative, health officials say.

On Sunday, United Nations officials said that the virus had spread to the capital, a port city of up to two million, from remote forests in the south, where some 61 people have died.

The government has sent out text messages, urging people to stay calm and wash their hands with soap.

Ebola is spread by close contact and kills between 25% and 90% of victims.

There is no known cure or vaccine.

Symptoms include internal and external bleeding, diarrhoea and vomiting.
.....

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 24, 2014, 08:45:43 PM
If it's not Ebola it could be an unknown hemorrhagic fever.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on March 24, 2014, 09:16:44 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 24, 2014, 08:45:43 PM
If it's not Ebola it could be an unknown hemorrhagic fever.

Edbola.  Uncontrollable shitting from the ass.

QuoteCanadian man in hospital with Ebola-like virus

A man is in hospital in Canada with symptoms of a haemorrhagic fever resembling the Ebola virus, a health official has said.

The man had recently returned from Liberia in the west African region, currently suffering a deadly outbreak of an unidentified haemorrhagic fever.

He is in isolation in critical condition in Saskatoon, the largest city in Saskatchewan province.

A provincial medical official said there was no risk to the public.

Dr Denise Werker, the province's deputy chief medical officer, declined to say how long the man had been in Africa but said he only fell ill after returning to Canada.

She said that was in line with the profile of common deadly haemorrhagic fever viruses Lassa fever and Ebola, which have an incubation period of up to 21 days.

She said the people most at risk were healthcare workers who do not protect themselves from contact with the patient's bodily secretions.

"There is no risk to the general public," she said. "We recognise that there is going to be a fair amount of concern and that is why we wanted to go public with this as soon as possible."

A virus resembling Ebola has struck in Guinea, with cases also reported in Liberia.

As many as 61 people have died of the disease in the remote forests of southern Guinea.

But health officials in the Guinean capital, Conakry, have said the virus is not Ebola.

In Saskatchewan, Dr Werker said the man's diagnosis had not yet been confirmed and that a laboratory in Winnipeg was testing a biological specimen from the man.

There is no drug treatment for Ebola, although Lassa can be treated with the drug Ribavirin.

Quote from: Zanza on March 25, 2014, 01:51:55 AM
Is Madagascar next?

Quote from: Malthus on March 25, 2014, 07:56:18 AM

Quote from: Zanza on March 25, 2014, 01:51:55 AM
Is Madagascar next?

Madagascar closed its port today ... game over.  :P

Quote
Ebola Outbreak 'Tip of the Iceberg,' Experts Say
By Maggie Fox


An "out of control" outbreak of Ebola in West Africa that's being called the deadliest ever is far from over and it's likely to get worse before it gets better, experts predict.

And health workers who have been fighting the outbreak, which spans three countries and has killed more than 300 people, say they are certain many cases are going unreported as they see gruesome infections, dangerous myths and people fleeing the virus, potentially spreading it further.

"This is the tip of the iceberg," said Robert Garry, a microbiology professor at the Tulane University School of Medicine who's been leading relief and investigation efforts in Sierra Leone for the Viral Hemorraghic Fever Consortium.

Dr. Mwayabo Kazadi, from the health unit for Catholic Relief Services, agreed that many cases could go uncounted and undiagnosed in the region, where Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia come together.

"When you don't have a proper health system in place, it is pretty difficult," Kazadi said.

Garry says team members arrived in at least one village to find it deserted, and the body of an Ebola victim left unattended in a house. It's not hard to imagine what happened, but it makes it impossible to track down people who might have been infected and get them to hospitals for what care can be provided, and to prevent them from infecting others.

A Doctors Without Borders official said Friday that the outbreak was out of control.

And the numbers make it clear this is the biggest outbreak yet of Ebola since the virus was first identified in 1976. The virus, which causes a particularly nasty form of hemorrhagic fever, has killed 337 people out of 528 infected.

"This is the biggest outbreak we have ever actually seen of Ebola," Kazadi said. "It's the biggest both in numbers and in terms of geography," Garry agreed.

The biggest outbreak affected 425 people in Uganda in 2000, killing 224 of them.

Ebola is spread in bodily fluids, and the worst stages of the disease make that frighteningly easy. "People are throwing up. They have diarrhea," Garry said. Patients can develop tiny blood hemorrhages on their skin and in their eyes.

At least a dozen women were infected by a healer, probably as they washed and kissed her body when she died of Ebola and they were preparing her for her funeral. The case illustrates just why this outbreak is so difficult to fight.

The healer, who used snakes as part of her practice, made some frightening and dire predictions from her death bed. "She said she was going to release the snakes and said anybody who saw the snakes would die the way she did," Garry said.

This frightened some of the people in her village, and they attacked some volunteers from Garry's team, throwing rocks at their vehicle.

Garry's back in the U.S. for a few days trying to scrape up funding to buy protective gear for health care workers. The WHO and other groups are also providing such gear, but it's getting spread thin.

If workers start re-using gloves, gowns or goggles, they could end up spreading the virus. There's no cure and no vaccine, and the outbreak is killing 60 percent of its victims.

Volunteers are trying to get the word out about how the virus is spread, but it's tricky getting the message right.

"People have been resisting the idea that it was just not some type of curse or spirit. Or that it's people trying to keep them from eating bush meat," Garry said.

One suspicion was that people initially got Ebola by eating bush meat — apes, monkeys, bats, and rodents slaughtered for food. That's how experts now believe the AIDS virus first started circulating among people and it's possible Ebola originated there, too.

But now it's spread mostly person-to-person, Garry said. "The only thing that people hear is 'Don't eat bushmeat.' It just gets people riled up. It's not a useful message."

The porous borders in the area make things difficult, also. People, many of them in the same ethnic groups, pass freely from one country to another.

Genetic testing makes it clear this particular Ebola outbreak is being caused by a local strain that arose in West Africa. Ebola had only been seen in central Africa before, but the discovery suggests that the virus had been circulating undetected before. Hemorrhagic fevers are common in Africa — Garry's team was originally in Sierra Leone to study and fight another virus, one that causes Lassa fever.

"We're probably finding (Ebola) now because we are looking for it," he said.

Bats are another suspected source. Bats carry hundreds of viruses and carry antibodies to Ebola, which suggests they can be infected. Bat meat could be one source, but so could bat spit.

"It's mango season. The bats are eating the mangoes and the people are eating the mangoes," Garry said.

It's not an unusual idea. Researchers tracking Middle East Respiratory Syndrome virus or MERS are also checking the theory that fruit-eating bats may spread that virus in their saliva.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on June 22, 2014, 07:20:31 PM
DOOM!

QuoteIt is spread by close personal contact with people who are infected and kills between 25% and 90% of victims.

Quote from: Berkut on June 23, 2014, 09:06:26 AM

QuoteIt is spread by close personal contact with people who are infected and kills between 25% and 90% of victims.

[/size]


It kills between 25 and 90%?


Does that make any sense at all? How can you have a range of a percentage?

Quote from: Berkut on June 23, 2014, 09:06:26 AM

QuoteIt is spread by close personal contact with people who are infected and kills between 25% and 90% of victims.

[/size]


It kills between 25 and 90%?


Does that make any sense at all? How can you have a range of a percentage?

Quote from: CountDeMoney on June 23, 2014, 09:21:06 AM

Quote from: Berkut on June 23, 2014, 09:06:26 AM

QuoteIt is spread by close personal contact with people who are infected and kills between 25% and 90% of victims.

[/size]


It kills between 25 and 90%?


Does that make any sense at all? How can you have a range of a percentage?

That's just poor reportage.  The research community pretty much considers a mortality rate of 50%+ as Mucho Muerto Supremo, and doesn't really mince numbers to 100% after that.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on June 23, 2014, 10:19:45 AM
I always preferred the Stones.

QuoteSpanish Health Authorities Activate Health Alert Over Possible West African Ebola Case In Valencia
By Matthew Bennett | on Google+ | June 25th, 2014
Ebola in Spain News Spanish Healthcare & Medicine

NEWS: A man from Guinea Conakry is in isolation in the La Fe hostpital in Valencia, eastern Spain, with a suspected case of Ebola. There are contradictory stories about how it was discovered.

Regional health authorities in Valencia activated their infectious disease protocols on Monday night after the man, who is "resident in Europe" according to a Spanish Health Ministry spokeswoman, was admitted to hospital with Ebola-like symptoms.

Data from the Center for Disease Control in the United States shows this spring's Ebola outbreak in West Africa to have so far infected 599 people, 362 of whom have died, a 60% fatality rate.

On Monday June 23, a Civil Guard agent at passport control at Valencia airport noticed the man did not look well and called the airport's first aid team, who then warned the Health Ministry's Foreign Healthcare section, a spokeswoman for Spanish airport authorities AENA in Valencia told The Spain Report.

In contradiction to the version offered by airport authorities, the Spanish Health Ministry in Madrid and regional health authorities in Valencia insist the man's symptoms were noticed on board the airplane by the crew and that he was first isolated on board the aircraft.

The Health Ministry spokesman first told The Spain Report that the patient had arrived not on a flight from Morocco but on a boat, later confirming that the man had: "a high fever, dizziness, shakes and a cough".

36 hours after the man was admitted to hospital, Spanish health officials are still waiting for the results of the tests.

Doctors Without Borders in Spain told The Spain Report that the Ebola test the organisation uses in field conditions in Guinea normally takes six hours to process, or up to 24 hours if there are transport problems from remote locations.

Spanish health authorities in Madrid and Valencia denied the tests in Spain were taking longer than necessary, and that Spanish doctors were following their own protocols. "We are not hiding anything", said a spokeswoman for La Fe Hospital, "but I don't know why it is taking so long".

Valencian regional health minister, Manuel Llobart said today that: "We really hope that the results of the test are negative, but if it is positive, the protection of the population is guaranteed", according to Spanish news agency EFE.

EFE also reports Mr. Llobart as saying the man was bleeding from his nose.

The ministry would not confirm the flight number, airline, time of arrival, number of flight crew or the total number of passengers on board, but the Valencia airport webpage shows just one company, Royal Air Maroc, operating a flight between Casablanca and Valencia.

Regional health authorities in Valencia issued a statement yesterday saying the man's symptoms: "could correspond to said disease, which has NOT yet been confirmed or denied. We are waiting for the test results", and asking for: "prudence and to not cause social alarm over the suspicion of a possible disease".

The patient is currently in a "clinically stable" condition "in isolation".

A spokeswoman for the World Health Organisation told The Spain Report that the WHO was in touch with the Spanish authorities and that they were following updates in the Spanish press, but that they do not have any further information at this point.

There are five species of the Ebola virus and the World Health Organisation says case outbreaks have a fatality rate of up to 90%. The virus spreads through human-to-human transmission and physical contact with infected surfaces or mucous substances.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on June 25, 2014, 08:19:52 AM
Maybe he's just faking it, like the rest of the Spaniards during World Cup season.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on June 23, 2014, 10:30:48 AM
Ooh, mortuary burn from Malthus!

Quote from: Malthus on June 25, 2014, 10:47:30 AM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on June 23, 2014, 10:30:48 AM
Ooh, mortuary burn from Malthus!

http://www.chacha.com/gallery/3364/who-chose-these-awesome-tombstones

QuoteCrisis meeting as Ebola death toll rises in West Africa

Healthcare workers from Medecins Sans Frontieres in Gueckedou, Guinea - 28 March 2014 The WHO has sent dozens of experts to West Africa in recent months to try and contain the outbreak

The World Health Organization (WHO) is hosting an emergency meeting in Ghana on Wednesday on the deadly Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

Health officials from 11 countries are meeting in Accra to discuss how to put an end to the crisis.

More than 400 people have died in what has now become the worst Ebola outbreak in history.

Most of the deaths have been in Guinea but there are an increasing number of cases in Liberia and Sierra Leone.

Health ministers from the three affected countries will join officials from neighbouring Ivory Coast, Mali, Guinea Bissau and Senegal, as well as Uganda, DRC, Gambia and hosts Ghana.

Tulip Mazumdar, the BBC's global health correspondent, says all of these countries are considered at risk from Ebola, which is one of the deadliest viruses on the planet.

On Tuesday, the WHO said the death toll in West Africa had risen to 467, with 68 of the deaths recorded since 23 June.

The number of cases had risen from 635 on 23 June to 759, a 20% increase, the WHO added.

Experts on the ground say one of the key reasons for the continuing spread is the fear and denial around the illness.

Some communities are said to be hiding loved ones who get sick, instead of taking them to hospital, increasing the risk of the virus spreading.

The WHO has already sent more than 150 experts into West Africa over the last few months to try and contain the outbreak.

But it says political commitment is needed from the region itself to ensure this virus is wiped out soon.

"Containment of this outbreak requires a strong response in the countries and especially along their shared border areas," it said in a statement.

Most of the deaths have been centred in the southern Guekedou region of Guinea, where the outbreak was first reported in February.

But health officials say the regions porous borders have allowed infected people to carry the disease into other countries.


    Symptoms include high fever, bleeding and central nervous system damage
    Fatality rate can reach 90%
    Incubation period is two to 21 days
    There is no vaccine or cure
    Supportive care such as rehydrating patients who have diarrhoea and vomiting can help recovery
    Fruit bats are considered to be the natural host of the virus

QuoteHundreds of West Africans could be carrying the deadly Ebola virus and not know it, potentially infecting hundreds more, as cash-strapped governments and overwhelmed aid agencies struggle to contain the virus's spread.

At least 1,500 people have not yet been traced who are known to have come into contact with others confirmed or suspected to be infected with the haemorrhagic fever, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) told The Telegraph.

Many more could be moving freely in the three countries battling the virus, Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, but fear of the illness and mistrust of Western medicine means they refuse to come forward to speak to doctors.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on July 09, 2014, 01:39:52 AM
844 cases, 518 dead

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/08/ebola-50-new-cases-25-deaths-sierra-leone-liberia-guinea

QuoteThe last remaining strains of smallpox are kept in highly protected government laboratories in Russia and at the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta. And, apparently, in a dusty cardboard box in an old storage room in Maryland.

The CDC said today that government workers had found six freeze-dried vials of the Variola virus, which causes smallpox, in a storage room at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland last week. Each test tube had a label on it that said "variola," which was a tip-off, but the agency did genetic testing to confirm that the viruses were, in fact, smallpox.

It's unclear whether or not the strains are still virulent, the agency told me, but they were kept in a cold room, where the virus should have been able to survive.

According to the agency, the virus was freeze dried and sealed in melted glass and the samples have been in storage since the 1950s. The Food and Drug Administration had been using the building where the samples were found since 1972, six years before smallpox killed its last person.

"The vials appear to date from the 1950s. Upon discovery, the vials were immediately secured in a CDC registered select agent containment laboratory in Bethesda," Benjamin Haynes, a CDC spokesperson, told me. "There is no evidence that any of the vials labeled Variola have been breached, and onsite biosafety personnel have not identified any infectious exposure risk to lab workers or the general public."

So, that's good news. Haynes said that the CDC did emergency genetic testing of the strains to confirm that they were smallpox. It's currently doing further tests to determine whether the strains are still virulent, which could take up to two weeks.

"After completion of this testing, the samples will be destroyed," he said. He said the FBI is currently helping the CDC investigate how the original samples were prepared and why they were stored in the building.

The CDC notified the World Health Organization and said that WHO witnesses will be invited to watch the destruction of the virus.

"The laboratory was among those transferred from NIH to the FDA in 1972, along with the responsibility for regulating biologic products," Haynes said. "The FDA has operated laboratories located on the NIH campus since that time. Scientists discovered the vials while preparing for the laboratory's move to the FDA's main campus." 

If you're not sure why this is such a big deal, it's because smallpox killed some 300 million people in the 20th century alone, and is the only human infectious disease that has ever been eradicated—a process that took the greater part of the 19th and 20th centuries. WHO declared smallpox eradicated back in 1979, but two strains of the virus are kept for further testing in extremely secure labs in Atlanta and in Russia.

Those strains were supposed to be destroyed multiple times—first in 1993 and then in 1999. But researchers in both Russia and the United States wanted to hold onto the virus to continue researching it. Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services, said that keeping the virus was important because there could be unknown stocks of the virus out there somewhere. Little did she know, some of those stocks happened to be in a government building:

"Although keeping the samples may carry a minuscule risk, both the United States and Russia believe the dangers of destroying them now are far greater," she wrote in a New York Times op-ed in 2011. "It is quite possible that undisclosed or forgotten stocks exist.

"Also, 30 years after the disease was eradicated, the virus' genomic information is available online and the technology now exists for someone with the right tools and the wrong intentions to create a new smallpox virus in a laboratory," seh continued. "Destroying the virus now is merely a symbolic act that would slow our progress and could even stop it completely, leaving the world vulnerable."

WHO, meanwhile, has said there's little point in doing further research on smallpox. Haynes told me that CDC researchers regularly and actively work with the virus in Atlanta.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on July 09, 2014, 09:51:43 AM
Knowing the federal government and its inventory systems, the box was probably mislabeled "small box."

QuoteDeath Toll From Ebola Surges in West Africa, Prompting Alarm

By RICK GLADSTONEJULY 15, 2014

New cases and deaths from the Ebola virus outbreak in the West African countries of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, already the worst ever recorded for the disease, have surged by double-digit percentages in the past week, the World Health Organization reported Tuesday, with no sign of a slowdown. Alarmed Ivory Coast border authorities blocked hundreds of Ivorian refugees in Liberia from returning, news agencies reported.

In its latest update, the W.H.O. said the number of suspect, probable and confirmed cases as of Saturday totaled 964, up about 14 percent from a week earlier. Deaths totaled 603, up about 16 percent from a week earlier. Half the deaths have been in Guinea.

"This trend indicates that a high level of transmission of the Ebola virus continues to take place in the community," the W.H.O. said in the update. "The respective ministries of health are working with W.H.O. and partners to step up outbreak containment measures."

The latest figures were reported as the W.H.O. helped complete a coordination center in Conakry, Guinea's capital, in an attempt to slow the spread of Ebola, a hemorrhagic fever with no known cure and a death rate that can reach 90 percent. The virus first appeared in 1976 near the Ebola River in the Democratic Republic of Congo and is believed to have been spread originally by fruit bats. Gorillas, chimpanzees, forest antelopes and porcupines can also spread the virus.

Despite the latest outbreak, the W.H.O. said it was not recommending any travel or trade restrictions in the three affected countries. Nonetheless, news agencies reported Tuesday that Ivory Coast had prevented 400 refugees who had fled to neighboring Liberia during the violent 2010-11 Ivorian political upheaval from re-entering the country. Agence France-Presse said Bruno Kone, an Ivorian government spokesman, had justified the move, quoting him as saying, "We cannot be lax in this area."

QuoteSierra Leone hunts Ebola patient kidnapped in Freetown

A hunt has been launched in Sierra Leone's capital, Freetown, for a woman with Ebola who was forcibly removed from hospital by her relatives.

Radio stations around the country are appealing for help to find the 32-year-old who is being described as a "risk to all".

She is the first Freetown resident to have tested positive for the virus.

Meanwhile, Nigeria's health minister has confirmed that a Liberian man has died of Ebola in Lagos.

According to the Reuters news agency, he collapsed on arrival in Lagos on Sunday and was taken from the airport and put in quarantine at a hospital in the Nigerian city.

Since February, more than 660 people have died of Ebola in West Africa - the world's deadliest outbreak to date.

It began in southern Guinea and spread to Liberia and Sierra Leone. The case in Nigeria is the first in Africa's most populous country.
Angry protesters

The virus kills up to 90% of those infected but if patients receive early treatment, they have a better chance of survival.

It spreads through contact with an infected person's bodily fluids.

Sidi Yahya Tunis, a spokesperson for Sierra Leone's ministry of health, said the King Harman Road Hospital was stormed by the Ebola patient's family on Thursday.

The BBC's Umaru Fofona in Freetown said the woman, who is an apprentice hairdresser, is a resident of the densely populated area of Wellington in the east of the city.

The Ebola cases in Sierra Leone are centred in the country's eastern districts of Kenema and Kailahun, just over the border from the Guekedou region of Guinea where the outbreak started.

Our reporter says there is increasing anger and confusion over the handling of the outbreak.

Police say thousands of people have taken to the streets of Kenema to protest - thronging to the town's hospital, which treats all Ebola cases in the district.

The father of a nine-year-old boy has told the BBC that his son was shot and injured by police as they tried to put down the angry demonstration, in which he says his son was not involved.

Our reporter says the police have not been able to confirm this as they say they are still busy with operational matters.

Nurses at Kenema hospital went on strike for a day on Monday after three of their colleagues died of suspected Ebola.

Earlier this week, it was announced that the doctor leading Sierra Leone's fight against Ebola was being treated for the virus.

On Thursday, the World Health Organization said that 219 people had died of Ebola in Sierra Leone.

QuoteNigeria government confirms Ebola case in megacity of Lagos

By Felix Onuah and Tom Miles

ABUJA/GENEVA Fri Jul 25, 2014 3:25pm EDT

(Reuters) - A Liberian man who died in Nigeria's commercial capital Lagos on Friday tested positive for the deadly Ebola virus, Health Minister Onyebuchi Chukwu said.

Patrick Sawyer, a consultant for the Liberian finance ministry in his 40s, collapsed on Sunday after flying into Lagos, a city of 21 million people, and was taken from the airport and put in isolation in a local hospital. Nigeria confirmed earlier on Friday that he had died in quarantine.

"His blood sample was taken to the advance laboratory at the Lagos university teaching hospital, which confirmed the diagnosis of the Ebola virus disease in the patient," Chukwu told a press conference on Friday. "This result was corroborated by other laboratories outside Nigeria."

However, at a separate press conference held by the Lagos state government at the same time, the city's health commissioner, Jide Idris, said that they were only "assuming that it was Ebola" because they were "waiting for a confirmative test to double check" from a laboratory in Dakar.

Paul Garwood, spokesman for the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva, said the U.N. health agency was also still waiting for test results.

"We're still waiting for laboratory-confirmed results as to whether he died of Ebola or not," he said.

It could not be immediately determined why there was a contradiction in the comments from central government and city officials.

If confirmed, the man would be the first case on record of one of the world's deadliest diseases in Nigeria, Africa's biggest economy and with 170 million people, its most populous country. Ebola has killed 660 people across Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone since it was first diagnosed in February.

Sawyer was quarantined on arrival and had not entered the city, a Nigerian official told Reuters.

"While he was quarantined he passed away. Everyone who has had contact with him has been quarantined," the official said.

Liberia's finance minister Amara Konneh said Sawyer was a consultant for the country's finance ministry.

"Our understanding is that the cause of death was Ebola," Konneh told Reuters.

The victim's sister had died of the virus three weeks previously, and the degree of contact between the two was being investigated by Liberian health ministry officials, he said.

Earlier on Friday, WHO spokesman Paul Garwood said: "I understand that he was vomiting and he then turned himself over basically, he made it known that he wasn't feeling well. Nigerian health authorities took him and put him in isolation."

Nigeria has some of the continent's least adequate healthcare infrastructure, despite access to billions of dollars of oil money as Africa's biggest producer of crude.

Some officials think the disease is easier to contain in cities than in remote rural areas.

"The fear of spread within a dense population would be offset by better healthcare and a willingness to use it, easier contact tracing and, I assume for an urban population, less risky funerary and family rites," Ian Jones, a professor of virology at the University of Reading in Britain, said.

"It would be contained more easily than in rural populations."

There have been 1,093 Ebola cases to date in West Africa's first outbreak, including the 660 who have died, according to the WHO.

(Reporting by Tom Miles; Additional reporting by Tim Cocks and Oludare Mayowa in Lagos, Kate Holtan in London, Clair MacDougall in Monrovia, Emma Farge in Dakar and Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva; Writing by Stephanie Nebehay and Tim Cocks; Editing by Susan Fenton and Sonya Hepinstall)

Quote from: mongers on July 25, 2014, 07:43:01 PM
Tim I read this 2-3 hours ago, but knew you'd be posting it, so gave you the 'honour' .

On subject, all in all, not a good situation.  :(

Quote from: jimmy olsen on July 25, 2014, 08:01:41 PM

Quote from: mongers on July 25, 2014, 07:43:01 PM
Tim I read this 2-3 hours ago, but knew you'd be posting it, so gave you the 'honour' .

On subject, all in all, not a good situation.  :(

Maybe it's time to change the title then? :contract:

Quote from: mongers on July 26, 2014, 05:51:15 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on July 25, 2014, 08:01:41 PM

Quote from: mongers on July 25, 2014, 07:43:01 PM
Tim I read this 2-3 hours ago, but knew you'd be posting it, so gave you the 'honour' .

On subject, all in all, not a good situation.  :(

Maybe it's time to change the title then? :contract:

OK.

Quote from: mongers on July 26, 2014, 05:51:15 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on July 25, 2014, 08:01:41 PM

Quote from: mongers on July 25, 2014, 07:43:01 PM
Tim I read this 2-3 hours ago, but knew you'd be posting it, so gave you the 'honour' .

On subject, all in all, not a good situation.  :(

Maybe it's time to change the title then? :contract:

OK.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on July 26, 2014, 10:19:23 AM
Wish ticker-tape was strong enough to strangle him.

Quote from: Grey Fox on July 27, 2014, 08:07:54 PM
You can't kill the news.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on July 27, 2014, 07:57:06 PM
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fhugefishtv.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2013%2F08%2FJapanese-Giant-Salamander.jpg&hash=cb4d703c886e596b9ed0f7d6e47db228360afcb3)

Quote from: Ed Anger on July 27, 2014, 08:31:33 PM

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on July 27, 2014, 07:57:06 PM
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fhugefishtv.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2013%2F08%2FJapanese-Giant-Salamander.jpg&hash=cb4d703c886e596b9ed0f7d6e47db228360afcb3)

Looks like one of my gallbladder attack bowel movements holding a giant salamander.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on July 27, 2014, 07:57:06 PM
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fhugefishtv.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2013%2F08%2FJapanese-Giant-Salamander.jpg&hash=cb4d703c886e596b9ed0f7d6e47db228360afcb3)

QuoteEbola: Germany accepts infected patient for treatment
As medical services across Europe are on high alert to prevent any risk of Ebola spreading here, a hospital in Germany accepts a patient with the virus
More than 670 people have died so far in West Africa, as doctors struggle to contain the deadliest outbreak of the virus in history.
The country of Liberia has closed most of its borders to prevent the spread of the disease.
But, amid speculation their patient may be one of the world's leading Ebola experts, doctors in Germany insist there is no risk of the infection spreading from him.
He will be kept in a special isolation ward behind three separate air locks. The air inside the ward will be kept at lower pressure than outside, so none can escape – even though it is not believed Ebola can be transmitted by air.
Doctors and nurses will wear complete protective bodysuits with their own oxygen supplies whenever in contact with him. The suits will be replaced and burned every three hours.
The extreme precautions are an indication of how feared the Ebola virus is. The disease is spread by direct contact of blood or bodily fluids, including sweat and saliva. It causes massive internal bleeding, and is deadly in up to 90 per cent of cases.
German doctors agreed to accept the patient after a special request from the World Health Organisation (WHO), but it is not certain he will be able to come to Germany, amid reports he may be too sick to travel.
The patient has not been named, but the confirmation he is a Sierra Leonean national has fuelled speculation he may be Sheikh Umar Khan, one of Africa's leading ebola experts, who was infected last week.
Dr Khan is one of a number of medics battling the outbreak in West Africa who have themselves become infected.
Samuel Brisbane, one of Liberia's most famous doctors, died a few days ago after contracting the disease while treating patients.
Kent Brantly, an American doctor, and Nancy Writebol, an American paramedic, are in serious condition after becoming infected while working at a mission hospital in Liberia.
Doctors working with Ebola patients are at high risk of infection, and both Dr Brisbane and Dr Khan are regarded as heroes in Africa for their work with those infected with the disease.
The latest outbreak began in Guinea in February, before spreading to Liberia and Sierra Leone. Last week the first case was reported in Nigeria, and there are fears it may have spread to the city of Lagos, home to some 21 million people.

Quote from: celedhring on August 01, 2014, 08:07:11 AM
The first thing I checked when "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" finished and they showed that map with the expansion of the epidemic, was to check if they got Madagascar.

QuoteExperts: Ebola Vaccine At Least 50 White People Away (http://www.theonion.com/articles/experts-ebola-vaccine-at-least-50-white-people-awa,36580/)

NEWS IN BRIEF • Science & Technology • World • Health • Disease • ISSUE 50•30 • Jul 30, 2014

CONAKRY, GUINEA—With the death toll in West Africa continuing to rise amid a new outbreak of the Ebola virus, leading medical experts announced Wednesday that a vaccine for the deadly disease is still at least 50 white people from being developed. "While all measures are being taken to contain the spread of the contagion, an effective, safe, and reliable Ebola inoculation unfortunately remains roughly 50 to 60 white people away, if not more," said Tulane University pathologist Gregory Wensmann, adding that while progress has been made over the course of the last two or three white people, a potential Ebola vaccination is still many more white people off. "We are confident, however, that with each passing white person, we're moving closer to an eventual antigenic that will prevent and possibly even eradicate the disease." Wensmann said he remained optimistic that the vaccine would not take considerably longer than his prediction, as waiting more than 50 white people for an effective preventative measure was something the world would simply not allow.

Quote from: alfred russel on August 01, 2014, 09:58:03 AM
I don't understand why people are being transported internationally for treatment. I'm sure that the risk is low and numerous precautions are being taken, but still....why not move the medical professionals to a secure site at the location of the patients instead?

Quote from: Barrister on August 01, 2014, 10:05:01 AM

Quote from: alfred russel on August 01, 2014, 09:58:03 AM
I don't understand why people are being transported internationally for treatment. I'm sure that the risk is low and numerous precautions are being taken, but still....why not move the medical professionals to a secure site at the location of the patients instead?

Because there are no secure sites in west Africa.

QuoteFormer Finance Ministry Consultant who died from Ebola had an 'Indiscipline' Encounter with Nurses after being told he had Ebola; He denied making contact with any suspected case and ran amok when Medical Authorities at the First Consultants Hospital in Lagos tried to contain him; A last-ditch Evacuation effort was blocked by ECOWAS and the Nigerian government, FrontPageAfrica has learned

Looking to get to the bottom of Sawyer's strange ailment on the Asky Airline flight, which Sawyer transferred on in Togo, hospital officials say, he was tested for both malaria and HIV AIDS. However, when both tests came back negative, he was then asked whether he had made contact with any person with the Ebola Virus, to which Sawyer denied. Sawyer's sister, Princess had died of the deadly virus on Monday, July 7, 2014 at the Catholic Hospital in Monrovia. On Friday, July 25, 2014, 18 days later, Sawyer died in Lagos.

The Center for Disease Control (CDC) recommends that the average incubation period for suspected cases or someone who has made contact with an Ebola patient is eight to ten days from exposure to onset of symptoms.  The range is from two to 21 days.  "That's why we recommend that contacts of an infected person go on a fever watch for 21 days," says Stephan Monroe, deputy director of CDC's National Center for Emerging Zoonotic and Infectious Diseases, at a briefing Monday.

'Against Medical Advice'

Since the first report surfaced in March, there have been more than 1,201 cases reported and unfortunately 672 deaths in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, the CDC says.  "This is the largest Ebola outbreak in history and the first in West Africa.  It's a rapidly changing situation and we expect there will be more cases in these countries in the coming weeks and months. The response to this outbreak will be more of a marathon than a sprint."

Back in Lagos, authorities at the First Consultants Hospital in Obalende decided that despite Sawyer's denial, they would test him for Ebola, due to the fact that he had just arrived from Liberia, where there has been an outbreak of the disease with more than 100 deaths.

The hospital issued a statement this week stating that Sawyer was quarantined immediately after he was discovered to have been infected with the deadly virus. In addition, a barrier nursing was implemented around Sawyer and the Lagos State Ministry of Health was immediately notified. Hospital authorities also requested the Federal Ministry of Health for additional laboratory test based on its suspicion of Ebola.

FrontPageAfrica has now learned that upon being told he had Ebola, Mr. Sawyer went into a rage, denying and objecting to the opinion of the medical experts. "He was so adamant and difficult that he took the tubes from his body and took off his pants and urinated on the health workers, forcing them to flee.

The hospital would later report that it resisted immense pressure to let out Sawyer from its hospital against the insistence from some higher-ups and conference organizers that he had a key role to play at the ECOWAS convention in Calabar, the Cross River State capital. In fact, FrontPageAfrica has been informed that officials in Monrovia were in negotiations with ECOWAS to have Sawyer flown back to Liberia.

A text message in possession of FrontPageAfrica from the ECOWAS Ambassador in Liberia, responding to a senior GoL official reads: Your Excellency, the disease control department of the Federal Ministry of Health just contacted me through the hospital now, insisting that Mr. Sawyer be evacuated for now. Pls advise urgently."

LUTH Lab positive on Ebola

First Consultants said that it then went further to reach senior officials in the Office of the Secretary of Health of the USA who assisted it with contacts at the Centre for Disease Control and W.H.O Regional Laboratory Centre in Senegal. According to the hospital, the initial results from LUTH laboratory showed a signal of possible Ebola virus, but required confirmation.

The First Consultants statement noted that it was able to obtain confirmation of Ebola virus disease, (Zaire strain) after working with the state, federal and international agencies. Sawyer was pronounced dead at 6:50 AM Nigeria time, on July 25 and all agencies were properly notified.

Once the case was officially confirmed, the hospital was temporarily shut down and in-house patients immediately evacuated. Sawyer's body was subsequently cremated under W.H.O guidelines and witnessed by all appropriate agencies, according to the hospital statement. "In keeping with W.H.O guidelines, the hospital is shut down briefly as full decontamination exercise is currently in progress. The re-opening of the hospital will also be in accordance with its guidelines", the hospital said.

In the aftermath of Sawyer's death, both federal and state authorities in Lagos have instituted measures to curb the spread of the disease and quarantining all those who came in contact with Sawyer.

In total, Sawyer reportedly came in direct contact with 59 persons, 44 of whom were at the hospital he was taken to when he fell ill, according to the Lagos State government. The Lagos state government clarified in a statement Monday that Ms. Obi-Nnadozie, Nigeria's Ambassador to Liberia was not among the 15 people at the airport who had had direct contact with Mr. Sawyer before his death as was initially believed.

Ashes Returned to Liberia

However, it has been reported that Sawyer came in contact with three ECOWAS officials – a driver, a liaison officer and a protocol officer. Also in the list are two nursing staff and five airport handlers.

Dr. Jide Idris, the Lagos State Health Commissioner, told a news conference this week that 20 per cent of those that came in contact with the deceased had been physically screened. "The private hospital (First Consultants Medical Centre) was demobilized and primary source of infection eliminated. The patient has been cremated and the ash will be transferred to the Liberian government whenever the need arises. Decontamination process in all affected areas has commenced," Dr. Idris said.

In the aftermath of Sawyer's death, diplomatic, ECOWAS and medical authorities here are baffled over Sawyer's deception, especially armed with new information that his sister, Princess had died of the deadly virus and his denial. Finance Ministry sources in Monrovia are in quiet murmur over what they feel was a letdown by Sawyer for not being forthcoming with his peers he worked with.

The ministry has since been temporarily shut down and those who came in contact with Sawyer are on a 21-day forced incubation monitoring process. "All senior officials coming in direct or indirect contact with Mr. Sawyer has been placed on the prescribed 21 days of observatory surveillance," the ministry said in a statement this week.

FrontPageAfrica has now learnt that Sawyer exhibited similar indiscipline behavior during his sister's stay at the Catholic Hospital in Monrovia where she was taken because he noticed she was bleeding profusely and was later found to be a victim of Ebola.

'Indiscipline' Sawyer, EJS Says

Sawyer was seen with blood on his clothing after his sister's death and had earlier demanded that she be placed in a private room. President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf cited indiscipline and disrespect as a key reason why Sawyer contracted the Ebola virus. She said his failure to heed medical advice put the lives of other residents across the nation's border at risk.

A disease which now claimed more than a hundred Liberians has now forced the Sirleaf-lead government to shut down the borders, schools and a host of other measures to ensure that the disease does not get out of hand, including a US$5 million initial contribution to begin the immediate implementation of this plan. "Our immediate strategy is to contain the spread, care for the afflicted with the goal of "No New Cases"," Sirleaf told the nation in an address Wednesday. FrontPageAfrica has learned that the Ministry of Health is requesting US$20 million to combat the disease.

In addition, the President has mandated that all non-essential staff, to be determined by the Minister or Head of Agency, are to be placed on a 30-day compulsory leave and Friday, August 1, is declared a non-working day and is to be used for the disinfection and chlorination of all public facilities.

"All borders that are to remain opened are to be directly supervised and controlled by the Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization whose duties it shall be, working with the assigned health authorities, to ensure strict adherence to announce preventive measures including preliminary testing for fever. Without exceptions, all schools are ordered closed pending further directive from the Ministry of Education. All markets at border areas including Foya, Bo Waterside, and Ganta are hereby ordered closed until further notice.

But despite the measures put in place by Liberia, the effect of Sawyer's 'indiscipline has already taken a toll. ASKY, the Pan-African airline ASKY on which Sawyer flew, has suspended all flights to and from Monrovia and Sierra Leone as has other regional carriers, Arik Air and Gambia Bird dealing a huge blow to commercial aviation.

Linger Questions Over Behavior

Back in Monrovia, Samaritan Purse, the U.S. missionary group helping to treat Ebola patients is scaling down, announcing Wednesday, plans to evacuate nonessential personnel given the five-month-old outbreak is worsening as the fate of two Americans infected with the Ebola hang in the balance on hope and prayers.

For Sawyer, questions are lingering over his behavior, both at the Catholic Hospital in Monrovia and the First Consultants in Lagos and what led him to behave the way he did. More importantly diplomatic observers here are puzzled over his demise: The timing and behavior. A few persons who spoke to Sawyer, including FrontPageAfrica reported that he sounded fine hours before his death. It is unclear what pushed him to the wall and why?

As for the other eight members of the delegation that flew to Lagos, along with Sawyer, diplomatic sources in Lagos confirmed to FrontPageAfrica Wednesday that they were all checked and told to report to the Ministry of Health in Monrovia upon their arrival. It is unclear how close they were to Sawyer or whether authorities in Monrovia have begun monitoring them as the clock ticks on the recommended 21-day incubation period.

QuoteThe deadly Ebola virus sweeping through West Africa continues to accelerate, according to numbers released Monday by the World Health Organization.

The virus has now claimed at least 887 lives, the WHO reported, with 163 new cases and 61 deaths in just two days.

The latest update indicates the disease is picking up speed, with the number of new infections surging by 33% over the last three-day report ending July 27, and three new cases reported in Nigeria, the latest country to be hit by the disease.

Of the four cases there, three were classified as "probable," and one was "suspected," the WHO said.

At least one of the newly reported cases in Nigeria was said to be a doctor who was treating Liberian-American Patrick Sawyer, 40, who fell ill on a flight from Liberia to Lagos on July 20, and was immediately quarantined upon arrival.

Efforts to confirm that Sawyer indeed died of Ebola have been hampered by couriers who are unwilling to transport the biological samples for secondary testing, the WHO said last week.

Sawyer, who became the first reported Ebola death in Nigeria and who was scheduled to fly to the United States soon to visit his family, raised major concerns that the virus could continue to spread quickly from major population centers like Lagos, the continent's largest city and home to 21 million people.

Last week, the WHO called the apparent spread of the disease into a fourth territory a "significant development in the course of this outbreak."

"This outbreak is moving faster than our efforts to control it," Dr. Margaret Chan, director-general of the World Health Organization, told leaders of four West African countries gathered in Conakry, Guinea, last week. "If the situation continues to deteriorate, the consequences can be catastrophic in terms of lost lives but also severe socioeconomic disruption and a high risk of spread to other countries."

In a press briefing Monday, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said the U.S. Centers for Disease Control were continuing to assist West African governments with the Ebola crisis, sending a "surge" of about 50 disease control specialists to the region starting last week.

In addition, Earnest said, authorities are screening travelers who are entering major U.S. airports from the affected countries and will quarantine them if necessary.

The CDC last week issued a travel advisory, warning travelers against non-essential travel to Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, for fear that travelers might get exposed to Ebola if they needed medical care in a hospital overwhelmed by patients.

Quote from: MadImmortalMan on August 06, 2014, 01:52:21 AM
Whose finance ministry was that guy working for? It's unclear.

QuoteJOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- The worst outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus in history could actually be much worse than the official death toll reflects. Already, the World Health Organization says 887 people have died, but a top doctor working at the heart of the outbreak in West Africa says many cases are going unreported.

The senior doctor, who works for a leading medical organization in Liberia, explained to CBS News' Debora Patta that what has helped set this outbreak apart from previous ones is the virus' spread in urban areas.

One of the epicenters of the disease is the Liberian capital of Monrovia, home to about a million people, or almost a quarter of the country's population.

The doctor, who spoke to CBS News on condition of confidentiality, said the disease is spinning out of control in Africa partly because it is extremely difficult to contain it in a sprawling, congested city center.

Meanwhile, the second American missionary infected with the virus was on her way back to the U.S. aboard a private jet Tuesday morning. Nancy Writebol was expected to reach the isolation unit at the Emory University Hospital later in the day. Her colleague, Dr. Kent Brantly, is already there. Both have been given an experimental serum to try and treat the disease, and hopes have been expressed over limited improvements in their condition.

Also, officials at a hospital in New York city said a man admitted to the facility Monday morning showing symptoms commonly associated with Ebola likely does not have the disease. He had traveled recently to West Africa, but a senior doctor at Mt. Sinai hospital told reporters the "odds are" his ailment is not linked to the deadly virus.

The official Ebola death toll jumped from 729 to 887 on Monday as Liberia confirmed dozens of new cases, but the doctor told us he believes the real number is at least 50 percent higher.

He put this down to the fact that people are scared to report Ebola cases, and have instead been hiding sick relatives and burying the still-contagious bodies of the dead in secret.

Traditions in parts of West Africa involve touching bodies before burial -- potentially putting unknown numbers of family and community members at risk.

The Liberian government has ordered that the corpses of all Ebola victims be cremated.

Two treatment centers have been set up in Monrovia; JFK Hospital, which is right in the middle of the city, and the ELWA (Eternal Love Wins Africa) center, run by a Christian charity, in a suburb not far from the center.

As Western aid organizations have pulled many workers out of West Africa, control of the treatment centers has been handed back to a large degree to the Liberian government, which has already said trying to control the outbreak is beyond its capability.

The international non-profit group Doctors Without Borders has issued a statement saying it is over-stretched and under-staffed on the ground in the region, and its workers still don't have a full grasp on all the infected areas.

The implication in that statement is that the disease could be quietly spreading in parts of Liberia and neighboring nations where victims' families have not yet come forward.

QuoteWest Africans Are Streaming Across the U.S. Southern Border Carrying the Ebola Virus (http://www.thecommonsenseshow.com/2014/08/03/west-africans-are-streaming-across-the-u-s-southern-border-carrying-the-ebola-virus/)

Whether the title of this article is true today, or tomorrow, this is a factual report. Given our border situation, there is nothing that can be done to keep Ebola out of the United States, even if all planes were grounded immediately.

One of the most often asked questions that I am receiving today centers on how I know that West Africans are coming into the United States in significant numbers.  Although some people will not believe something is so unless they see it on CNN, I am unequivocally stating that the arrival of Ebola through our southern border has already happened or is imminent.

What I have learned over the past three weeks about the path of Ebola into the United States is frightening and it is not being discussed anywhere in the main stream media.

To those who have asked me about how we know that Ebola-exposed West Africans are coming into the country, this article will answer this question.

Quote from: HVC on August 09, 2014, 01:01:14 AM
Well ebolas hit toronto. Or at least a guy who visited Nigeria has Ebola like symptoms.  I hope you're happy Tim <_< :P

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on August 09, 2014, 01:03:45 AM
Was nice knowing you, Hilario.  :cry:

Quote from: CountDeMoney on August 09, 2014, 08:07:36 AM

Quote from: HVC on August 09, 2014, 01:01:14 AM
Well ebolas hit toronto. Or at least a guy who visited Nigeria has Ebola like symptoms.  I hope you're happy Tim <_< :P

Don't worry, you'll know it if you've got it.  Until then, don't sweat it.  :P

The only person you can't tell the difference between hemorrhagic diarrhea and taking a dump is Ed.

Quote
...
The outbreak is getting worse.

It's already an unprecedented outbreak, CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden says, and the number

of infected and killed by Ebola will likely soon outnumber all other Ebola outbreaks in the past 32 years combined. Accordingto the CDC, there have already been more than 1,700 suspected and confirmed cases ofEbola in West Africa, and more than 900 deaths—numbers that Frieden latercalled"too foggy" to be definitive. Ken Isaacs, the vice president of Program and Government Relations for Samaritan's Purse, paintedan even bleaker picture.

According to the WorldHealth Organization, West Africa has counted1,711 diagnoses and 932 deaths, already, which could represent only a small fraction ofthe true number. "We believe that these numbers represent just 25 to 50 percent of what is happening," said Isaacs.

The atmospherein West Africa is "apocalyptic."

In a six-hour meeting with the president of Liberia last week, Isaacs saidworkers from Samaritan's Purse and SIM watched as the "somber" officials explained the gravity of the situation in theircountries, where hundreds lie deadin the streets. "It has an atmosphere of apocalypse," Isaacs said of the Liberia Ministry ofHealth's status updates. "Bodies lying in the street...gangs threatening to burndown hospitals. I believe this disease has the potential to be a national security risk for many nations. Our response has been a failure." Isaacs says that the epidemic is inciting panic worldwide that, in his opinion, may soon be warranted.

"We have to fight it now here orwe're going to have to fight it somewhere else."

Quote from: Baron von Schtinkenbutt on August 07, 2014, 09:10:48 AM
From the Mehmet Oz Institute of Medicine, Infectious Batshit Crazy division:

QuoteWest Africans Are Streaming Across the U.S. Southern Border Carrying the Ebola Virus (http://www.thecommonsenseshow.com/2014/08/03/west-africans-are-streaming-across-the-u-s-southern-border-carrying-the-ebola-virus/)

Whether the title of this article is true today, or tomorrow, this is a factual report. Given our border situation, there is nothing that can be done to keep Ebola out of the United States, even if all planes were grounded immediately.

One of the most often asked questions that I am receiving today centers on how I know that West Africans are coming into the United States in significant numbers.  Although some people will not believe something is so unless they see it on CNN, I am unequivocally stating that the arrival of Ebola through our southern border has already happened or is imminent.

What I have learned over the past three weeks about the path of Ebola into the United States is frightening and it is not being discussed anywhere in the main stream media.

To those who have asked me about how we know that Ebola-exposed West Africans are coming into the country, this article will answer this question.

For a nice, scientific round-up, try this (http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/ebola-outbreaks-science-versus-fear-mongering-and-quackery/).

Quote
Yet another plague panic (http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/yet-another-plague-panic/)

Thirty plus years in medicine has given me some perspective as has infectious diseases (ID). One of the almost TNTC cool things about ID is that infections, unlike the diseases of modernity, have been plaguing humans since before we were humans.

There is a sense, a usually unvoiced assumption, on the part of many people that we are supposed to be healthy, that our default mode is good health and that with the proper diet and attitude we could obtain the health that was ours before the fall.

I think not. I see no perfection in any human, except maybe my wife who would achieve perfection if only she liked beer and steak.

We are a hodgepodge of anatomic and physiologic compromises that allowed us to spread across the world. But if you like to read history, you realize that most of the time we died like flies from infections, trauma and other medical problems. The variations that allowed us to survive malaria or tuberculosis led to sickle crises and the metabolic syndrome. Even with evolution no good mutation ever goes unpunished.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on August 12, 2014, 10:02:07 AM
Languish rally point is Camp Anger.  Between his stash of MREs and all the Fancy Ketchup packs he's lifted from MickeyD's Happy Meals, we could ride out the Rapture.

Quote from: Ed Anger on August 12, 2014, 11:25:25 AM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on August 12, 2014, 10:02:07 AM
Languish rally point is Camp Anger.  Between his stash of MREs and all the Fancy Ketchup packs he's lifted from MickeyD's Happy Meals, we could ride out the Rapture.

I have 3000 rounds of 7.62 ammo. You fucks won't get over the wall.

Plus the twins will contribute with their Henry rifles.

Quote from: Ed Anger on August 12, 2014, 11:25:25 AM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on August 12, 2014, 10:02:07 AM
Languish rally point is Camp Anger.  Between his stash of MREs and all the Fancy Ketchup packs he's lifted from MickeyD's Happy Meals, we could ride out the Rapture.

I have 3000 rounds of 7.62 ammo. You fucks won't get over the wall.

Plus the twins will contribute with their Henry rifles.

Quote from: Ed Anger on August 12, 2014, 11:32:25 AM
I really doubt the ability of Languish Aspies to infiltrate anything.

OMG, THIS WALL ISNT PERFECTLY LEVEL
WHY DOES HE HAVE 2 SHEDS?
OH MY GOD, THERE IS A CROSS ABOVE HIS FRONT DOOR. RELIGIONWHARGARBL

Quote from: Ed Anger on August 12, 2014, 11:25:25 AM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on August 12, 2014, 10:02:07 AM
Languish rally point is Camp Anger.  Between his stash of MREs and all the Fancy Ketchup packs he's lifted from MickeyD's Happy Meals, we could ride out the Rapture.

I have 3000 rounds of 7.62 ammo. You fucks won't get over the wall.

Plus the twins will contribute with their Henry rifles.

Quote from: Valmy on August 12, 2014, 11:34:45 AM
We Languish posters are more than a match for the likes of you, 'Two Sheds'.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on August 12, 2014, 12:21:57 PM
Eat me, Ed.  Gonna scale that compound like Titus broke Jerusalem:  with anodized industrial shelving. :yeah:

Quote from: Ed Anger on August 12, 2014, 12:03:33 PM
Also, fuck you all. I wouldn't piss on you people if you was on fire.

Quote from: garbon on August 12, 2014, 06:41:41 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on August 12, 2014, 12:03:33 PM
Also, fuck you all. I wouldn't piss on you people if you was on fire.

I think I'd be rather insulted if you peed on me. :angry:

Quote from: garbon on August 12, 2014, 06:41:41 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on August 12, 2014, 12:03:33 PM
Also, fuck you all. I wouldn't piss on you people if you was on fire.

I think I'd be rather insulted if you peed on me. :angry:

Quote from: Malthus on August 13, 2014, 09:15:37 AM

Quote from: garbon on August 12, 2014, 06:41:41 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on August 12, 2014, 12:03:33 PM
Also, fuck you all. I wouldn't piss on you people if you was on fire.

I think I'd be rather insulted if you peed on me. :angry:

Worse if he set you on fire first.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on August 13, 2014, 10:40:25 AM
LOL, flaming. I GIT IT

Quote from: Ed Anger on August 12, 2014, 11:32:25 AM
I really doubt the ability of Languish Aspies to infiltrate anything.

OMG, THIS WALL ISNT PERFECTLY LEVEL
WHY DOES HE HAVE 2 SHEDS?
OH MY GOD, THERE IS A CROSS ABOVE HIS FRONT DOOR. RELIGIONWHARGARBL

QuoteLast week the Royal Festival Hall saw the first performance of a new symphony by one of the world's leading modern composers, Edward 'Two Sheds' Anger. Mr. Anger.

Quote from: Martinus on August 13, 2014, 01:20:12 PM
So speaking of which, today Polish media are talking about a Catholic-priest-led group of Polish high school humanitarian volunteers who just came back from Liberia. Noone would have noticed if one of the bunch didn't post on Facebook that he wonders if he should be worried.

When, in few years, we discuss how Europe fell to Ebola, you will know where it started. :frusty:

Quote from: garbon on August 15, 2014, 07:07:55 AM
I guess one shouldn't try and use an epidemic as leverage.

Quote from: Martinus on August 16, 2014, 04:12:04 AM

Quote from: garbon on August 15, 2014, 07:07:55 AM
I guess one shouldn't try and use an epidemic as leverage.

And here you go again applying first world morality to third world problems.

Quote from: Liep on August 17, 2014, 12:33:06 PM
White people in white plastic suits bringing death to the village, nah, not going to hurt the voodoo douches.

Quote from: alfred russel on August 17, 2014, 12:42:35 PMThe voodoo guys have been failing to cure anything for centuries. I don't see why failing to cure sick people should suddenly now discredit them.

Quote from: alfred russel on August 17, 2014, 12:42:35 PM

Quote from: Liep on August 17, 2014, 12:33:06 PM
White people in white plastic suits bringing death to the village, nah, not going to hurt the voodoo douches.

The voodoo guys have been failing to cure anything for centuries. I don't see why failing to cure sick people should suddenly now discredit them.

Quote from: Liep on August 17, 2014, 09:44:48 AM
They're not making it easier for themselves.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/report-armed-men-attack-liberia-ebola-clinic-freeing-patients/

QuoteEbola patients flee quarantine centre in Liberia as local mob on 'looting spree' steals bloody sheets, mattresses

Quote from: jimmy olsen on August 17, 2014, 08:47:33 PM

Quote from: Liep on August 17, 2014, 09:44:48 AM
They're not making it easier for themselves.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/report-armed-men-attack-liberia-ebola-clinic-freeing-patients/

The bolded calls for the most appropriate use of this emoticon ever :bleeding:

http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/08/17/ebola-patients-flee-quarantine-centre-in-liberia-as-local-mob-on-looting-spree-steals-bloody-sheets-mattresses/

QuoteEbola patients flee quarantine centre in Liberia as local mob on 'looting spree' steals bloody sheets, mattresses

Quote from: The Brain on March 23, 2014, 11:59:36 PM
How many people in Africa actually eat da poo poo?

Quote from: alfred russel on August 17, 2014, 08:54:50 PM
I'm not an epidemiologist, but there might be reasons communicable disease outbreaks so commonly occur in Africa.  :hmm:

QuoteWhat you need:
1. A face mask and gloves
2. Two bottles (50 ml up to 500 ml glass or plastic bottles) with caps
3. Clean water (mineral or tap water)
4. An Ebola sample: some spit or other disease product, such as blood, from a person infected with Ebola, or who is suspected sick with it.
Any small quantity will do, even a pinhead.
5. An alcoholic liquid, such as whisky, brandy, rum, etc.
6. Half an hour of your time.

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 06:09:20 AM
Meanwhile, in the rational and scientific West:

http://i100.independent.co.uk/article/yes-a-website-published-a-homeopathic-treatment-for-ebola-article--l1qdO2Pazg

QuoteWhat you need:
1. A face mask and gloves
2. Two bottles (50 ml up to 500 ml glass or plastic bottles) with caps
3. Clean water (mineral or tap water)
4. An Ebola sample: some spit or other disease product, such as blood, from a person infected with Ebola, or who is suspected sick with it.
Any small quantity will do, even a pinhead.
5. An alcoholic liquid, such as whisky, brandy, rum, etc.
6. Half an hour of your time.

Quote"Natural News was made aware of a blog post that seemed to recommend a highly questionable method related to Ebola prevention. The blog post has been removed pending further investigation, and the blogger is under review. Natural News does not condone any member of the public attempting to interact with Ebola, a very hazardous biological threat."

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 07:48:14 AM
That someone had that idea in the first place is idiotic, no?

Quote from: grumbler on August 21, 2014, 08:51:10 AM

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 07:48:14 AM
That someone had that idea in the first place is idiotic, no?

Not nearly as idiotic as implying that that sort of nonsense was in any way connected to "the rational and scientific West."  As a troll, that's weak sauce indeed.

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 08:55:39 AM
My point was that we are making fun of Africans with their voodoo doctors and shamans, but in the West we have our own share of lunatics. Or are you saying that homeopathy is not a Western phenomenon?

Quote from: Valmy on August 21, 2014, 09:37:20 AM

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 08:55:39 AM
My point was that we are making fun of Africans with their voodoo doctors and shamans, but in the West we have our own share of lunatics. Or are you saying that homeopathy is not a Western phenomenon?

I think we are rather horrified of the serious damage these sorts of beliefs are having in Africa with regards to the Ebola epidemic than laughing and doing blackface dances or whatever.  But we do the same when Westerners do horrible things like immunization skepticism or other dangerous anti-science nonsense that leads to tragedy.

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 09:39:21 AM
True, but I think we tend to view (or at least imply) the former being a rule and the latter an exception to the rule.

Quote from: Valmy on August 21, 2014, 09:41:08 AM

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 09:39:21 AM
True, but I think we tend to view (or at least imply) the former being a rule and the latter an exception to the rule.

Euros might.  I live in a country where something like 25% believe the world is 6000 years old.  No telling what idiotic stuff Americans will believe.

Quote from: Valmy on August 21, 2014, 09:41:08 AM

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 09:39:21 AM
True, but I think we tend to view (or at least imply) the former being a rule and the latter an exception to the rule.

Euros might.  I live in a country where something like 25% believe the world is 6000 years old.  No telling what idiotic stuff Americans will believe.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on August 21, 2014, 12:22:14 PM

Quote from: Valmy on August 21, 2014, 09:41:08 AM

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 09:39:21 AM
True, but I think we tend to view (or at least imply) the former being a rule and the latter an exception to the rule.

Euros might.  I live in a country where something like 25% believe the world is 6000 years old.  No telling what idiotic stuff Americans will believe.

They believe agencies like the CDC and FDA possess too much "regulatory zeal".  And they vote. 

QuoteEbola Patient Dr. Kent Brantly Says 'God Saved My Life'

Quote from: Valmy on August 21, 2014, 03:40:48 PM
God sent him back to lead us against Mordor.

Quote from: garbon on August 21, 2014, 01:02:02 PM
The FDA is generally dreadful.

Quote from: derspiess on August 21, 2014, 03:45:13 PM

Quote from: garbon on August 21, 2014, 01:02:02 PM
The FDA is generally dreadful.

They do like to try and fix problems that don't exist.

Quote from: garbon on August 21, 2014, 01:02:02 PM
The FDA is generally dreadful.

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 03:42:23 PM

Quote from: Valmy on August 21, 2014, 03:40:48 PM
God sent him back to lead us against Mordor.

To quote Mrs. Betty Bowers, America's Best Christian, thanking God for sparing you from a pestilence that has killed hundreds of others is a bit like sending a thank-you note to a serial killing for stabbing the family next door.  ;)

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 08:55:39 AM
My point was that we are making fun of Africans with their voodoo doctors and shamans, but in the West we have our own share of lunatics. Or are you saying that homeopathy is not a Western phenomenon?

Quote from: Razgovory on August 22, 2014, 10:18:22 PM
Grumbler has no problem rejecting science when he feel the need.

Quote from: LaCroix on August 22, 2014, 10:21:56 PM
he once made an argument against agnosticism so convincing it helped switch me over to atheism. :)

Quote from: LaCroix on August 22, 2014, 10:21:56 PM
:hmm:

grumbler is often right. he once made an argument against agnosticism so convincing it helped switch me over to atheism. :)

Quote from: grumbler on August 22, 2014, 05:05:49 PM

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 08:55:39 AM
My point was that we are making fun of Africans with their voodoo doctors and shamans, but in the West we have our own share of lunatics. Or are you saying that homeopathy is not a Western phenomenon?

I don't see how any "Western lunatics" are part of "the rational and scientific West." If they are considered lunatics, they probably aren't part of Western rationality or science.  Your argument seems to be 100% pure rhetorical bullshit.

Quote from: alfred russel on August 22, 2014, 11:56:43 PM

Quote from: grumbler on August 22, 2014, 05:05:49 PM

Quote from: Martinus on August 21, 2014, 08:55:39 AM
My point was that we are making fun of Africans with their voodoo doctors and shamans, but in the West we have our own share of lunatics. Or are you saying that homeopathy is not a Western phenomenon?

I don't see how any "Western lunatics" are part of "the rational and scientific West." If they are considered lunatics, they probably aren't part of Western rationality or science.  Your argument seems to be 100% pure rhetorical bullshit.

Martinus' meaning was quite clear to me. The "rational and scientific" adjectives applied to the west were alluding to the stereotype that western democratic societies are rational and scientific while places such as Africa are irrational and superstitious. In a tongue in cheek way, Martinus was pointing out that our societies have irrational and superstitious elements as well. The post was probably primarily motivated to share a ridiculous story he read.

Quote from: grumbler on August 23, 2014, 10:47:12 AM

Why am I not surprised that you found "meaning" in what you concede was a troll?  :lol:

Quote from: Martinus on August 23, 2014, 11:41:24 AM
It wasn't a troll. It was a sarcastic post but it was not meant to create a negative reaction in the reader - mainly on the account that an average Languish reader would be smart enough to interpret it the way alfred russell did.

The fact that only you, grumbler, thought otherwise, proves that my judgement was correct.

Quote from: viper37 on August 23, 2014, 11:49:48 PM
There's a correlation between cases and death?  How strange...

Quote from: garbon on August 22, 2014, 10:23:38 PM

Quote from: LaCroix on August 22, 2014, 10:21:56 PM
he once made an argument against agnosticism so convincing it helped switch me over to atheism. :)

:mellow:

Quote from: jimmy olsen on August 24, 2014, 06:17:45 AM
:rolleyes:

The slope of the graph in July-August is vastly higher than it was in April to May.

Quote from: viper37 on August 23, 2014, 11:49:48 PM
There's a correlation between cases and death?  How strange...

Quote from: Liep on August 24, 2014, 10:19:16 AM

Quote from: viper37 on August 23, 2014, 11:49:48 PM
There's a correlation between cases and death?  How strange...

Probably just spotty reporting from African health departments.

Quote from: Razgovory on August 24, 2014, 06:24:26 AMYeah, that's sad.

Quote from: LaCroix on August 24, 2014, 03:43:40 PM
@tim's graphs: why the hate? they're images showing the trend of reported cases.  :hmm:

Quote from: mongers on August 24, 2014, 03:49:11 PM
I not entirely convinced about the practice of flying infected Westerners back to their home countries.

I get the reason for the two Americans was different, as they were going to use the experimental drug on them. But now the British are flying back an infected national and somehow the isolation preparations don't look quite so thorough as the Americans used.

(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.bbcimg.co.uk%2Fmedia%2Fimages%2F77149000%2Fjpg%2F_77149537_77149536.jpg&hash=610da1978cd77e6b58ae4ce840d21ffd517ad772)


It is after all just one person, why run the risk when they can be treated 'in isolation', that is within the country where they caught Ebola.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on August 24, 2014, 03:52:10 PM

Quote from: LaCroix on August 24, 2014, 03:43:40 PM
@tim's graphs: why the hate? they're images showing the trend of reported cases.  :hmm:

(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dumpaday.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2013%2F01%2Fhaters-gonna-hate-300x264.jpg&hash=bc2cedab0e8b50f0f5c7efcb31dc91d89d412a86)

Quote from: mongers on August 24, 2014, 03:49:11 PM
I not entirely convinced about the practice of flying infected Westerners back to their home countries.

QuoteIt is after all just one person, why run the risk when they can be treated 'in isolation', that is within the country where they caught Ebola.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on August 24, 2014, 05:17:11 PM

Quote from: mongers on August 24, 2014, 03:49:11 PM
I not entirely convinced about the practice of flying infected Westerners back to their home countries.

Stop being silly.

QuoteIt is after all just one person, why run the risk when they can be treated 'in isolation', that is within the country where they caught Ebola.

Isolation there is not the same as isolation here.  Just like drinking water there is not the same as drinking water here.

QuoteSo trust me if a serious pandemic hits the UK, we're fucked because of the appalling personal hygiene some/many Brits inflict on others.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on August 24, 2014, 05:17:11 PM

Quote from: mongers on August 24, 2014, 03:49:11 PM
I not entirely convinced about the practice of flying infected Westerners back to their home countries.

Stop being silly.

QuoteIt is after all just one person, why run the risk when they can be treated 'in isolation', that is within the country where they caught Ebola.

Isolation there is not the same as isolation here.  Just like drinking water there is not the same as drinking water here.

QuoteEbola contacts in Africa go missing
By Elizabeth Cohen, Senior Medical Correspondent
August 25, 2014 -- Updated 2151 GMT (0551 HKT)


(CNN) -- Earlier this summer, Kelsey Mirkovic, a disease detective with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, entered a hut with her team in Gueckedou, Guinea, to speak with a man who had Ebola.

Their mission: to get the names of everyone he'd had contact with while he was ill, so that they could stop those people from spreading the disease.

"Who lives with you here? Who has eaten off the same plate as you? Who has bathed you and taken care of you?" they asked him.

Just his wife, the man answered.

Mirkovic and her team knew that wasn't true.

They knew he had children, and they knew that in West Africa, families and even neighbors eat off the same plate and bathe and care for sick people. They explained to the man how important it was to stop Ebola, and that his friends and family would be treated with respect.

Their pleas didn't work.

Mirkovic saw this scene play out over and over again. One of her colleagues at the CDC who's worked in Liberia says preliminary data shows they could be missing 40 to 60% of the contacts of known Ebola patients.

"This is one of the hardest parts of the response," said Dr. Brett Petersen, a medical officer with the CDC.

Mirkovic agrees. She says she understands why Ebola patients don't want to name names: There was a rumor going around the communities she worked in that getting on a contact list meant you would die -- and the deaths would happen in the same order as they appeared on the list.

"I understand they're scared," she said. "But it's very frustrating."

The Ebola outbreak in the West African nations of Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Nigeria has killed nearly 1,500 people. Just one contact left un-traced could go on to start a whole new line of Ebola transmission.

"It's like fighting a forest fire. If you leave behind even one burning ember, one case undetected, it could reignite the epidemic," Dr. Thomas Frieden, the director of the CDC, told reporters at a press conference earlier this summer.

"Contact tracing is a formidable challenge," said Dr. Margaret Chan, director-general of the World Health Organization. "In some areas, chains of transmission have moved underground. They are invisible. They are not being reported."

There's no solid number of how many contacts have gone missing. Petersen said the CDC arrived at the 40 to 60% number because in some communities, each sick person has only listed an average of two contacts -- and households commonly have five or six people.

Mirkovic, an officer with the CDC's epidemic intelligence service, said when she and her team felt patients weren't being honest, they would try to get information from neighbors or community leaders.

Sometimes that helped, and sometimes it didn't.

"Unfortunately, there's nothing we can do," she said. "We can't force them" to give contacts.

The World Health Organization estimates that 10% of contacts will go on to develop symptoms of Ebola. Occasionally, some of these Ebola cases go missing as well.

"Many families hide infected loved ones in their homes," according to a WHO press release issued Friday.

Mirkovic, who left Guinea in the end of July, said she felt that the situation might improve as health care workers gain more trust in the community.

But there's another problem with that: the availability of workers to follow up with contacts.

For example, in Sierra Leone, there are 2,000 contacts that need following, but the group Doctors without Borders says they've only been able to follow up with about 200 of them.

The group's teams in Sierra Leone and Liberia are "stretched to the breaking point" as the epidemic is "spiraling out of control," the group wrote in a press release.

QuoteOn Monday, Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the , arrived in Liberia to assess the Ebola outbreak. The situation "is overwhelming," he said.

The outbreak "really is a crisis and is affecting most if not all the counties in Liberia already," he told NPR from Monrovia, the capital city and first stop on a three-country visit. "This is absolutely unprecedented."

The CDC, Frieden said, "is working flat out on this, but this is huge and needs a global response. ... They need a lot of help from the world."

He emphasized that the toll is "far larger than has been recorded, not because they are trying to hide anything but because they are really overwhelmed by these numbers." Beyond this, he said, the cases "are increasing at an extremely quick rate, and this is very alarming."

As bad as the Ebola situation is, Frieden warned that the worst is yet to come. "Unfortunately, we are definitely not at the peak. It's going to get worse before it gets better," he said. "The real question is how much worse will it get? How many more people will be infected and how much more risk to the world will there be?"

...

Quote
Liberia: MSF's new Ebola centres already overwhelmed
Brice de le VingneMSF Director of Operations
27.08.2014

Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) is rapidly scaling up its operations in Liberia as the international response to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa continues to be chaotic and entirely inadequate.

In its first week, MSF's newest Ebola management centre – also known as ELWA3 – in the capital Monrovia, is already at capacity with 120 patients, and a further expansion is underway.

Meanwhile, in the north of the country, patients continue to flow into the newly rehabilitated Ebola management centre in Foya.

Serious lack of international leadership and coordination

"It is simply unacceptable that, five months after the declaration of this Ebola outbreak, serious discussions are only starting now about international leadership and coordination ," says Brice de le Vingne, MSF Director of Operations.

"Self-protection is occupying the entire focus of states that have the expertise and resources to make a dramatic difference in the affected countries. They can do more, so why don't they?"

The outbreak is spreading rapidly in Monrovia, overwhelming the few medical facilities accepting Ebola patients.

Emergency within the emergency

Much of the city's medical system has shut down over fears of the virus among staff members and patients, leaving many people with no healthcare at all, generating an emergency within the emergency.

"In the aftermath of an earthquake it would be unthinkable that there are so few places where women can safely deliver their babies, or where people can be treated for life-threatening conditions," says Lindis Hurum, MSF emergency coordinator in Monrovia.

"This is not only an Ebola outbreak – it is a humanitarian emergency, and it needs a full-scale humanitarian response."

The number of people seeking care at the newly constructed 120-bed centre in Monrovia, which opened on 17th August, is growing faster than the team can handle, both in terms of the number of beds and the capacity of the staff.

Patients are coming from nearly every district of the city. The staff are struggling to screen new arrivals, care for admitted patients, safely remove dead bodies and transport them to the crematorium...

Quote
"Ebola patients sent away"

Wednesday Aug 27 2014

"We have staff at the gate who do nothing but turn away people. This is not easy, because we don't know where they could go," said Karline Kleijer from MSF.

In West Africa, the Ebola epidemic is still spreading rapidly. To help patients MSF opened an emergency clinic last week in the Liberian capital Monrovia. After four days the clinic was full.

Currently there are about 200 patients in the clinic. According Kleijer that could have been more than 600 already if they had opened the doors. That can not be, because so many people infected with Ebola would be a danger to the employees of MSF.

Not administered
Because there are not enough emergency clinics and regular healthcare is not functioning most Ebola patients can not be administered. Therefore, the clinic expanded by another dozen beds. But even that is not enough. "We know that there are thousands of patients are walking in the street, infecting other people," says Kleijer.

According to her, there are not enough resources to detect the contacts of the patients. Thereforepeople who are also infected can not be identified . " The houses of patients must be decontaminated. It will not happen."

emotional
The work of the rescuers is heavy. It is very hot in the suits that they need and there is always the risk of getting infected with the virus.

Emotionally it is difficult, says Kleijer. "One of the worst moments is when people die when they arrive here. Often with family and then you get their grief too."

"But what I find the weirdest is that I talk with patients that I know they are dead a few days later."

QuoteBreaking: Nigeria Records New Ebola Death In Port Harcourt

The diplomat, who was part of the team who met with Patrick Sawyer in Lagos, flew to Port Harcourt, Rivers State for treatment, evading surveillance for the disease.

by Sahara Reporters Aug 27, 2014

A doctor, who secretly treated a diplomat who had contact with the index case, Liberian-American Patrick Sawyer, has died of Ebola in Nigeria.

The doctor, who has yet to be named, died on Friday. His wife has also taken ill and has been quarantined in Port Harcourt. Interestingly, the diplomat the doctor treated is still alive.

The diplomat, who was part of the team who met with Patrick Sawyer in Lagos, flew to Port Harcourt, Rivers State for treatment, evading Nigerian federal government surveillance for the disease. The late doctor then took him to a hotel for treatment.

As a result of this, 70 people have been quarantined. The doctor's hospital, Good Heart Hospital in Rivers State, has been shut down. The unnamed hotel, where the secret treatment took place, has also been shut down.

The Minister of Health and the Rivers State government are expected to make a statement on the incident tomorrow.

QuoteThe residents of the Mount Barclay Community within the Johnsonville Township, outside of Monrovia woke up on last Friday morning in total dismay when the remains of dead Ebola victims were reportedly seen, eaten by dogs, something reminiscent of the brutal civil war here, when dogs ate dead bodies on the streets.

The Liberian Government, through the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, buried some unaccounted-for corpses, suspected to have died from the Ebola Virus in that township few weeks ago.

The burial was done in a hurry at night following a standoff in the day between residence and the Ministry of Health burial team. The former had refused to grant the authority a piece of land to carry out the burial. The dogs, in their numbers, were seen pulling the bodies out of the shadowed grave and hastily eating them.

A resident, who spoke to the NewDawn, said that the action of the dogs has posed a serious health hazard to the entire Mount Barclay Community. Mr. Alfred Wiah noted that the dogs could easily spread the virus through further interactions with community dwellers.

According to Mr. Wiah, upon discovery of the dogs' behavior, some young men immediately contacted the Health Ministry, but to no avail. The young men also attempted to kill all of the dogs, but some escaped the scene, making the terrain very scaring for the residents.

He then expressed his disappointment in the manner and form the Liberian Government has treated the township. "We are very disappointed in the Health Ministry, especially the government that took an oath to defend and protect us; to see them act in such manner is unacceptable and we'll never allow the government come to bury any longer. They will be resisted by us because I think the government has failed to protect us- why bring Ebola bodies and mot bury them well,"? He explained in this paper.

According to him, some residents were deciding to leave the township in order to save their respective families, noting that since the incident occurred last Friday, the government has failed to clean the "mess"  by reburying the dead properly.  When the Commissioner of the Johnsonville Township, Mr. Melvin Bettie, was contacted yesterday, he confirmed the information, but added that his leadership was working with the community leadership to find a solution to the situation.

"I received the information already through the community chairman and I've sent a delegation there to see how we can revise the situation because it is embarrassing and it poses serious hazard to the community's dwellers," he said.

Quote from: alfred russel on August 28, 2014, 08:57:45 AM
Imagine Tim giving updates on the Black Death back in the day.

Quote from: The Brain on August 28, 2014, 12:38:39 PM
The WHO?

Quote from: alfred russel on August 28, 2014, 08:57:45 AM
Imagine Tim giving updates on the Black Death back in the day.

QuoteU.S. officials announce Ebola vaccine trial launch
Liz Szabo, USA TODAY 11:32 a.m. EDT August 28, 2014
The USA plans to begin testing an experimental Ebola vaccine next month, but even in the best case, it won't become available until next year.

U.S. health officials announced that the first human trial of an experimental Ebola vaccine will start next week, and that trials of other vaccines will follow close on its heels.

The vaccine trial will involve 20 healthy volunteers at the campus of the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md., with results expected by the end of the year, said Anthony Fauci, director of the NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease.

Although NIH has been developing the vaccine for more than a decade, the public health emergency in West Africa has pushed both the NIH and the Food and Drug Administration to accelerate its development, said NIH director Francis Collins, who said the agencies have taken "extraordinary measures" to launch the study as quickly as possible.

"This is a public health emergency that demands an all-hands-on-deck response," Fauci said.


USATODAY
Ebola outbreak could strike 20,000, WHO says
Fauci called the Ebola epidemic, which has killed half of the 3,000 people infected, an "uncontrolled outbreak" that needs to be contained using traditional methods, such as diagnosing cases, isolating those individuals to prevent them from infecting others, tracing their contacts and testing those people for the disease, as well.

Fauci has previously said that even an experimental vaccine would not be available until the middle of next year. The World Health Organization announced Thursday that it could take six to nine months to contain the current outbreak in Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Nigeria, and that the outbreak could grow to 20,000 cases.

In a significant announcement, Fauci said that drug giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) will co-develop the vaccine. That will make it much easier to "scale up" production of large quantities of the vaccine, if it proves effective, Fauci said. He noted that it has been difficult to produce enough doses of an experimental medication, called ZMapp, which is being developed by a small San Diego biotech company. That company has said that it has given away all of its doses and has none left.

Fauci stressed that the phase 1 study — the earliest of all human tests — is aimed at answering two very basic questions about the vaccine. Is the vaccine safe? Does it provoke the immune system to respond to Ebola? Scientists will be able to gauge the vaccine's prospects for preventing infection by measuring whether a volunteer's immune system mounts a strong response to the Ebola genes in the vaccine.

The vaccine will use a monkey cold virus as a "vector" to deliver Ebola genes to the body. Cold viruses are notoriously good at infecting the body, so they make good delivery vehicles. The viruses act only like delivery trucks, and cannot cause harm. The Ebola genes carried in those viruses can't cause someone to become sick with Ebola, Fauci said. But the genes would direct volunteers' bodies to create one Ebola protein. If the body recognizes that protein as foreign and dangerous, the immune system should create antibodies against it. Those antibodies would protect against a real infection, if the person were to be exposed to Ebola.

The vaccine is designed to protect against two strains of Ebola virus, known as the Zaire and Sudan species. The current outbreak in West Africa is caused by the Zaire strain.

Based on early results, scientists will be able to assess whether to go ahead with larger studies. The vaccine already has performed well in tests in animals, protecting them against Ebola infections.

Volunteers will be evaluated by NIH staff nine times over 48 weeks, Fauci says. To ensure safety of the volunteers — all healthy adults — scientists will give the vaccine to just three people at a time, pausing the trial to check for safety before vaccinating additional volunteers. Safety is "paramount" when testing an experimental drug against healthy people who are not sick or in danger.

Another U.S.-based vaccine study, also using 20 volunteers, will test a vaccine that protects against just the Zaire strain of the virus. That trial also will be conducted at NIH and is set to begin in October, Fauci said.

That vaccine also will be tested in the United Kingdom and the African countries of Mali and Gambia, Fauci said.

NIH scientists also are working with the Department of Defense on an early-stage trial of a third Ebola vaccine, developed by the Public Health Agency of Canada and licensed to NewLink Genetics. That trial will begin this fall at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.

In addition, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has begun talks with the Nigeria's ministry of health to conduct vaccine tests there, Fauci said. The CDC has not yet announced which vaccine it will test in Nigeria.

"We will share data from our studies as quickly as they become available," Fauci said.

The USA has been working on an Ebola vaccine partly to protect against a bioterrorist attack.

The experimental vaccine set to be tested next month was designed by scientist Nancy Sullivan, chief of the biodefense research section in the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease's Vaccine Research Center. She worked with researchers at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, and Okairos, a Swiss-Italian biotechnology company bought by GSK last year.

QuoteAs Ebola Grips Liberia's Capital, a Quarantine Sows Social Chaos

By NORIMITSU ONISHIAUG. 28, 2014

MONROVIA, Liberia — Some people are swimming in and out of the Ebola quarantine zone in this seaside capital. One man slips out every day to reach his job at a Western embassy. Another has turned his living room into a tollbooth, charging others to escape through his apartment at the edge of the cordoned area. Countless others have used a different method: bribing their way out with fees that soldiers determine according to a person's appearance, circumstances and even gender.

Christian Verre, a 26-year-old clothing salesman, sneaked out through an abandoned building with his girlfriend, Alice Washington, 21, and eight friends. "Go back! Go back!" soldiers and police officers yelled, he recalled, but the conversation quickly took on a different turn: "What do you got?"

Those carrying goods handed over more than $8, Mr. Verre said. Traveling light, he was charged $4.25 for his girlfriend and about $6 for himself, "because I'm a man." The couple now share a shack a few blocks outside West Point, the vast, sprawling slum that was placed under an Ebola quarantine last week.

"I didn't want to stay in West Point for 21 days," he said, referring to Ebola's maximum incubation period. "I wouldn't die of Ebola but of hunger."

The five-month outbreak here in West Africa, already worse than all other Ebola epidemics combined, is for the first time spreading uncontrollably in a major city — one in which a third of Liberia's 4.5 million people is estimated to rub shoulders, often uneasily. Though Ebola reached Monrovia three months after its appearance in the rural north, the city has become, in a few short weeks, a major focal point of the epidemic.

The outbreak has overwhelmed the government of President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, who has won the Nobel Peace Prize and the admiration of leaders around the world. But her management of Liberia has long drawn criticism at home, and now her handling of the Ebola epidemic has presented her with a political crisis that is galvanizing her opposition.

"We suffering! No food, Ma, no eat. We beg you, Ma!" one man yelled at Ms. Johnson Sirleaf as she visited West Point this week, surrounded by concentric circles of heavily armed guards, some linking arms and wearing surgical gloves.

"We want to go out!" yet another pleaded. "We want to be free, Mama, please."

International Ebola experts and her own health officials advised against imposing the quarantine in West Point, worried that it would antagonize a population whose cooperation the government desperately needs to stop the epidemic. But Ms. Johnson Sirleaf sided with the army, which was the strongest proponent of the quarantine and took the lead in enforcing it, especially in the first two days.

"Putting the police and the army in charge of the quarantine was the worst thing you could do," said Dr. Jean-Jacques Muyembe, a Congolese doctor who helped identify the Ebola virus in the 1970s, battled many outbreaks in Central Africa and has been visiting Monrovia to advise the government. "You must make the people inside the quarantine zone feel that they are being helped, not oppressed."

Isolating communities has succeeded in some rural areas in past outbreaks in Central Africa. But the quarantine of an entire urban neighborhood, where an estimated 60,000 to 120,000 people are crammed into crumbling shacks, has proved to be more than just porous. It has also led to deadly clashes with soldiers and may even be helping spread the disease, experts say, forcing people to crowd together for basic humanitarian aid, like food relief.

Cordoned off from the city, young men in West Point squeeze together in dense lines for rice and water, pushing and shoving, sweat mixing, saliva flying, blood sometimes spilling. One morning, a man in a wheelchair trying to cut to the front was beaten, stripped and left sprawled in the middle of the road, urinating over himself.

"The quarantine is going to worsen the spread of Ebola," said Dr. Muyembe, the director of the National Institute for Biomedical Research in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo. "It's difficult to understand the motivation behind it. It's simply not a good strategy."

Lewis Brown, the Liberian minister of information, said the president made the decision based on both health and security concerns. Though Ebola has been spreading throughout other parts of the city, he said, the government singled out West Point because of its dense population and its potential for political instability, as shown when residents recently stormed an Ebola holding center that they did not want in the neighborhood.

"We're not saying that Ebola is any more present in West Point than other places in the country — that's not the argument we're making," Mr. Brown said. "But the potential is in the size of the area and the interaction with the city itself."

He added: "We're not claiming to be experts on Ebola. We've never had to deal with this kind of thing, but we've always had to deal with our people. We understand our people more than we understand this disease."

Ms. Johnson Sirleaf has made no public statement since the start of the quarantine and the fatal shooting of a 15-year-old West Point boy, Shakie Kamara, who was caught in a battle between soldiers and men trying to break out of the quarantine zone.

During her visit to West Point, she apologized to his family and looked at those calling for help with sympathy in her eyes, saying little. Walking several feet behind her, a man in a checkered shirt pulled out Liberian dollar bills from a backpack with his gloved hand and tossed the money to the loudest protesters. The money silenced their criticism but immediately set off fistfights.

A Toyota Land Cruiser took the president out of West Point. Her guards and entourage followed on foot, tossing their used gloves on the ground on their way out.

An Explosive Outbreak

No one knows yet why Ebola has succeeded in spreading at such an alarming rate here in the capital. Ebola has reached the capital cities of Freetown, Sierra Leone, and Conakry, Guinea — the two other West African nations most affected by the current outbreak — but the disease has been more effectively contained in those cities.

The first cases in Monrovia were reported only in June. Infections have multiplied quickly here in recent weeks, illustrating the speed with which Ebola can spread in a major urban area. The county containing Monrovia quickly registered the nation's biggest death toll — now 274 deaths out of a national total of 754, according to the Ministry of Health.

"The Conakry outbreaks have been very small, and they haven't exploded in Freetown," said Dr. Armand Sprecher, an Ebola expert for Doctors Without Borders here. "So something is different in Monrovia. It's something in the disease transmission behaviors in Monrovia that has done this. That's my guess. We've never seen this kind of explosion in an urban environment before."

Others point to a political system long dominated by an elite out of touch with the population and more focused on jockeying for power. Politicians, including members of the president's own party, publicly expressed doubts about the extent of the outbreak and even accused her administration of exaggerating it to collect money from international donors.

Among Liberians, still grappling with the consequences of a 14-year civil war that ended in 2003, distrust of the government runs deepest in Monrovia's poorest neighborhoods. Despite billboards and posters throughout the city declaring that "Ebola is Real," many Liberians believe it is not.

Dr. Moses Massaquoi, who has been heading Ebola case management for Liberia's health ministry during the crisis, said that high-level political denials delayed the expansion of a treatment center just as cases mushroomed last month.

"Unfortunately, Ebola is not waiting for politics," he said. "That was a missed window of opportunity."

As the situation worsened in the capital in mid-August, the government established the city's first Ebola holding center in West Point, Monrovia's biggest slum and political opposition stronghold. Locals ransacked and closed down the center within days.

On Aug. 20, under the president's orders, the army and police placed West Point under quarantine — the first time, some experts say, that a quarantine was attempted on such a scale. West Point reacted with fury: hundreds of young men tried to storm through the barricades. As soldiers fired live rounds to drive them back, the 15-year-old boy, Shakie, was killed. Only heavy rain starting around noon put a stop to the riots.

In rural areas, quarantining communities can work if they are small enough and unified under political or traditional leadership, experts say.

"What is important is for the people to participate in the process; otherwise it becomes too difficult to implement effectively," said Dr. Nestor Ndayimirije, the World Health Organization's director for Liberia.

A week into the quarantine of West Point, life has been getting harder for those without the means or connections to get out. The price of goods that find their way into the quarantine zone — rice, water, coal, prepaid cellphone cards, soap — has doubled.

"People are fighting for food to eat," said Victor Nwanodu, who owns one of West Point's most popular public toilets and baths. Business has dropped, he said, as people can no longer afford to pay for a hot bath.

Serena Wallo, 31, was one of a few dozen people whose houses were washed away this week along West Point's heavily eroded shoreline. Unable to leave the quarantine zone, her family now has to stay with friends in the area, in the kind of overcrowded conditions where Ebola thrives.

"I'm not happy with the government," Ms. Wallo said. "They are treating us like we are slaves."

A Political Backlash

Like her counterparts in Sierra Leone and Guinea, Ms. Johnson Sirleaf was dealing with Ebola for the first time. She decided to do so with a firm hand by deploying the army — an institution that remains troubled despite being rebuilt after the civil war with American training and hundreds of millions of dollars in American assistance.

Mr. Brown, the information minister, said that it was necessary for the army to take the lead in the first couple of days of the quarantine. "If the military had not backed up the police the way they did, probably not only West Point would have been overrun, but the city center would have also been overrun," he said.

But the president's handling of the crisis is drawing new political challenges and leading to defections. Political parties and newspapers are calling for her resignation. This week, Ms. Johnson Sirleaf announced she had fired high-ranking government officials who refused to return to Liberia because of the Ebola outbreak. Though she inspired great hope among Liberians when she was first elected in 2005, becoming the first woman elected head of state in Africa, the crisis has fueled longstanding criticism that her reputation abroad was inflated by foreigners with little knowledge of the conditions in Liberia.

"This Ebola thing now has basically laid the thing out like this: the system is bad and the emperor has no clothes," said Samuel P. Jackson, who served as an economic adviser to the president until the end of July but is now backing, Benoni Urey, a businessman believed to be Liberia's richest man and a candidate in the next presidential election.

Mr. Urey, who for months has been criticizing the government's handling of the outbreak, said Ms. Johnson Sirleaf "must take the ultimate blame for everything." One of the greatest sources of public anger, he pointed out, has been the government's inability to pick up the bodies of the Ebola dead, which have often been left in people's houses or even dumped on public streets.

"Come on!" Mr. Urey said, calling it an example of the government's incompetence.

Jerolinmek Piah, the president's press secretary, said that Ms. Johnson Sirleaf was no longer giving interviews.

In a very brief exchange, Ms. Johnson Sirleaf said of the quarantine in West Point, "We are trying to make it go well."

Little the Hospital Could Do

Shakie Kamara, the 15-year-old boy who was killed in the clashes in West Point, was raised by his aunt. His mother died when he was a toddler, and his father a couple of years later.

On the morning of his own death, Shakie had gone to buy tea and bread for his aunt at a shop near the entrance to West Point, but apparently got caught between a crowd of rock-throwing men and soldiers firing live rounds.

"No pa, no ma," he said, pleading for help as he lay on the ground with wounds to both legs.

The defense ministry said the wounds were caused by barbed wire. But Dr. Mohammed Sankoh, the medical director of Redemption Hospital, where Shakie died, and two other hospital staff members said that the boy died after suffering deep bullet wounds. There was little that the hospital, where a doctor and several nurses had died recently of Ebola, could do, hospital workers said.

"There was no material in the emergency room," said Dr. Alphonso Gray. "The theater was not operating."

While visiting West Point, the president promised Shakie's family an investigation into his death.

Shakie's older brother, Lusine Kamara, 27, said he told the president he wanted nothing — just Shakie's body for a proper funeral. Shakie's aunt, Eva Nah, left the door open.

"She told me that after everything, she will get back to me," Ms. Nah said.

A couple of hours later, the military released Shakie's body to his family, and he was buried at Monrovia's Muslim cemetery.

Clair MacDougall contributed reporting.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on August 28, 2014, 07:25:50 PM
Ugh, this quarantine is just going to accelerate the spread of that disease within the slum and to rest of Moravia.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on August 28, 2014, 07:44:25 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on August 28, 2014, 07:25:50 PM
Ugh, this quarantine is just going to accelerate the spread of that disease within the slum and to rest of Moravia.

Czech your spelling, please.  ;)

Quote from: viper37 on August 28, 2014, 01:00:38 PM

Quote from: alfred russel on August 28, 2014, 08:57:45 AM
Imagine Tim giving updates on the Black Death back in the day.

it would have been nice.  We could have laughed at europeans and their silly, non pragmatic customs.

Quote from: Ed Anger on August 28, 2014, 08:12:45 PM
Heydrich is loose!

Quote

Disease modelers project a rapidly rising toll from Ebola

Kai is a contributing correspondent for Science magazine based in Berlin, Germany.
By   Kai Kupferschmidt    31 August 2014 10:00 am

Alessandro Vespignani hopes that his latest work will turn out to be wrong. In July, the physicist from Northeastern University in Boston started modeling how the deadly Ebola virus may spread in West Africa. Extrapolating existing trends, the number of the sick and dying mounts rapidly from the current toll—more than 3000 cases and 1500 deaths—to around 10,000 cases by September 24, and hundreds of thousands in the months after that. "The numbers are really scary," he says—although he stresses that the model assumes control efforts aren't stepped up. "We all hope to see this NOT happening," Vespigani writes in an e-mail.

Vespignani is not the only one trying to predict how the unprecedented outbreak will progress. Last week, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimated that the number of cases could ultimately exceed 20,000. And scientists across the world are scrambling to create computer models that accurately describe the spread of the deadly virus. Not all of them look quite as bleak as Vespignani's. But the modelers all agree that current efforts to control the epidemic are not enough to stop the deadly pathogen in its tracks.

Computer models "are incredibly helpful" in curbing an outbreak, says infectious disease researcher Jeremy Farrar, who heads the Wellcome Trust research charity in London. They can help agencies such as WHO predict the medical supplies and personnel they will need—and can indicate which interventions will best stem the outbreak. Mathematical epidemiologist Christian Althaus of the University of Bern, who is also building Ebola models, says both WHO and Samaritan's Purse, a relief organization fighting Ebola, have contacted him to learn about his projections.

But the modelers are hampered by the paucity of data on the current outbreak and lack of knowledge about how Ebola spreads. Funerals of Ebola victims are known to spread the virus, for example—but how many people are infected that way is not known. "Before this we have never had that much Ebola, so the epidemiology was never well developed," says Ira Longini, a biostatistician at the University of Florida in Gainesville. "We are caught with our pants down."



To a mathematician, combating any outbreak is at its core a fight to reduce one number: Re, the pathogen's effective reproductive rate, the number of people that an infected person in turn infects on average. An Re above 1, and the disease spreads. Below 1, an outbreak will stall.

Outbreak models typically assume that there are four groups of people: those who are susceptible, those who have been infected but are not contagious yet, those who are sick and can transmit the virus, and those who have recovered. A model, in essence, describes the rates at which people move from one group to the next. From those, Re can be calculated.

If the disease keeps spreading as it has, most of the modelers Science talked to say WHO's estimate will turn out to be conservative. "If the epidemic in Liberia were to continue in this way until the 1st of December, the cumulative number of cases would exceed 100,000," predicts Althaus. Such long-term forecasts are error-prone, he acknowledges. But other modelers aren't much more encouraging. Caitlin Rivers of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg expects roughly 1000 new cases in Liberia in the next 2 weeks and a similar number in Sierra Leone.

Vespignani has analyzed the likelihood that Ebola will spread to other countries. Using data on millions of air travelers and commuters, as well as mobility patterns based on data from censuses and mobile devices, he has built a model of the world, into which he can introduce Ebola and then run hundreds of thousands of simulations. In general, the chance of further spread beyond West Africa is small, Vespignani says, but the risk grows with the scale of the epidemic. Ghana, the United Kingdom, and the United States are among the countries most likely to have an introduced case, according to the model. (Senegal, which reported its first Ebola case last week, was in his top ten countries, too.)

The models are only as good as the data fed to them; up to three-quarters of Ebola cases may go unreported. The modelers are also assuming that key parameters, such as the virus's incubation time, are the same as in earlier outbreaks. "We might be missing the boat and we have no signal to indicate that," says Martin Meltzer of the U.S. Centers for Disease Prevention and Control in Atlanta.

The biggest uncertainty is how much doctors, nurses, and others can slow the virus. There are many ways of pushing down Re, Farrar says—washing hands, wearing masks, or quarantining people, for example. "But given the complexity of this outbreak and the limited resources, we need to find out what are the two or three things that will most help drive down infections," Farrar says, and that's where models can help. For instance, would following up on all the contacts of every case be more effective than following up on the much smaller number who had a certain type of contact with a case, such as sharing a room?

Rivers is evaluating interventions, such as increased use of protective equipment or campaigns to isolate infected people. In the most optimistic scenario, every contact of infected people is traced, and transmission in hospitals is reduced by 75%. Even that, while drastically reducing the number of Ebola deaths, did not push Re below one.

The challenge varies by country, Althaus says. "In Guinea and Sierra Leone, Re is close to 1 and the outbreak could be stopped if interventions improve a bit." In Liberia, Re has been near 1.5 the whole time. "That means work is only just beginning there." But Meltzer says there is no reason to believe the situation is any better in Sierra Leone. "We are not seeing any change in the rate of the accumulation of cases," he says.

As models get better at differentiating what is happening in places, Rivers says, "you might be able to put firelines around certain communities." But such measures are very controversial. When Liberia last week barricaded off West Point, a sprawling slum with probably more than 100,000 inhabitants, it drew a largely negative response. "Quarantines and curfews tend to instill fear and distrust towards the whole of the outbreak response including health structures," a representative for Doctors Without Borders told Science. Paul Seabright, a researcher at the Toulouse School of Economics in France who has studied such measures, says they are an incentive for people to keep it secret if they have had contact with a patient. Liberia's harsh actions are "the last thing this epidemic needs," he says.

People in West Africa will have to alter behaviors, Meltzer says. "We won't stop this outbreak solely by building hospitals. There will have to be a change in the way the community deals with the disease." Modeling that is easy enough, Vespignani says. "I can decrease the transmission at funerals by 40% easily in a model. That's one line of code. But in the field that is really hard."

QuoteWest Africa: Ebola outbreak puts harvests at risk, sends food prices shooting up

Agriculture in affected countries under significant strain, says new FAO special alert

2 September 2014, Rome - Disruptions in food trade and marketing in the three West African countries most affected by Ebola have made food increasingly expensive and hard to come by, while labor shortages are putting the upcoming harvest season at serious risk, FAO warned today.

In Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, quarantine zones and restrictions on people's movement aimed at combating the spread of the virus, although necessary, have seriously curtailed the movement and marketing of food. This has lead to panic buying, food shortages and significant food price hikes on some commodities, especially in urban centers, according to a special alert issued today by FAO's Global Information and Early Warning System (GIEWS).

At the same time, the main harvest season for two key crops - rice and maize - is just weeks away. Labor shortages on farms due to movement restrictions and migration to other areas will seriously impact farm production, jeopardizing the food security of large numbers of people, the alert says.

Generally adequate rains during the 2014 cropping season had previously pointed to likely favorable harvests in the main Ebola-affected countries. But now food production - the areas most affected by the outbreak are among the most productive in Sierra Leone and Liberia - stands to be seriously scaled back.

Likewise, production of cash crops like palm oil, cocoa and rubber - on which the livelihoods and food purchasing power of many families depend - is expected to be seriously affected.

"Access to food has become a pressing concern for many people in the three affected countries and their neighbors," said Bukar Tijani, FAO Regional Representative for Africa. "With the main harvest now at risk and trade and movements of goods severely restricted, food insecurity is poised to intensify in the weeks and months to come. The situation will have long-lasting impacts on farmers' livelihoods and rural economies," he added.

Major spikes in food prices

Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone are all net cereal importers, with Liberia being the most reliant on external supplies. The closure of some border crossings and the isolation of border areas where the three countries intersect - as well as reduced trade from seaports, the main conduit for large-scale commercial imports - are resulting in tighter supplies and sharply increasing food prices.

In Monrovia, Liberia, a recently conducted rapid market assessment indicates that prices of some food items have increased rapidly - for example, in Monrovia's Redlight Market the price of cassava went up 150 percent within the first weeks of August.

"Even prior to the Ebola outbreak, households in some of the affected areas were spending up to 80 percent of their incomes on food," said Vincent Martin, Head of FAO's Dakar-based Resilience Hub, which is coordinating the agency's response. "Now these latest price spikes are effectively putting food completely out of their reach. This situation may have social repercussions that could lead to subsequent impact on the disease containment."

The depreciation of national currencies in Sierra Leone and Liberia in recent months is expected to exert further upward price pressure on imported food commodities.

Response efforts

To meet short-term food relief needs, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) has launched a regional emergency operation targeting some 65,000 tonnes of food to 1.3 million people.

At the same time, FAO's special alert says that "rapid assessments are required to identify the type of measures that are feasible to mitigate the impact of labour shortages during the harvesting period and for related post-harvest activities."

And measures to revive internal trade are essential to ease supply constraints and mitigate further food price increases, it notes.

Preventing further loss of human life and stopping the spread of the virus remain the top priorities at this time. FAO has joined the coordinated UN effort to support affected countries, is in daily communication with WHO and other key actors, and has personnel in West Africa aiding technical and logistical efforts.

It is critical that rural communities understand which practices pose the highest risks of human-to-human transmission as well as the potential spill-over from wildlife. Toward that end, FAO has activated its networks of local animal health clubs, community animal health workers, producer organizations, forestry contacts and agriculture extension and rural radio services to help UNICEF and WHO communicate risk to affected populations.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 02, 2014, 06:03:42 AM
Still impressed by Languish's blase assurance that this epidemic won't be able to spread to the First World.  :ph34r:

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 02, 2014, 06:03:42 AM
Still impressed by Languish's blase assurance that this epidemic won't be able to spread to the First World.  :ph34r:

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 02, 2014, 07:06:03 AM
Nobody listened to Jeff Goldblum.  :(

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 02, 2014, 07:55:16 AM
Nature will always find a way to make you bleed out your ass.

Quote from: mongers on September 02, 2014, 06:40:55 PM
A dramatic video illustrating the problems faced by local people in Liberia:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-29039041 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-29039041)

Quote from: Liep on September 02, 2014, 06:51:22 PM

Quote from: mongers on September 02, 2014, 06:40:55 PM
A dramatic video illustrating the problems faced by local people in Liberia:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-29039041 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-29039041)

Holy shit, what a crap place to live right now.

QuoteAbout 60 other people are under surveillance after having "high-risk" or "very high-risk" contact with the infected doctor, WHO said. More than 140 others are also being monitored.

"Given these multiple high-risk exposure opportunities, the outbreak of Ebola virus disease in Port Harcourt has the potential to grow larger and spread faster than the one in Lagos," WHO warned.

QuoteWHO said Wednesday that the physician continued to see patients after the onset of Ebola symptoms and even operated on two people. Ebola is transmitted through direct contact with bodily fluids, and health authorities say patients are only contagious once they show symptoms.

"Prior to hospitalization, the physician had numerous contacts with the community, as relatives and friends visited his home to celebrate the birth of a baby," WHO said in a statement.

"Once hospitalized, he again had numerous contacts with the community, as members of his church visited to perform a healing ritual said to involve the laying on of hands. During his six-day day period of hospitalization, he was attended by the majority of the hospital's health care staff."

Quote from: Caliga on September 04, 2014, 07:02:29 AM
Relax.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 04, 2014, 10:23:32 AM

Quote from: Caliga on September 04, 2014, 07:02:29 AM
Relax.

You always say that. At what threshold is okay not to relax? 100,000 cases? 250,000? More?

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 04, 2014, 10:23:32 AM

Quote from: Caliga on September 04, 2014, 07:02:29 AM
Relax.

You always say that. At what threshold is okay not to relax? 100,000 cases? 250,000? More?

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 04, 2014, 10:58:14 AM
The 60,000 bags didnt meet QA\QC standards in the West, so they got a deal.  Zippers are on the inside.

Quote from: sbr on September 04, 2014, 11:21:37 AM
They had Buffalo Bills Super Bowl Champs 1992 on all of them.

Quote from: Grey Fox on September 04, 2014, 12:29:29 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 04, 2014, 10:23:32 AM

Quote from: Caliga on September 04, 2014, 07:02:29 AM
Relax.

You always say that. At what threshold is okay not to relax? 100,000 cases? 250,000? More?

When there are multiple cases in the West.

Quote from: Liep on September 05, 2014, 02:17:47 AM
Why do Americans write the month first? Just to be different? I'll have you know Belize also uses that format, so you're not a snowflake here.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 04, 2014, 05:18:46 PM

Quote from: Grey Fox on September 04, 2014, 12:29:29 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 04, 2014, 10:23:32 AM

Quote from: Caliga on September 04, 2014, 07:02:29 AM
Relax.

You always say that. At what threshold is okay not to relax? 100,000 cases? 250,000? More?

When there are multiple cases in the West.

Ah, but I actually have a conscience and care what happens to people regardless of location. I have no fear of there being a big outbreak in a western country, that does not mean I do not care.

Quote from: Grey Fox on September 05, 2014, 07:07:21 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 04, 2014, 05:18:46 PM

Quote from: Grey Fox on September 04, 2014, 12:29:29 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 04, 2014, 10:23:32 AM

Quote from: Caliga on September 04, 2014, 07:02:29 AM
Relax.

You always say that. At what threshold is okay not to relax? 100,000 cases? 250,000? More?

When there are multiple cases in the West.

Ah, but I actually have a conscience and care what happens to people regardless of location. I have no fear of there being a big outbreak in a western country, that does not mean I do not care.

You are a better human being than all of us, Tim.

I mean that.

Quote from: Liep on September 05, 2014, 02:17:47 AM
Why do Americans write the month first? Just to be different? I'll have you know Belize also uses that format, so you're not a snowflake here.

Quote from: Liep on September 05, 2014, 02:17:47 AM
Why do Americans write the month first? Just to be different? I'll have you know Belize also uses that format, so you're not a snowflake here.

QuoteThis sequence is used primarily in the United States. This date format was commonly used alongside the little-endian form in the United Kingdom until the mid-20th century and can be found in both defunct and modern print media such as the London Gazette and The Times, respectively. In the United States, it is said as Sunday, November 9, although usage of "the" isn't uncommon (e.g. Sunday, November the 9th, and even November the 9th, Sunday, are also possible and readily understood).

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 06, 2014, 04:29:00 AM
3900 cases, 2100 dead. :(

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 07, 2014, 03:38:14 AM
Stat guy says 1.2 million will die in 6 months.

Can any of our math people debunk this?

http://www.statsblogs.com/2014/09/06/1-2-millions-deaths-by-ebola-projected-within-six-months/

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 04, 2014, 10:23:32 AM

Quote from: Caliga on September 04, 2014, 07:02:29 AM
Relax.

You always say that. At what threshold is okay not to relax? 100,000 cases? 250,000? More?

Quote
8 September 2014 Last updated at 19:53

Ebola crisis: Liberia 'faces huge surge' says WHO

Ebola is spreading exponentially in Liberia, with thousands of new cases expected in the next three weeks, the World Health Organization (WHO) says.

Conventional methods to control the outbreak were "not having an adequate impact", the UN's health agency added.

.....

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 08, 2014, 10:04:39 PM
Really looking bad.

Thanks for the title change though

Quote from: grumbler on September 09, 2014, 08:14:31 AM
"Ebolapalooza?"  That's rather flippant, given that people are dying in large numbers.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 05, 2014, 03:43:09 AM
Anyways, the cases have doubled from what they were 22 days ago, which were double what they were 30 days before that, which were double what they were 35 days before that. Periodic doubling would indicate exponential growth, but the rate of doubling is itself increasing..

Quote from: sbr on September 09, 2014, 08:16:38 PM
Did the doctor have a hold of your nut sack?

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 09, 2014, 07:29:14 PM
One day update by the WHO says that from thw 5th to the 6th more than 300 cases and nearly 200 deaths were recorded!

It is obviously unstoppable now. Liberia and Sierra Leone will probably lose hundreds of thousands of people. :(

Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 09, 2014, 10:26:30 PM
Help them how?  My understanding is the virus is spreading because people who are infected refuse to come forward and allow themselves to be quarantined and refuse to disclose who they've been in contact with.

Quote from: sbr on September 09, 2014, 10:29:04 PM
What exactly should "we" do to help people who intentionally break infected people out of quarantine and think that Western medicine is a plot to kill them?

Quote from: Ed Anger on September 09, 2014, 08:12:59 PM
I coughed today

Quote from: Valmy on September 09, 2014, 10:59:05 PM

"We", and by we I mean everybody who is not in West Africa, did a decent job helping to slow the AIDs epidemic despite people saying raping virgins was the best cure.  Not sure why we could not do a decent job here.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 09, 2014, 10:26:30 PM
Help them how?  My understanding is the virus is spreading because people who are infected refuse to come forward and allow themselves to be quarantined and refuse to disclose who they've been in contact with.

QuoteEbola outbreak 'threatens Liberia's national existence'

Patients too weak to move are being turned away by medical staff who cannot cope with the influx of cases, as Thomas Fessy reports

Liberia is facing a "serious threat" to its national existence as the deadly Ebola virus "spreads like wildfire" there, its defence minister says.

Brownie Samukai told the UN Security Council that the international response to the crisis was "less than robust".

The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned that thousands more cases could occur in Liberia, which has been worst hit by the West Africa outbreak.

Some 2,288 people have died from Ebola in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone.

The WHO says half of these deaths occurred in the three weeks running up to 6 September.

In Nigeria, eight people have died out of a total 21 cases, while one case has been confirmed in Senegal, with no deaths.

Liberia's defence minister warned on Tuesday that the country's weak health system was already overwhelmed by the number of cases.

Mr Samukai told UN Security Council members that Liberia lacked "infrastructure, logistical capacity, professional expertise and financial resources to effectively address this disease".

"The deadly Ebola virus has caused a disruption of the normal functioning of our state," he said.

Separately on Tuesday, the UN's envoy in Liberia said that at least 160 Liberian health workers had contracted the disease and half of them had died.

Karin Landgren described the outbreak as a "latter-day plague" that was growing exponentially.

She added that health workers were operating without proper protective equipment, training or pay, in comments to the UN Security Council.

"Liberians are facing their gravest threat since their war," Ms Landgren said.

"I don't think anybody can say right now that the international response to the Ebola outbreak is sufficient," US ambassador to the UN Samantha Power said after the Security Council briefing.

Ebola spreads between humans by direct contact with infected blood, bodily fluids or organs, or indirectly through contact with contaminated environments.

Unlike other West African nations affected by the outbreak, efforts to contain the virus in Liberia were not working well, the WHO has said.

The reason for this remains unclear; however, experts say it could be linked to burial practices, which can include touching the body and eating a meal near it.

There are also not enough beds to treat Ebola patients, particularly in the capital Monrovia, with many people told to go back home, where they may spread the virus.

The WHO is calling on organisations combating the outbreak in Liberia to scale up efforts "three-to-four fold" to control the outbreak.

The US says it will help the African Union mobilise 100 African health workers to the region and contribute an additional $10m (£6.2m) in funds to deal with the outbreak.

The announcement comes as a fourth US aid worker infected with the deadly virus was transported to a hospital in Atlanta for treatment. The identity of the aid worker has not yet been revealed.

Two other aid workers who were treated at the same hospital have since recovered from an Ebola infection.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon says he will hold a meeting on the international response to the Ebola crisis on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly this month.

Quote from: viper37 on September 09, 2014, 11:55:30 PM
You may send a thousand doctors there, but if people fear them, rely on their sorcerers and superstitions to 'cure' themselves, and that 'cure' happens to be just as effective as 'our' 'cure', then good luck convinced them to stay at home and isolate themselves.

I honestly don't know what to do.

QuoteUN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon says he will hold a meeting on the international response to the Ebola crisis on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly this month.

Quote from: Valmy on September 10, 2014, 05:20:48 PM

QuoteUN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon says he will hold a meeting on the international response to the Ebola crisis on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly this month.

Is that a joke?  Hold a meeting sometime this month?  Oh FFS.

Quote from: Valmy on September 10, 2014, 05:20:48 PM
Is that a joke?  Hold a meeting sometime this month?  Oh FFS.

Quote
Ebola Hits Seat of Liberian Presidency; 1 Dead; 1 Quarantined

    Written by Rodney D. Sieh, [email protected]
    Published: 10 September 2014

Monrovia - Liberia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which is also the seat of the Liberian presidency, has been hit by the deadly Ebola virus, FrontPageAfrica has learned.

On Monday, the Administrative Assistant to Foreign Minister Augustine Ngafuan reportedly died from what sources say is a suspected case of the deadly virus. Her husband, a staffer in the office of President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, is currently under quarantine.

FrontPageAfrica is withholding the names of the officials because the government has not officially notified the public about the cases, so close to the Liberian presidency. Minister Ngafuan's office is two floors below the floor now being used as the President's office.

The wife of the President's office staffer reportedly died on Monday and may have gotten the virus from a sister, who had previously died. A praying woman who reportedly had sessions and laid hands on the sister of the deceased Administrative Assistant, has also died.

Sources within the Executive Mansion informed FrontPageAfrica Wednesday that both the deceased Administrative Assistant in Minister Ngafuan's office and her husband had been told not to return to the office until after 21 days.

" They had not been coming to work for more than 21 days now," the source, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not clothed with the authority to speak on the matter.

Minister Ngafuan is currently in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia attending an Emergency Meeting of the African Union's Executive Council on the Ebola Virus Disease Outbreak.  Attempts to reach the minister and his press aide have been unsuccessful. The AU members are recommending the urgent lifting of all travel bans imposed on countries affected by the Ebola outbreak in Africa.

The Ministry has been the seat of the presidency since 2006 when fire gutted the fourth floor during celebrations marking the 159th Independence Day celebrations in the presence of three West African leaders, who had come to witness the then newly-elected President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf switch on electricity to reach limited parts of the capital city.

South African forensic scientists brought in to probe the cause of the fire said it was an electrical fault. Following the fire outbreak at the Executive Mansion, the Government of Liberia announced a closure of the Mansion, and President Johnson-Sirleaf relocated to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where the president has for the past eight years been performing official state functions.

The mansion was constructed in 1964 under the regime of the late Liberian President William Vacanarat Shadrach Tubman by 2,000 workers, including about a fifth of Monrovia's labor force, and 150 foreign technicians. The eight-storey Executive Mansion building, which costs US$20 million, has an atomic-bomb shelter, an underground swimming pool, a private chapel, a trophy room, a cinema, an emergency power plant, water supply and sewage system, among others.

The report comes just 24 hours after Defense Minister Brownie Samukai told the U.N. Security Council that the outbreak poses a "serious threat" to the war-torn nation's very existence. Samukai's words were echoed by the U.N. Secretary-General's special representative Karin Landgren, who said Liberia is facing its gravest threat since its decade-long civil war ended in 2003. She deemed the outbreak a "latter-day plague" and its spread "merciless."

Liberia is worst hit among the nations affected by the current Ebola epidemic with at least 1,200 recorded deaths. Over the past three weeks, the country has experienced a 68% bump in infections and the World Health Organization estimates the surge will continue to accelerate in coming weeks.

Humanitarian groups in the country have been complaining that there simply aren't enough beds and suspected victims of Ebola are reportedly turned back to their communities or left waiting outside medical facilities, aggravating the risk of further contagion.

At least 160 health workers have been infected with the virus and 79 have died, in a nation that counted a paltry single doctor per 100,000 inhabitants at its onset. Landgren pointed out that the challenge also goes beyond the medical response.

"The enormous task of addressing Ebola has revealed persistent and profound institutional weaknesses, including in the security sector," she said. "As the demands pile on, the police face monumental challenges in planning and implementing large scale operations."

QuoteVirologist: Fight against Ebola in Sierra Leone and Liberia is lost

The killer virus is spreading like wildfire, Liberia's defense minister said on Tuesdayas he pleaded for UN assistance. A German Ebola expert tells DW the virus must "burn itself out" in that part of the world.

His statement might alarm many people.

But Jonas Schmidt-Chanasit of the Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine in Hamburg told DW that he and his colleagues are losing hope for Sierra Leone and Liberia, two of the countries worst hit by the recent Ebola epidemic.

"The right time to get this epidemic under control in these countries has been missed," he said. That time was May and June. "Now it is too late."

Schmidt-Chanasit expects the virus will "burn itself out" in this part of the world.

With other words: It will more or less infect everybody and half of the population - in total about five million people - could die.

Stop the virus from spilling over to other countries

Schmidt-Chanasit knows that it is a hard thing to say.

He stresses that he doesn't want international help to stop. Quite the contrary: He demands "massive help".

For Sierra Leone and Liberia, though, he thinks "it is far from reality to bring enough help there to get a grip on the epidemic."

According to the virologist, the most important thing to do now is to prevent the virus from spreading to other countries, "and to help where it is still possible, in Nigeria and Senegal for example."

Moreover, much more money has to be put into evaluating suitable vaccines, he added.

Angry reactions

In the headquarters of Welthungerhilfe, a German non-governmental aid organization that is engaged in helping with the Ebola epidemic, Schmidt-Chanasit's statement causes much contempt.

Such declarations "are not very constructive," a spokeswoman said.

Jochen Moninger, Sierra Leone based coordinator of Welthungerhilfe, told DW, Schmidt-Chanasit's statement is "dangerous and moreover, not correct."

Moninger has been living in Sierra Leone for four years and has experienced the Ebola outbreak there from the beginning.

"The measures are beginning to show progress," he says. "The problem is solvable - the disease can be stemmed."

"If I had lost hope completely, I would pack my things and take my family out of here", Moninger adds. Instead, he and his family will stay.

In Sierra Leone, the government has ordered a quarantine of 21 days for every household in which an Ebola case occurred. Soldiers and police are guarding these houses preventing anyone who has come into contact with an Ebola patient from leaving.

According to Moninger, that is exactly the right thing to do: isolating sick people - should it be necessary, even with military force.

Creating hopelessness doesn't help

Moninger says he doesn't know much about the situation in Liberia. But indeed, he got the impression that "there seems to be happening something that is not good at all."

He grants that Schmidt-Chanasit's statement "might point a little bit into the right direction" regarding Liberia.

Liberia has not taken on the same quarantine measures as Sierra Leone. According to a WOrld HEalth Organization (WHO) report, Ebola-infected people are crisscrossing the capital in shared taxis, looking for a treatment place and returning home after finding none. This way the virus spreads.

"Distributing hopelessness", though, Moninger said, "is dangerous", adding that there are many human lives at risk, and "statements like these make the situation even worse".

Disastrous, but not without hope

The WHO in Geneva refuses to comment on Schmidt-Chanasit's statement.

WHO spokeswoman Fadéla Chaib, though, says that there is "of course" still hope for both countries.

"We can bring the situation under control in 6 to 9 months," she told DW.

She admits, though, that the situation especially in Liberia is "very intense".

The government is completely outstripped and as soon as a new Ebola treatment center has opened, it is overflowed by patients, she says, adding that Liberia has the highest number of cases and deaths in West Africa with a 60 percent case-fatality rate.

The situation is getting worse after 80 health workers, doctors and nurses, have died after contracting the disease.

The WHO even expects thousands of new cases of Ebola in Liberia over the next few weeks.

Winning together

Not only neighboring countries but also Europe and the US will have to support the fight against the epidemic, WHO's Chaib demands.

Then it might be possible to win this fight.

The key to getting a grip on the epidemic is to stop the transmission of Ebola, especially in healthcare workers, she says.

Creating Ebola centers in the communities themselves will stop Ebola patients and their family members moving around and infecting other people.

"We will do everything we can to stop this Ebola outbreak. We will not let down West Africa."

Quote
I had to turn people away from an Ebola treatment centre. It's desperate work
Explaining to people pleading for their loved ones that we were full was almost impossible. Yet despite the horrors of the situation here in Liberia, there are moments of true joy

   
        Pierre Trbovic   
        theguardian.com, Thursday 11 September 2014 16.48 BST   


Soon after arriving in Monrovia, I realised that my colleagues were overwhelmed by the scale of the Ebola outbreak. Our treatment centre – the biggest Médecins Sans Frontières has ever run – was full, and Stefan, our field coordinator, was standing at the gate turning people away. This wasn't a job that we had planned for anyone to do, but somebody had to do it – and so I put myself forward.

For the first three days I stood there, it rained hard. People were drenched, but they carried on waiting because they had nowhere else to go.

The first person I had to turn away was a father who had brought his sick daughter in the trunk of his car. He was an educated man, and he pleaded with me to take his teenage daughter, saying that while he knew we couldn't save her life, at least we could save the rest of his family from her. At that point I had to go behind one of the tents to cry. I wasn't ashamed of my tears but I knew I had to stay strong for my colleagues – if we all started crying, we'd be in trouble.

Other families just pulled up in cars, let the sick person out and then drove off, abandoning them.

One mother tried to leave her baby on a chair, hoping that if she did, we would have no choice but to care for the child.

I had to turn away one couple who arrived with their young daughter. Two hours later the girl died in front of our gate, where she remained until the body removal team took her away. We regularly had ambulances turning up with suspected Ebola patients from other health facilities, but there was nothing we could do. We couldn't send them anywhere else – everywhere was, and still is, full.

Once I entered the high-risk zone, I understood why we couldn't admit any more patients. Everyone was completely overwhelmed. There are processes and procedures in an Ebola treatment centre to keep everyone safe, and if people don't have time to follow them, they can start making mistakes.

It can take 15 minutes to dress fully in the personal protective equipment and, once inside, you can only stay for an hour before you are exhausted and covered in sweat. You can't overstay or it starts getting dangerous. The patients are also really unwell, and it is a lot of work to keep the tents clean of human excrement, blood and vomit, and to remove the dead bodies.

There was no way of letting more patients in without putting everyone, and all of our work, at risk.

But explaining this to people who were pleading for their loved ones to be admitted, and assuring them that we were expanding the centre as fast as we could, was almost impossible. All we could do was give people home protection kits, containing gloves, gowns and masks, so that they could be cared for by their loved ones with less chance of infecting them.

A week ago, MSF's president spoke at the UN and called on states with biohazard response capability to urgently send teams to west Africa. To have any hope of getting the outbreak under control we need more treatment beds for Ebola patients and we need them yesterday. We are worried that if left to UN agencies and NGOs it will take too much time to respond – more lives will be lost and the virus will spread even further.

MSF is currently providing 160 beds in Monrovia, we will soon have 200, and we will carry on expanding as fast as we can. But we are stretched to capacity by our work elsewhere on the outbreak and through the rest of the world.

In Monrovia, we estimate that there needs to be more than 1,000 beds to treat every Ebola patient. There are currently just 240 in total. Until that gap is closed by treatment centres with hundreds, rather than the small numbers pledged so far, the misery of turning people away at our gates will continue.

After one week on the gate my colleagues told me to stop. They could see the emotional toll that it was taking on me. That same afternoon a nurse came to find me, saying there was something I had to see. Whenever people recover, we have a small ceremony for the patients who are discharged.

Seeing the staff gather to celebrate this exceptional moment, hearing the words of the discharged patients as they thank us for what we did, gives us all a good reason to be there. Looking around I saw tears in all of my colleagues' eyes. Sometimes there are good reasons to cry.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 11, 2014, 09:53:39 PM
A blood-borne hemmoragic fever like Ebola mutating to the point of becoming aerosolized on its own is a long shot;  they haven't even reached that point in the laboratory, it's that difficult.  A cross-species jump requires a lot of molecular engineering as well.

Quote

The exponential growth in case numbers during an outbreak also makes resource-intensive activities like contact tracing and surveillance increasingly difficult. Recent studies, including the one by Nishiura et al. in this issue, suggest that the reproduction number of Ebola (the average number of secondary cases generated by a typical case) is between 1.5–2 in some countries [8,9]. Based on the durations of incubation and infectiousness of EVD [3], it is plausible that the number of cases could therefore double every fortnight if the situation does not change. There are currently hundreds of new EVD cases reported each week; with the number of infections increasing exponentially, it could soon be thousands. Following up contacts and monitoring them for symptoms has already become unfeasible in areas where health authorities are stretched to the limit.

...
Ebola cannot be ignored in the hope it will burn itself out. It is true that outbreaks of acute infections will generally decline once a large number people have been infected, because there are no longer enough susceptible individuals to sustain transmission. But if Ebola indeed has a reproduction number of 2 in some locations as described by Nishiura et al. [8], the susceptible pool – which likely includes most individuals – would have to shrink by at least half before the outbreak declined of its own accord [17]. Given the vast populations in affected areas and the disease's high fatality rate, this is clearly not an acceptable scenario.[/

Quote from: Caliga on September 12, 2014, 05:08:29 AM
What were you told about relaxing? :sleep:

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 12, 2014, 01:51:28 AM
Then again, that doctor who wrote the Op-ed in the Times is the director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, so maybe he knows what he's talking about.

Quote
Ebola case count could rise to between 77,000 and 277,000 by year's end

A worst-case scenario would see an additional 77,181 to 277,124 Ebola cases by the end of 2014

Helen Branswell

September 11, 2014


TORONTO – The case count in West Africa's unprecedented Ebola outbreak could grow by tens or even hundreds of thousands of cases before the end of this year, a new study suggests.

The work, published Thursday in the online journal Eurosurveillance, said that if growth continues at its current pace, a worst-case scenario would see an additional 77,181 to 277,124 cases by the end of 2014.

The authors suggested it is unlikely the worst-case scenario would come to pass because containment efforts are being scaled up in response to the crisis. But in an interview, one of the authors admitted that if the current numbers are wrong and many more cases have been missed in recent weeks, their estimate could potentially be too low.

"If the cases are roughly uniformly distributed over time, then our estimates shouldn't change much," said Gerardo Chowell of Arizona State University in Tempe.

However, if most of the missed cases had more recently occurred, "this would be very bad news."

An editorial that accompanied the study warned that the world cannot hope that this Ebola outbreak will burn itself out. It was written by Adam Kucharski and Peter Piot of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Piot is one of the discoverers of the Ebola virus.

They called the epidemic an international crisis and said it demands a commensurate response.

"It is true that outbreaks of acute infections will generally decline once a large number of people have been infected because there are no longer enough susceptible individuals to sustain transmission," the authors noted.

"But ... given the vast populations in affected areas and the disease's high fatality rate, this is clearly not an acceptable scenario."

They suggested that unless the containment efforts start to gain ground, the number of cases could double every two weeks.

The most recent numbers from the World Health Organization suggest there have been at least 4,269 cases of the disease and 2,288 deaths in this outbreak, which is believed to have started late last year. Those numbers are higher than the total of all known Ebola cases and Ebola deaths since the first known outbreak in 1976.

The agency has said it believes its numbers are underestimates, but because the outbreak is so large and the situation in hot zones so chaotic it does not have a good handle on how far off the numbers are.

Because of those problems, an infectious diseases expert at the University of Minnesota warned against seeing the numbers in this study as a true projection.

Michael Osterholm said he wasn't trying to suggest the case numbers aren't big or that they won't get much bigger, but just that at this point it is difficult to quantify how large the outbreak might get.

"All we can say is there are lots and lots of cases, and more coming. And there are lots and lots of deaths, and more coming," said Osterholm, who is director of the Center for Infectious Diseases Research and Policy.

"And I don't think we can put any real precision around this at this point. All we can say for our planning is that it's a very, very big number. And we just have to take that into consideration."

The work is what is known as a modelling study. Chowell and a colleague, H. Nishiura from the University of Tokyo, calculated what is called the reproductive number of the outbreak, the number of new infections that stem from an average case. When a disease has a reproductive rate of less than one, it cannot sustain itself and will eventually stop spreading.

In the case of this outbreak, they estimated the reproductive rate was between one and two. In Sierra Leone and Liberia, the harder hit of the countries, the reproductive number was calculated to be between 1.4 and 1.7. The worst-case scenario of 77,181 to 277,124 was calculated using those figures.

Chowell, who was reached in Japan, said in a telephone interview that as of Aug. 26 there was no evidence the containment efforts were bringing down the reproductive number. That would occur if new cases were isolated as soon as the people became sick, eliminating the risk they would infect others. People with Ebola are only believed to be contagious when they have symptoms.

Chowell said he and Nishiura will continue to track the numbers to see if the increased efforts are making an impact on the outbreak.

Quote from: Valmy on September 12, 2014, 10:42:10 AM
Us being in denial does not really matter.  The fact the UN and various other idiots seem to be in denial is much more serious.  Anybody going to get some doctors and emergency facilities over there?  Bueller?

QuoteSo far, 4,784 Ebola cases have been reported and more than 2,400 people have died in the outbreak, which is concentrated in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, Ms. Chan said on Friday, citing the latest data available. But she made clear the figures were "an underestimate."

A surge of 400 new cases in Liberia in the past week, double the number of new cases in the preceding week, was "a particular cause for concern," the health organization said. Sierra Leone reported 200 new cases in the past week and a high rate of transmission in the capital, Freetown, the W.H.O. said. Nearly half the total number of infections in West Africa and just over half the deaths occurred in the last 21 days, it said.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 12, 2014, 10:34:31 AM
You guys are in denial.

Quote from: Caliga on September 12, 2014, 11:41:21 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 12, 2014, 10:34:31 AM
You guys are in denial.

:mellow:

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 12, 2014, 11:26:36 AM
I'm not in denial, I'm in the United States. Where it's safer.

Quote from: Ed Anger on September 12, 2014, 07:13:03 PM

Quote from: Caliga on September 12, 2014, 11:41:21 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 12, 2014, 10:34:31 AM
You guys are in denial.

:mellow:

Deni-alist.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 12, 2014, 07:19:50 PM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 12, 2014, 11:26:36 AM
I'm not in denial, I'm in the United States. Where it's safer.

Until the boatloads of infected Africans start washing up on our shores.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 12, 2014, 08:18:24 PM
I'm unfamiliar with the disease that affected five million Haitians.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 12, 2014, 08:25:47 PM
I'm unfamiliar with all this bullshit panic over an easily containable disease provided Western approaches to science and medicine are even marginally accepted.

QuoteDr. Shaman's research team created a model that estimated the number of cases through Oct. 12, with different predictions based on whether control of the epidemic stays about the same, improves or gets worse. If control stays the same, according to the model, the case count by Oct. 12 will be 18,406. If control improves, it will be 7,861. If control worsens, it will soar to 54,895

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 12, 2014, 10:23:35 PM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 12, 2014, 08:25:47 PM
I'm unfamiliar with all this bullshit panic over an easily containable disease provided Western approaches to science and medicine are even marginally accepted.

plenty of nations where that isn't accepted.

QuoteMore projections

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/09/13/world/africa/us-scientists-see-long-fight-against-ebola.html?_r=0&referrer=

QuoteDr. Shaman's research team created a model that estimated the number of cases through Oct. 12, with different predictions based on whether control of the epidemic stays about the same, improves or gets worse. If control stays the same, according to the model, the case count by Oct. 12 will be 18,406. If control improves, it will be 7,861. If control worsens, it will soar to 54,895

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 12, 2014, 08:25:47 PM
I'm unfamiliar with all this bullshit panic over an easily containable disease provided Western approaches to science and medicine are even marginally accepted.

Quote from: Caliga on September 14, 2014, 06:22:39 AM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 12, 2014, 08:25:47 PM
I'm unfamiliar with all this bullshit panic over an easily containable disease provided Western approaches to science and medicine are even marginally accepted.

:yes:

Not to sound racist Tim, but these people are basically talking gorillas. :)  In real, non-trainwreck countries, Ebola wouldn't be an issue unless some crazy airborne mutation shit happens.

Quote from: Caliga on September 14, 2014, 06:22:39 AM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 12, 2014, 08:25:47 PM
I'm unfamiliar with all this bullshit panic over an easily containable disease provided Western approaches to science and medicine are even marginally accepted.

:yes:

Not to sound racist Tim, but these people are basically talking gorillas. :)  In real, non-trainwreck countries, Ebola wouldn't be an issue unless some crazy airborne mutation shit happens.

Quote"It could get very bad indeed," said Prof John Edmunds, an epidemiologist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. "And I mean you can't rule out some sort of nightmare doomsday scenario."

"But the quicker we react and put interventions in place, the better chance we've got of avoiding something really, really serious."

The leading epidemiologist is studying the spread of the virus in Monrovia, where the outbreak is now most intense. He has told Channel 4 News that based on the current rate of spread and lack of power to control it, it has the potential to infect the majority of the population of the country.

Quote

    *The number of suspected cases has fallen, as some have been laboratory confirmed.

    **12 alerts including one with death in Kokolo military camp in Kinshasa, a second reported in Kambove in Katanga and 10 cases of which 8 deaths reported in Bongandanga, Equateur Provincer. Five samples from Bongandanga and from Nyakunde in Ituri (Orientale Province) are being analyzed.

    Between 2 and 10 September, 35 cases of EVD have been reported in the area of Djera in Equateur Province in DRC, increasing the cumulative number of cases to 66 (see the above table for details).

    Two additional treatment centers are operational since 9 September with the capacity of 50 beds

    Some local/provincial committees of the CNC (Ebola response coordination) are not operating optimally like Kinshasa; some coordination tools for the smooth functioning of these structures at local / provincial level are still unavailable

    Epidemic Control Commission (ECC) has submitted a health roadmap on the management and prevention of the Ebola Virus Disease to the DRC Minister of Health as per recommendations of the latest meeting of SADEC Ministers of Public Health held in Zimbabwe.

    Two hotline numbers have been set up to allow the population to get information on the disease and ongoing efforts: 081 08 000 20 and 099 99 710 05. An additional hotline for information on the prevention of the EVD is available using Tigo: 119.

    The contingency plan for Kinshasa has been finalized, but actions for its full activation are yet to be taken.

Quote from: Caliga on September 14, 2014, 06:22:39 AM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 12, 2014, 08:25:47 PM
I'm unfamiliar with all this bullshit panic over an easily containable disease provided Western approaches to science and medicine are even marginally accepted.

:yes:

Not to sound racist Tim, but these people are basically talking gorillas. :)  In real, non-trainwreck countries, Ebola wouldn't be an issue unless some crazy airborne mutation shit happens.

QuoteThe Obama administration plans to ask Congress to approve $1 billion to fight Ebola, sources say, as the U.S. military command in Africa makes countering the deadly disease its highest priority.

The increased funding would result in the deployment of approximately 3,000 U.S. military personnel, the creation of a joint task force commanded by a three-star officer, military provision of logistics and mobility support, three field medical facilities and a training program for health care workers, a source told Fox News on Monday.


The support is estimated to last at least six months and cost upwards of $1 billion dollars, with estimated daily costs of at least $5.4 million a day.

The request would not be in addition to money that's already been approved, but rather, re-appropriating existing funding.

Quote from: Valmy on September 15, 2014, 11:13:27 PM
Took him long enough.  The UN should have been mobilizing a large response months ago.  I mean geez what good are they if they cannot facilitate a response to a disease?

QuoteThe Defense Department will divert $500 million for the effort, which will include building 17 treatment centers with 100 beds apiece, dedicating 10,000 sets of personal protective equipment and distributing supplies such as disinfectant and hand sanitizer to help 400,000 families protect themselves and care for sick family members.

...
The U.S. Africa Command will train as many as 500 new health care workers a week for six months and longer if needed. WHO and aid groups such as Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF, or Doctors Without Borders) have said medical staff are by far the greatest need.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 15, 2014, 11:52:58 PM
Did Congress shitcan the Mercy and Comfort yet?  You want to provide medical services in that shithole, do it offshore.

QuoteThe Ebola virus outbreak is "unparalleled in modern times," the World Health Organization said Tuesday, announcing a "global response coalition" as the death toll in West Africa climbed towards 2,500 with 5,000 others infected.

QuoteAylward said a faster response was needed to keep the numbers infected within the "tens of thousands."

QuoteMSF President's remarks to the UN Special Briefing on Ebola
Share
16 September 2014

P.K. Lee/MSF

United Nations Member States Briefing on the Ebola outbreak and Response in West Africa, Geneva, 16 September 2014

Remarks by Dr. Joanne Liu, International President, Médecins Sans Frontières

Ms. Under Secretary General, Mr. Special Coordinator, Mr. Assistant Director General, Distinguished Delegates, ladies and gentlemen.

Two weeks ago, I made an urgent appeal to member states of the United Nations in New York for your help in stemming the Ebola epidemic in West Africa. Many other organisations, such as the CDC, the WHO, and the UN, have also described the unfolding catastrophe.

Yet, since then, only a few countries have promised to deploy more hands-on capacity to the affected countries such as the United States of America, United Kingdom, China, France and Cuba, or the European Union. We understand President Obama will announce later today plans to deploy military and medical assistance to West Africa. If this is true – but we have no real details yet on what this deployment entails, and how fast it will be – then it shows that the US is willing to lead by example. Other countries need to follow.

Today, the response to Ebola continues to fall dangerously behind, and I am forced to reiterate the appeal I made two weeks ago:

We need you on the ground. The window of opportunity to contain this outbreak is closing. We need more countries to stand up, we need greater deployment, and we need it NOW.  This robust response must be coordinated, organized and executed under clear chain of command.

Today, in Monrovia, sick people are banging on the doors of MSF Ebola care centres, because they do not want to infect their families and they are desperate for a safe place in which to be isolated.

Tragically, our teams must turn them away.  We simply do not have enough capacity for them. Highly infectious people are forced to return home, only to infect others and continue the spread of this deadly virus.  All for a lack of international response.

As of today, MSF has sent more than 420 tonnes of supplies to the affected countries. We have 2,000 staff on the ground. We manage more than 530 beds in five different Ebola care centres. Yet we are overwhelmed.  We are honestly at a loss as to how a single, private NGO is providing the bulk of isolation units and beds.

We are unable to predict how the epidemic will spread. We are dealing largely with the unknown. But we do know that the number of recorded Ebola cases represents only a fraction of the real number of people infected.  We do know that transmission rates are at unprecedented levels. We do know that communities are being decimated. And, with certainty, we know that the ground response remains totally, and lethally, inadequate.

With every passing week, the epidemic grows exponentially. With every passing week, the response becomes all the more complicated.

More countries must deploy their civil defence and military assets, and medical teams, to contain the epidemic. Large numbers of trained staff are needed to tend to patients in basic and efficient isolation wards and tent hospitals, which can be established quickly on open ground in a comparatively straight forward logistical operation.

The fight against this outbreak is more than just about controlling the virus.  While thousands have died of Ebola, many more are dying from easily treatable conditions and diseases because health centres no longer function. Health structures need support to start working again and reduce death rates and suffering caused by other untreated ailments.

Meanwhile, efforts towards producing an effective vaccine must continue, in order to cut the chain of transmission. But it must be a vaccine of proven safety and efficiency and of wide availability.  Until that day comes, we must act as if no vaccine exists.

How the world deals with this unprecedented epidemic will be recorded in history books.  This is a regional crisis with economic, social and security implications that reach far beyond the borders of the affected countries.

States have a political and humanitarian responsibility to halt this mounting disaster

It can only be done by massively deploying assets to the field, and battling the epidemic at its roots.

The first pledges have been made, now more countries must urgently also mobilise. The clock is ticking.

Quote from: derspiess on September 16, 2014, 10:28:13 AM
Send supplies, money, whatever.  Just not people.

Quote from: Valmy on September 15, 2014, 11:13:27 PM
Took him long enough.  The UN should have been mobilizing a large response months ago.  I mean geez what good are they if they cannot facilitate a response to a disease?

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 16, 2014, 08:46:40 PM
People are what's needed most though. Not that it will help much. It's too late.

(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FR5sCqsX.png&hash=d62a8780b4d62e3f6ceeae0702af2d1a1951ef84)

Quote from: derspiess on September 17, 2014, 09:34:43 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 16, 2014, 08:46:40 PM
People are what's needed most though. Not that it will help much. It's too late.

Okay, then allow volunteers to go.  Just don't order servicemen & wimmenz over there FFS.

Quote from: The Brain on September 17, 2014, 11:43:30 AM
Why not?

Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 17, 2014, 11:58:20 AM
Because we have a lot invested in their training and it's not what they signed up for.

Anyone else who wants to order their military to the area should feel free to do so however.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 17, 2014, 11:58:20 AM

Quote from: The Brain on September 17, 2014, 11:43:30 AM
Why not?

Because we have a lot invested in their training and it's not what they signed up for.

Anyone else who wants to order their military to the area should feel free to do so however.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 17, 2014, 11:58:20 AM
Because we have a lot invested in their training and it's not what they signed up for.

Anyone else who wants to order their military to the area should feel free to do so however.

Quote from: Baron von Schtinkenbutt on September 17, 2014, 12:30:21 PM
Then I suppose the services should remove all the images of uniformed personnel providing humanitarian aid, including medical aid, from their recruiting materials?

Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 17, 2014, 12:40:50 PM

They should definitely scrub the ads with uniformed personnel dying of Ebola, if they have any in the works.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 17, 2014, 12:38:15 PM
Their purpose is what their Commander-in-Chief says it is.

Quote from: derspiess on September 17, 2014, 12:34:31 PM
That should not be their purpose.

Quote from: frunk on September 17, 2014, 12:44:15 PM
As well as the ones where they get their legs blown off by an IED.

Quote from: Jacob on September 17, 2014, 12:50:05 PM

Quote from: derspiess on September 17, 2014, 12:34:31 PM
That should not be their purpose.

Why not?

Quote from: derspiess on September 17, 2014, 12:46:46 PM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 17, 2014, 12:38:15 PM
Their purpose is what their Commander-in-Chief says it is.

:bleeding:

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 17, 2014, 01:12:48 PM
Somebody's got to be there to shoot all the Liberians fleeing to the Ivory Coast.

Quote from: Maximus on September 17, 2014, 01:31:11 PM

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 17, 2014, 01:12:48 PM
Somebody's got to be there to shoot all the Liberians fleeing to the Ivory Coast.

That's the real issue, IMO. If they end up enforcing a quarantine, they could end up shooting at unarmed, desperate people just trying to survive. Maybe that needs to be done, I don't know, but it's a far greater concern than that our troops might be going into harms way to help people.

Quote from: Maximus on September 17, 2014, 01:31:11 PM

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 17, 2014, 01:12:48 PM
Somebody's got to be there to shoot all the Liberians fleeing to the Ivory Coast.

That's the real issue, IMO. If they end up enforcing a quarantine, they could end up shooting at unarmed, desperate people just trying to survive. Maybe that needs to be done, I don't know, but it's a far greater concern than that our troops might be going into harms way to help people.

Quote from: Razgovory on September 17, 2014, 01:11:05 PM

Quote from: derspiess on September 17, 2014, 12:46:46 PM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 17, 2014, 12:38:15 PM
Their purpose is what their Commander-in-Chief says it is.

:bleeding:

Nope, he's right.  Their purpose is to follow orders.  If the President wants them to dress up like clowns then by God they will all wear stupid berets.

Quote from: derspiess on September 17, 2014, 01:04:57 PM

Quote from: Jacob on September 17, 2014, 12:50:05 PM

Quote from: derspiess on September 17, 2014, 12:34:31 PM
That should not be their purpose.

Why not?

Just my opinion.  The military's purpose should be to kill people and break things, not meals-on-wheels or wading into a sea of ebola.

Quote from: Jacob on September 17, 2014, 05:17:18 PM

No disaster relief, no infrastructure construction, no winning hearts and minds, just a pure focus on destruction?

Seems a bit limiting.

Quote from: Ed Anger on September 17, 2014, 08:23:56 PM
I'd round up Aspies and Anime fans and throw add them at to the problem.

Quote from: grumbler on September 17, 2014, 08:26:21 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on September 17, 2014, 08:23:56 PM
I'd round up Aspies and Anime fans and throw add them at to the problem.

FTFY  Excellent idea! :thumbsup:

Suggestion: Have the hipsters rounded up and in the camps ready to replace losses.

Quote from: grumbler on September 17, 2014, 08:14:21 PM

Quote from: Jacob on September 17, 2014, 05:17:18 PM

No disaster relief, no infrastructure construction, no winning hearts and minds, just a pure focus on destruction?

Seems a bit limiting.

To be fair to Spicey, there are lots of non-military organizations that engage in disaster relief, infrastructure construction, and winning hearts and minds, but there aren't any that have the mandate to kill people and break things.  It is okay to be limited to a specialty; that's more or less how modern society works.

Quote from: Jacob on September 17, 2014, 09:12:41 PM
Yeah, but my understanding is that the military gets more funding than all those other organizations put together, in part so it can deal with anything and everything.

I mean, if you want to keep the military purely a fighting organization (as opposed to primarily a fighting organization), you definitely have more say on the matter than I do. Personally, however, I'm under the impression that the US military has a pretty solid history of humanitarian efforts and disaster relief, and that that history has worked in favour of American interests (whether from straight up positive PR, or from keeping situations from escalating into situations less favourable for the US).

Quote from: grumbler on September 18, 2014, 06:15:09 AM
I am not disagreeing with you, but simply noting that the mission of the military is kill/break, and that Spicey is supportable in his assertion that these other capabilities exist to support the mission.  Personally, i don't have a problem using these other capabilities as long as the use doesn't detract from the mission (indeed, I would argue that using these capabilities enhances the mission, because it gives personnel valuable experience and allows them to evaluate the performance of their equipment and procedures in real-world circumstances).

Quote from: derspiess on September 18, 2014, 07:23:31 PM
That's nothing compared to wars & genocides in the region. Wake me up when it hits that level.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 18, 2014, 07:30:47 PM

Quote from: derspiess on September 18, 2014, 07:23:31 PM
That's nothing compared to wars & genocides in the region. Wake me up when it hits that level.

You do understand the concept of exponential growth do you not?

QuoteBy Elise Viebeck - 09/19/14 01:40 PM EDT

The U.S. government is preparing to announce new Ebola projections that include a worst-case scenario of 550,000 cases by January, according to a report.

The estimates are currently in development at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and would help provide a baseline to measure the effectiveness of the ramped-up American response to the outbreak.

The figures set to be released next week assume no additional intervention in West Africa, according to Bloomberg, which broke the news. Hundreds of thousands more people could contract the virus under that scenario, the numbers show.

Health officials and organizations are racing to contain Ebola, warning the outbreak is "spiraling out of control" with 2,630 dead as of this week. Cases are concentrated in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Libera, and present in two other countries.

CDC Director Tom Frieden has been a key advocate for Ebola victims within the Obama administration, urging the United States to intensify its response.

The White House announced Friday that its chief information officer, Steve VanRoekel, will be deployed to improve the use of technology and data to fight the epidemic.

Quoteentire households found dead with no effort at postmortem diagnosis.

QuoteThe most terrifying thing about Ebola

It is the disease threatening humanity by preying on humanity. Imagine: you are a parent whose child has suddenly come ill with fever - do you cast your child away?

20 Sep 2014 - 1:10 PM  UPDATED 20 Sep 2014 - 1:21 PM

As the Ebola epidemic in West Africa has spiraled out of control, affecting thousands of Liberians, Sierra Leonians, and Guineans, and threatening thousands more, the world's reaction has been glacially, lethally slow. Only in the past few weeks have heads of state begun to take serious notice. To date, the virus has killed more than 2,600 people. This is a comparatively small number when measured against much more established diseases such as malaria, HIV/AIDS, influenza, and so on, but several factors about this outbreak have some of the world's top health professionals gravely concerned:

    Its kill rate: In this particular outbreak, a running tabulation suggests that 54 percent of the infected die, though adjusted numbers suggest that the rate is much higher.
    Its exponential growth: At this point, the number of people infected is doubling approximately every three weeks, leading some epidemiologists to project between 77,000 and 277,000 cases by the end of 2014.
    The gruesomeness with which it kills: by hijacking cells and migrating throughout the body to affect all organs, causing victims to bleed profusely.
    The ease with which it is transmitted: through contact with bodily fluids, including sweat, tears, saliva, blood, urine, semen, etc., including objects that have come in contact with bodily fluids (such as bed sheets, clothing, and needles) and corpses.
    The threat of mutation: Prominent figures have expressed serious concerns that this disease will go airborne, and there are many other mechanisms through which mutation might make it much more transmissible.

Terrifying as these factors are, it is not clear to me that any of them capture what is truly, horribly tragic about this disease.

The most striking thing about the virus is the way in which it propagates. True, through bodily fluids, but to suggest as much is to ignore the conditions under which bodily contact occurs. Instead, the mechanism Ebola exploits is far more insidious. This virus preys on care and love, piggybacking on the deepest, most distinctively human virtues. Affected parties are almost all medical professionals and family members, snared by Ebola while in the business of caring for their fellow humans. More strikingly, 75 percent of Ebola victims are women, people who do much of the care work throughout Africa and the rest of the world. In short, Ebola parasitizes our humanity.



More than most other pandemic diseases (malaria, cholera, plague, etc.) and more than airborne diseases (influenza, swine flu, H5N1, etc.) that are transmitted indiscriminately through the air, this disease is passed through very minute amounts of bodily fluid. Just a slip of contact with the infected party and the caregiver herself can be stricken.

The images coming from Africa are chilling. Little boys, left alone in the street without parents, shivering and sick, untouchable by the throngs of people around them. Grown men, writhing at the door to a hospital, hoping for care as their parents stand helplessly, wondering how to help. Mothers and fathers, fighting weakness and exhaustion to move to the edge of a tent in order to catch a distant, final glimpse of a get-well video that their children have made for them.

If Ebola is not stopped, this disease can destroy whole families within a month, relatives of those families shortly thereafter, friends of those relatives after that, and on and on. As it takes hold (and it is taking hold fast), it cuts out the heart of family and civilization. More than the profuse bleeding and high kill rate, this is why the disease is terrifying. Ebola sunders the bonds that make us human.

Aid providers are now working fastidiously to sever these ties themselves, fighting hopelessly against the natural inclinations that people have to love and care for the ill. They have launched aggressive public information campaigns, distributed updates widely, called for more equipment and gear, summoned the military, tried to rein in the hysteria, and so on. Yet no sheet of plastic or latex can disrupt these human inclinations.

Such heroic efforts are the appropriate medical response to a virulent public health catastrophe. The public health community is doing an incredible job, facing unbelievable risks, relying on extremely limited resources. Yet these efforts can only do half of the work. Infected parties—not all, to be sure, but some (enough)—cannot abide by the rules of disease isolation. Some will act without donning protective clothing. Some will assist without taking proper measures. And still others will refuse to enter isolation units because doing so means leaving their families and their loved ones behind, abandoning their humanity, and subjecting themselves to the terror of dying a sterile, lonely death.

It is tempting, at these times, to focus on the absurd and senseless actions of a few. One of the primary vectors in Sierra Leone is believed to have been a traditional healer who had been telling people that she could cure Ebola. In Monrovia a few weeks back, angry citizens stormed a clinic and removed patients from their care. "There is no Ebola!" they are reported to have been shouting. More recently, the largest newspaper in Liberia published an article suggesting that Ebola is a conspiracy of the United States, aimed to undermine Africa. And, perhaps even more sadly, a team of health workers and journalists was just brutally murdered in Guinea. It is easy, in other words, to blame the spread on stupidity, or illiteracy, or ritualism, or conspiracy theories, or any number of other irrational factors.



But imagine: You are a parent whose child has suddenly come ill with a fever. Do you cast your child away and refuse to touch him? Do you cover your face and your arms? Stay back! Unclean! Or do you comfort your child when he asks for you, arms outstretched, to make the pain go away?

Imagine: You live in a home with five other family members. Your sister falls ill, ostensibly from Ebola, but possibly from malaria, typhoid, yellow fever, or the flu. You are aware of the danger to yourself and your other family members, but you have no simple means to move her, and she is too weak to move herself. What do you do?

Imagine: You are a child of 5 years old. Your mother is sick. She implores you to back away. But you are scared. What you need, more than anything, is a hug and a cry.

Who can blame a person for this? It is a terrible, awful predicament. A moral predicament. To stay, comfort, and give love and care to those who are in desperate need, or to shuttle them off into an isolation ward, perhaps never to see them again? What an inhumane decision this is.

What makes the Ebola virus so terrifying is not its kill rate, its exponential growth, the gruesome way in which it kills, the ease of transmission, or the threat of mutation, but rather that people who care can do almost nothing but sit on the sidelines and watch.

Will Ebola spread worldwide?

Many have asked whether Ebola could come here, come West. (The implication, in its way, is crass—as if to suggest that we need not be concerned about a tragedy unless it poses a threat to us.) We have been reassured that it will never spread widely here, because our public health networks are too strong, our hospitals too well-stocked. The naysayers may be right about this. But they are not right that it does not pose a threat to us.

But imagine: You are a parent whose child has suddenly come ill with fever. Do you cast your child away?

For starters, despite the pretense, the West is not immune from absurd, unscientific thinking. We have our fair share of scientific illiteracy, skepticism, ritualism, and foolishness. But beyond this, it is our similarities, not our differences, that make us vulnerable to this plague. We are human. Every mechanism we have for caring—touching, holding, feeding, playing, warming, comforting, caressing—every mechanism that we use to bind us to our families and our neighbors, is preyed upon by Ebola. We cannot seal each other into hyperbaric chambers and expect that once we emerge, the carnage will be over. We are humans, and we will care about our children and our families even if it means that we may die in doing so.

The lesson here is a vital one: People do not give up on humanity so very easily. Even if we persuade all of the population to forgo rituals like washing the dead, we will not easily persuade parents to keep from holding their sick children, children from clinging to their ailing parents, or children from playing and wrestling and slobbering all over one another. We tried to alter such behaviors with HIV/AIDS. A seemingly simple edict—"just lay off the sex with infected parties"—would seem all that is required to halt that disease. But we have learned over the decades that people do not give up sex so readily.



If you think curtailing sex is hard, love and compassion will be that much harder. Humans will never give this up—we cannot give this up, for it is fundamental to who we are. The more that medical personnel require this of people without also giving them methods to manifest care, the more care and compassion will manifest in pockets outside of quarantine. And the more humanity that manifests unchecked, the more space this virus has to grow. Unchecked humanity will seep through the cracks and barriers that we build to keep our families safe, and if left to find its own way, will carry a lethal payload.

The problem is double-edged. Ebola threatens humanity by preying on humanity. The seemingly simple solution is to destroy humanity ourselves—to seal everything off and let the disease burn out on its own. But doing so means destroying ourselves in order to save ourselves, which is no solution at all.



We must find a method of caring without touching, of contacting without making contact. The physiological barriers are, for the time being, necessary. But we cannot stop people from caring about one another, so we must create, for the time being, mechanisms for caring. Since we will never be able to beat back humanity, we must coordinate humanity, at the family level, the local level, and the global level.

The only one way to battle a disease that affixes itself parasitically to our humanity is to overwhelm it with greater, stronger humanity. To immunize Africa and the rest of the world with a blast of humanity so powerful that the disease can no longer take root. What it will take to beat this virus is to turn its most powerful vehicle, our most powerful weapon, against it.

Here are some things we can do:

Donate to the great organizations that are working tirelessly to bring this disease under control. They need volunteers, medical supplies, facilities, transportation, food, etc. Share information about Ebola, so people will learn about it, know about it, and know how to address it when it comes. And inform and help others. It is natural at a time of crisis to call for sealing the borders, to build fences and walls that separate us further from outside threats. But a disease that infects humanity cannot easily be walled off in this way. Walling off just creates unprotected pockets of humanity, divisions between us and them: my family, your family; that village, this village; inside, outside.



One final thing.

When Prince Prospero, ill-fated protagonist of Edgar Allan Poe's story "The Masque of the Red Death," locked himself in his castle to avoid a contagion that was sweeping his country—a disease that caused "profuse bleeding at the pores"—he assumed mistakenly that the only reasonable solution to his problem was to remove himself from the scene. For months he lived lavishly, surrounded by courtiers, improvisatori, buffoons, musicians, and wine, removed from danger while the pestilence wrought havoc outside.

As with much of Poe's writing, Prospero's tale does not end well. For six months, all was calm. He and his courtiers enjoyed their lives, secure and isolated from the plague laying waste to the countryside. Then, one night during a masquerade ball, the Red Death snuck into the castle, hidden behind a mask and a cloak, to afflict Prospero and his revelers, dropping them one by one in the "blood-bedewed halls." Prospero's security was a façade, leaving darkness and decay to hold "illimitable dominion over all." The eventual intrusion that would be his undoing foretells of a danger in believing that we can keep the world's ills at bay by keeping our distance.

If we seek safety by shutting out the rest of the world, we are in for a brutally ugly awakening. Nature is a cruel mistress, but Ebola is her cruelest, most devious trick yet.

Quote from: derspiess on September 18, 2014, 07:23:31 PM
That's nothing compared to wars & genocides in the region. Wake me up when it hits that level.

Quote from: Valmy on September 21, 2014, 11:16:14 PM

Quote from: derspiess on September 18, 2014, 07:23:31 PM
That's nothing compared to wars & genocides in the region. Wake me up when it hits that level.

So...we wake you up and what is it exactly that you will do?

Quote from: Valmy on September 21, 2014, 11:20:56 PM
This is crazy, I cannot believe this is not on every headline around the world.  We are sure waking up slowly to this.  It is just amazing the extent this is allowed to go on unchecked. 

Quote from: Liep on September 22, 2014, 01:57:22 AM

Quote from: Valmy on September 21, 2014, 11:20:56 PM
This is crazy, I cannot believe this is not on every headline around the world.  We are sure waking up slowly to this.  It is just amazing the extent this is allowed to go on unchecked. 

Isn't this just another horrible thing we're ignoring in Africa? Famine and war kills so many more each day and yet that never headlines anywhere.

Quote from: Valmy on September 21, 2014, 11:20:56 PM
This is crazy, I cannot believe this is not on every headline around the world.  We are sure waking up slowly to this.  It is just amazing the extent this is allowed to go on unchecked.

Quote from: grumbler on September 22, 2014, 05:02:04 AM
Is it possible that we have simple inured ourselves to tragedy in Africa? 

Quote from: Liep on September 22, 2014, 05:52:16 AM

Quote from: grumbler on September 22, 2014, 05:02:04 AM
Is it possible that we have simple inured ourselves to tragedy in Africa? 

you just can't expect the west to mobilise before the really big numbers actually start ticking I'm.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 22, 2014, 06:30:52 AM

Quote from: Liep on September 22, 2014, 05:52:16 AM

Quote from: grumbler on September 22, 2014, 05:02:04 AM
Is it possible that we have simple inured ourselves to tragedy in Africa? 

you just can't expect the west to mobilise before the really big numbers actually start ticking I'm.

When the big numbers start rolling in nothing can be done. You'll have failed states, civil war, famine and refugees streaming into neighboring countries, bring the disease there. You have to stop these kinds of things at the start.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 22, 2014, 06:30:52 AM
You'll have failed states, civil war, famine and refugees streaming into neighboring countries, bring the disease there. You have to stop these kinds of things at the start.

Quote from: derspiess on September 22, 2014, 05:07:29 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 22, 2014, 06:30:52 AM
You'll have failed states, civil war, famine and refugees streaming into neighboring countries, bring the disease there. You have to stop these kinds of things at the start.

Yes.  It would suck if that someday happened in Africa.

Quote from: Liep on September 22, 2014, 05:52:16 AM
I agree  that this has the potential to become catastrophic, but there's still famine and HIV and what have you. People still remember that whole Kody affair too and coupled with stories of people raiding hospitals you just can't expect the west to mobilise before the really big numbers actually start ticking I'm.

Quote from: alfred russel on September 22, 2014, 06:10:12 PM
I'm not certain "the West" / NGOs really have the capability to stop the "exponential growth" - assuming that is what is going to come to pass. The reasons this is an outbreak in West Africa -- poor sanitation, lack of access to and trust in medical care, inadequate medical facilities, lack of effective quarantine control, etc., can't be realistically fixed in short order.

Quote from: Valmy on September 22, 2014, 05:37:09 PM

Quote from: Liep on September 22, 2014, 05:52:16 AM
I agree  that this has the potential to become catastrophic, but there's still famine and HIV and what have you. People still remember that whole Kody affair too and coupled with stories of people raiding hospitals you just can't expect the west to mobilise before the really big numbers actually start ticking I'm.

Is there nobody else in the world besides the west?

Quote from: Valmy on September 22, 2014, 05:37:09 PM

Quote from: Liep on September 22, 2014, 05:52:16 AM
I agree  that this has the potential to become catastrophic, but there's still famine and HIV and what have you. People still remember that whole Kody affair too and coupled with stories of people raiding hospitals you just can't expect the west to mobilise before the really big numbers actually start ticking I'm.

Is there nobody else in the world besides the west?  I thought we had a UN and all these NGOs to handle things like this.  But they blew it and soon this is going to be a problem that will burn enormous resources and lives to contain.  Would have been nice when all it required was a few beds and doctors for one of the organizations that are supposed to handle that take care of it.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 22, 2014, 07:42:49 PM
Doctors Without Borders has been giving it's all, but it just doesn't have the resources to supply the medical care needed for three nations of 20 million people.

Quote from: Legbiter on September 22, 2014, 07:48:28 PM
It'll get better soon Tim, don't worry.

Quote from: Valmy on September 22, 2014, 07:46:39 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 22, 2014, 07:42:49 PM
Doctors Without Borders has been giving it's all, but it just doesn't have the resources to supply the medical care needed for three nations of 20 million people.

That a fact?  Glad to hear it.

Quote...what soon became troubling to Batchyli were the phone calls from people who saw the hand of foreigners behind the epidemic. The logic followed a pattern: the virus had never been anywhere near Guinea before. Then the white people came, and only at that point did talk of "Ebola" start. The foreigners had come so fast that they had actually out-run their own messaging: there were trucks full of foreigners in yellow space suits motoring into villages to take people into isolation before people understood why isolation was necessary.

Even if you understood the reasons, the message from the government and the health workers (and the local media) had undercut the incentive to cooperate. If Ebola was a death sentence, what was the point? The public-service announcements had not been subtle—they didn't explain that mortality rates vary or that, with supportive care, patients do survive (as half the Ebola patients at the M.S.F. treatment center in Conakry had done). To a villager, the isolation centers were fearsome places. They offered a one-way maze through white tarpaulins and waist-high orange fencing. Relatives or friends went in and then you lost them. You couldn't see what was happening inside the tents—you just saw the figures in goggles and full-body protective gear. The health workers move carefully in order to avoid tears and punctures; from a distance, the effect is robotic. The health workers don't look like any people you've ever seen. They perform stiffly and slowly, and then they disappear into the tent where your mother or brother may be, and everything that happens inside is left to your imagination.Villagers began to whisper to one another—They're harvesting our organs; they're taking our limbs.

The process of finding and isolating infected patients was on one level effective and on another deeply disorienting. Batchyli didn't fully grasp the implications at the time. Nobody did. But people in Guinea were as frightened by the response to Ebola as they were by Ebola itself. As the international community started to make significant progress against the epidemic, people in the Forest Region and in the capital were starting to shut health workers out. Fear was proving to be a contagion: You want to hide from the disease. You want to deny that you have it. You want to retreat to your village behind a phalanx of family members, and when the men in space suits come looking for you, you want to crawl under the bed. And you do—and your family members throw stones at the people in space suits, and so they leave.

This dynamic did not at first register. What the medical teams in Guinea saw was that, barely a month after the international community's response began, the incidence of reported infections stopped rising, then declined. It continued to drop. In early May, the Ebola-treatment center inside Donka hospital, in Conakry, reached a milestone: a full week had elapsed since its last Ebola case. Another week passed, with nobody testing positive. The work until then had been so intense and so extraordinarily draining—working in the heat in full Tyvek suits, treating patients who often died and who posed a direct threat to care-givers—that the mood after two Ebola-free weeks was one of relief, bordering on celebration.

Another week passed in Conakry with no Ebola victims. Things slowed even further. A few patients came in and were triaged to the "suspected" section of the treatment center; none tested positive. Relief gave way to boredom. The medical team began making work for itself—taking a full inventory of supplies, cleaning and re-disinfecting tents.

Yet another week passed: once again, Ebola-free. Then, in late May, more good news. At the daily coordination meeting, a Ministry of Health representative announced that the last outstanding contact had been symptom-free for 21 days. The implication was clear: if everyone who had come into physical contact with an Ebola patient was symptom-free after the virus's incubation period had expired, there effectively was no one left who could be infected.

In Guéckédou, medical personnel received the news from the capital by phone. There were still a few patients at the treatment center there, but after an onslaught of 163 Ebola cases in that one prefecture, 119 of them fatal, the team was now following contact cases in only two villages. The news from Conakry tracked with what they were seeing in the Forest Region.

The President of Guinea announced that "for the moment, the situation is well in hand." The foreigners began to leave. The C.D.C. cycled its staff out of Guinea. At the treatment center at Donka hospital, preparations went forward to hand leadership over to local staff. By this point, toward the end of May, there had been 248 clinical cases of Ebola throughout Guinea, and 171 deaths. But there were no more cases in the pipeline. The worst was over.

Much of the medical community in Conakry savored a moment of respite. But it was illusory. As the doctors would learn all too soon, many people had simply stopped cooperating with health workers. They had gone to ground and taken Ebola with them—until so many people had become sick in a community that it was no longer possible to conceal them.

On May 27, a patient with Ebola was admitted to the treatment center in Conakry—the first such patient in a month. On June 2, five more people with Ebola were admitted. On June 3, two more arrived. The cases weren't coming from just Conakry. They were also coming from places a hundred miles or more from the capital: Télimélé, Boffa—everywhere. Down in the Forest Region, between May 29 and June 1, there were 15 new Ebola cases. Out of nowhere, from a flat bottom, the curve had begun to rise, and to rise more steeply than ever.

QuoteRadio
Why Raising Money To Fight Ebola Is Hard

by Zoe Chace
September 22, 2014 4:24 PM ET

The response to the 2010 earthquake in Haiti was massive: Billions of dollars in donations poured in.

"It had everything," says Joel Charny, who works with InterAction, a group that coordinates disaster relief. "It had this element of being an act of God in one of the poorest countries on the planet that's very close to the United States. ... And the global public just mobilized tremendously."

People haven't responded to the Ebola outbreak in the same way; it just hasn't led to that kind of philanthropic response.

From the point of view of philanthropy, the Ebola outbreak is the opposite of the Haiti earthquake. It's far from the U.S. It's hard to understand. The outbreak emerged over a period of months — not in one dramatic moment — and it wasn't initially clear how bad it was.

Donors like being part of a recovery story. In Haiti, buildings and lives were destroyed. The pitch was, let's help them rebuild.

In the case of Ebola, it's been harder to make a pitch.

Doctors Without Borders tried to tell stories about Ebola for months. But much of the public wasn't listening. The story wasn't prominent in the news until things became dire. Experts who have worked on famine relief say their field is similar.

"There's plenty of early warning," says Gary Shaye, who works with Save the Children. "All the people on the ground know what's going to happen; they talk about it. But until it's something much more visible in the media, it's almost impossible to raise funds."

The Ebola outbreak is unimaginable, says Sophie Delaunay, the director of Doctors Without Borders in the U.S. "It is so horrific, that once you realize how dramatic the situation is, then you just keep thinking about Ebola all the time," Delaunay says. "But until you make that step, you prefer to get away from it."

Quote from: Valmy on September 22, 2014, 06:26:22 PM
When there were a small number of cases medical assistance would have been decisive. 

QuoteEbola virus in humans may be here to stay; fatality rate is 71%

By Monte Morin 

In a grim assessment of the Ebola epidemic, researchers say the deadly virus threatens to become endemic to West Africa instead of eventually disappearing from humans..

"The current epidemiologic outlook is bleak," wrote a panel of more than 60 World Health Organization experts in a study published Tuesday by the New England Journal of Medicine.

"We must therefore face the possibility that Ebola virus disease will become endemic among the human population of West Africa, a prospect that has never previously been contemplated."

In the absence of new control measures, the authors estimated that the total case load would exceed 20,000 by Nov 2.

"The numbers of cases of and deaths from EVD are expected to continue increasing from hundreds to thousands per week in the coming months," the authors wrote.

As of Monday, the United Nations health organization reported that out of a total of 5,864 confirmed and probable cases, 2,811 deaths have resulted.

"The true numbers of cases and deaths are certainly higher," the authors wrote. "There are numerous reports of symptomatic persons evading diagnosis and treatment, of laboratory diagnoses that have not been included in national databases, and of persons with suspected Ebola virus disease who were buried without a diagnosis having been made."

When a virus is slow to mutate, as Ebola appears to be, the pathogen steadily wanes as the number of people who have developed immunity increases. With proper controls, experts say the virus would find it increasingly difficult to spread among the population until it eventually disappeared from humans and survived only in its so-called animal reservoir, which is believed to be a fruit bat.

In this case however, epidemiologists fear that the virus could continue to linger in small pockets, extending its life in humans and potentially mutating in a way that makes fighting it more difficult.

In an accompanying editorial, Dr. Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust, and Dr. Peter Piot, director of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said the epidemic has helped to degrade an already meager system of healthcare.


This "disintegration" would have broad consequences and "only worsen as the epidemic progresses," they wrote.

"West Africa will see much more suffering and many more deaths during childbirth and from malaria, tuberculosis, HIV-AIDS, enteric and respiratory illnesses, diabetes, cancer, cardiovascular disease, and mental health during and after the Ebola epidemic."

Farrar and Piot also warned that here was "a very real danger of a complete breakdown in civic society."

In the WHO paper, researchers presented their first, full statistical snapshot of the epidemic, which gained a foothold in December of last year and has fallen hardest on Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

The majority of patients stricken by Ebola are 15 to 44 years old, with men and women suffering at a nearly equal rates, according to researchers. The case fatality rate -- based on confirmed cases only -- is 70.8%, with a slightly lower chance of death -- 64.3% -- for those admitted to a hospital.

Although the epidemic has already killed more people than all previous outbreaks combined, researchers said the virus now wreaking havoc on some of the world's poorest nations is no more lethal or virulent than other strains.

Instead, its rapid spread is due to "insufficient" control efforts, and a "large intermixing" population that has transported the virus across borders and between rural and urban areas.

In order to stop the epidemic, researchers say the rate of transmission would have to be cut in half. This would be equivalent to vaccinating 50% of the population.

Several experimental vaccines are under development, and -- if they prove to be effective -- won't be available in large quantities for months.

Study authors made the following observations on the effects of the outbreak.

The average age of a person infected with Ebola is 32, and 49.9% of patients are male, researchers said. The age group that has been most affected by the virus makes up 44% of the total population.

The most common symptoms reported by patients included fever (87.1%), fatigue (76.4%), loss of appetite (64.5%), vomiting (67.6%), diarrhea (65.6%), headache (53.4%), and abdominal pain (44.3%).

Although the disease is infamously known for causing bleeding, "specific hemorrhagic symptoms were rarely reported (in less than 1% to 5.7% of patients)," authors wrote. "Unexplained bleeding" however was reported in 18% of cases.

People age 45 or older faced a significantly greater threat of death, as did those who suffered a number of the following symptoms: diarrhea, conjunctivitis, difficulty breathing or swallowing, confusion or disorientation and coma, unexplained bleeding, bleeding gums, bloody nose, bleeding at injection sites and bleeding from the vagina.

"The risk of continued epidemic expansion and the prospect of endemic EVD in West Africa call for the most forceful implementation of present control measures and the rapid development and deployment of new drugs and vaccines," the authors concluded.

QuoteFresh Graves Point to Undercount of Ebola Toll

By ADAM NOSSITERSEPT. 22, 2014

FREETOWN, Sierra Leone — The gravedigger hacked at the cemetery's dense undergrowth, clearing space for the day's Ebola victims. A burial team, in protective suits torn with gaping holes, arrived with fresh bodies.

The backs of the battered secondhand vans carrying the dead were closed with twisted, rusting wire. Bodies were dumped in new graves, and a worker in a short-sleeve shirt carried away the stretcher, wearing only plastic bags over his hands as protection. The outlook for the day at King Tom Cemetery was busy.

"We will need much more space," said James C. O. Hamilton, the chief gravedigger, as a colleague cleared the bush with his machete.

The Ebola epidemic is spreading rapidly in Sierra Leone's densely packed capital — and it may already be far worse than the authorities acknowledge.

Since the beginning of the outbreak more than six months ago, the Sierra Leone Health Ministry reported only 10 confirmed Ebola deaths here in Freetown, the capital of more than one million people, and its suburbs as of Sunday — a hopeful sign that this city, unlike the capital of neighboring Liberia, had been relatively spared the ravages of the outbreak.

But the bodies pouring in to the graveyard tell a different story. In the last eight days alone, 110 Ebola victims have been buried at King Tom Cemetery, according to the supervisor, Abdul Rahman Parker, suggesting an outbreak that is much more deadly than either the government or international health officials have announced.

"I'm working with the burial team, and the first question I ask them is, 'Are they Ebola-positive?' " said Mr. Parker, adding that the figures were based on medical certificates that he had seen himself. The deaths are carefully recorded by name and date in a notebook headed "Ebola Burials."

A burial team supervisor who drove up with fresh bodies echoed Mr. Parker's assertion. "Any body we collect is a positive case," said Sorie Kessebeh. "All the bodies that we are bringing in are positive."

Beyond the many worrisome trends in the Ebola epidemic seizing parts of West Africa — the overflowing hospitals, the presence of the disease in crowded cities, the deaths of scores of health workers trying to help — another basic problem has stymied attempts to contain the disease: No one seems to know how bad the outbreak really is.

The World Health Organization acknowledged weeks ago that despite its efforts to tally the thousands of cases in the region, the official statistics probably "vastly underestimate the magnitude of the outbreak."

Here in Sierra Leone, the government just finished an aggressive national lockdown to get a handle on the epidemic, ordering the entire country to stay indoors for three days as an army of volunteers went door to door, explaining the dangers of the virus and trying to root out hidden pockets of illness.

Still, the Health Ministry spokesman insisted that the epidemic was not as bad as the flow of bodies at the cemetery suggested.

"It is not possible that all of them are Ebola-related deaths," said Sidie Yahya Tunis, the Health Ministry spokesman, saying the corpses included people who died of other causes.

But as the cemetery records show, the challenge facing the government might be of a different magnitude than previously thought.

The majority of the recent deaths recorded at the cemetery were young people — young adults, people in early middle age, or children — with very few elderly people on the list. Several of the deaths also occurred in a concentrated area, sometimes in the same house, suggesting that a virulent infection had struck.

At the house of Marion Seisay — the third name on the list — her son acknowledged she was a secretary at Wilberforce Hospital, had died of Ebola and was buried on Sept. 14. The house was now under quarantine, with some of its eight residents lingering on the cinder-block porch.

"The way my Mummy died was pathetic," said the son, Michael Foday, clearly frustrated by the quarantine. "How do you expect us to get food?"

Other houses in Wilberforce Barracks, the village-like compound surrounding the hospital, were on the list of the dead and placed under quarantine, marked off from the surrounding jumble of shacks and cinder-block houses by a thin line of red or blue string.

In one of them, the house of Momoh Lomeh, the residents said that a total of five people who lived there had died of Ebola — yet four of them did not even appear on the cemetery list. At another, the house of Andrew Mansoray, a family member said that the disease had been ruthless and unrelenting.

"It wouldn't stop," Abdul R. Kallon said of the diarrhea that Mr. Mansoray, his brother-in-law, had endured before dying. "They took him to the hospital, and they wouldn't let him out."

At another six households on the cemetery supervisor's list of the dead, residents gave similar accounts. One family said the victim had definitely died of Ebola, while five others described Ebola-like symptoms — vomiting, diarrhea, fever — though none had been given an official cause of death.

International health experts here had no explanation for the striking discrepancy between the government's tally of the dead in the capital and the cemetery crew's statistics. Several of them noted the general confusion surrounding official statistics here from the beginning, with one leading international health official saying: "We don't know exactly what is going on."

But nobody disputed that things appear to be getting worse. The W.H.O. has shown a sharp increase in new cases in Freetown in recent weeks, rising from almost none early in the summer to more than 50 during the week of Sept. 14.

Various models of the growth of the epidemic here "all show an exponential increase," said Peter H. Kilmarx, the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention team in Sierra Leone. "The conditions are amenable to Ebola spread."

The goal of the government's national lockdown was to reach every household in the country, and officials claimed success in doing so on Monday, saying that progress had been made in the fight against the disease.
Continue reading the main story Continue reading the main story
Continue reading the main story

But the exhaustion of the Ebola gravediggers at King Tom Cemetery, who dig as many as 16 graves a day, indicated that the disease was far from being contained.

"It's a herculean task," said Mr. Hamilton, the chief gravedigger. "It's only out of patriotism that we are doing it."

The Ebola victims were buried in an expanding stretch of fresh muddy graves under a giant cotton tree, and the makeshift arrangements are seen as a looming threat by the residents of the slum next to it. No barrier stops the pigs rooting in the adjoining trash field from digging in the fresh Ebola graves, which residents say they often do.

"We have creatures in the community, and they dig in the graves," said Henry S. Momoh, who lives in the adjoining slum, which residents call Kolleh Town. "They are burying the Ebola patients in there, but not in the proper manner."

Five yards from where the new graves begin, a well-used path connects the slum to the main road. Residents all use it, passing close to the freshly dug graves, and are frightened by the intensifying activity in the cemetery.

"Since last month, it's every day, any minute and hour, and often, they are coming" to bury the Ebola dead, said Desmond Kamara, a police officer.

A cloudy stream drains from the area of the new graves into the slum, further frightening the residents.

"We are at risk, big risk," said Ousman Kamara, a resident. "We have made many complaints."

But the bodies, he said, keep coming.

"Even at night," he said. "You stand here, and you see them coming."
Correction: September 22, 2014

A caption with an earlier version of this article misstated the sex of a possible victim of Ebola whose body was being removed from a house in Freetown, Sierra Leone. It was a man, not a woman.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 23, 2014, 09:12:56 AM
If Fox is to be trusted

QuoteAntonio Vigilante, head of the U.N. Development Programme in Liberia, said Liberia now had 350 to 400 beds for Ebola patients, but that fell far short of the 2,000 needed.

"Even if we are at 2,000 beds two or three weeks from now, the cases we'll have in any single day may be more than that," he said.

QuoteIf they are able to increase the percentage from 10 to 13 starting today, hit 25 percent on October 23, 40 percent on November 22, and the 70-percent goal by December 22, the outbreak will peak at up to 3,408 daily cases, and will drop to less than 300 daily cases by late January.

If they don't start increasing from 10 to 13 percent until October 23, there could be 10,646 daily cases (accounting for underreporting), and if it's pushed back to November 22, there could be 25,847 daily cases by January 20, 2015, according to the CDC's Ebola Response model. In that case, there could be more than 1.4 million cases of Ebola in two countries with a combined population of approximately 10.4 million people.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 24, 2014, 02:29:12 AM
It's time for someone to say it like it is rather than pussy footing around it.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 23, 2014, 11:41:37 PM
Dude with the awesome name is right, I just don't see how this is going to be able to be turned around. :(

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 24, 2014, 02:29:12 AM
They only cover S. Leone and Liberia, they do not count Guinea.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 24, 2014, 02:29:12 AM
If three quarters of the population of S. Leone, Liberia and Guinea contract the virus and 70% die that's 52.5% off the population dead just from that. That's 11 million people. How many more will die from starvation, other diseases and injuries that can no longer be treated, and conflict over dwindling food and medical supplies?

Quote from: derspiess on September 24, 2014, 10:57:20 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 24, 2014, 02:29:12 AM
They only cover S. Leone and Liberia, they do not count Guinea.

I always wondered how Sergio died :(

Quote from: Zanza on September 24, 2014, 12:27:02 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 24, 2014, 02:29:12 AM
If three quarters of the population of S. Leone, Liberia and Guinea contract the virus and 70% die that's 52.5% off the population dead just from that. That's 11 million people. How many more will die from starvation, other diseases and injuries that can no longer be treated, and conflict over dwindling food and medical supplies?

The 70% in the article reference the number of patients in quarantine. The article gives a figure of 550.000-1.400.000 victims. That's admittedly terrible, but way short of your number.

QuoteHome Deaths Spread Circle of Contagion

By NORIMITSU ONISHI
September 24, 2014

MONROVIA, Liberia — The family of the sick man, who had endured Ebola's telltale symptoms for six days, took him by taxi to treatment centers here in the capital twice, only to be turned back at the gate each time for lack of beds. He died at home, his arms thrashing violently and blood spewing out his mouth, in front of his sons.

"We had to carry him home two times because they could do nothing for us," said Eric Gweah, 25, as a team of body collectors came to retrieve the corpse of his father, Ofori Gweah, 62. "The only thing the government can do is come for bodies. They are killing us."

So many Ebola victims are dying at home because of the severe shortage of treatment centers here in Monrovia, Liberia's capital, that they are infecting family members, neighbors and others in a ballooning circle of contagion.

Only 18 percent of Ebola patients in Liberia are being cared for in hospitals or other settings that reduce the risk of transmission by isolating them from the rest of the population, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Unless that rate reaches 70 percent, the center predicted this week, Ebola cases will keep soaring.

In its worst-case estimate, Liberia and Sierra Leone, two of the three West African nations hit hardest by the outbreak, could face 1.4 million infections by Jan. 20 — more than 10 percent of their combined populations of about 10.3 million.

In the coming weeks, the United States military will try to overhaul the fight against Ebola in Liberia, home to 1,580 of the 2,800 Ebola deaths so far recorded in West Africa. The 3,000-strong American mission will not treat patients, but will build as many as 17 treatment centers, with a total of 1,700 beds, and try to train 500 health workers a week.

But building the centers is expected to take weeks and it is unclear who will run them, especially since the disease has decimated Liberia's already weak health care system and the fear of Ebola has long kept many international aid workers away.

"I've worked in many crises for more than 20 years, and it's the first time I can see a situation that nobody wants to come," said Jean-Pierre Veyrenche, who is heading the World Health Organization's efforts to build treatment centers here. "There's plenty of money, so that's not the issue."

"People are afraid to come — that's it," he added.

With treatment beds overflowing, the government is often left to simply pick up the bodies of the dead. As its six teams of body collectors crisscross this capital of 1.5 million people, navigating cratered streets left over from the 14-year civil war that ended in 2003, they encounter a city that is likely to remain at the mercy of Ebola for weeks, perhaps months.

Every day, each team retrieves a half-dozen to a couple of dozen bodies, delivering them to a crematorium at the end of the day.

The body collectors who came to pick up Mr. Gweah had descended to the compound where he lived four times in the past four weeks, down a steep cliff to a riverside area called Rockspring Valley. Each week, they had picked up a body that passed on the Ebola virus to the next person, and now Mr. Gweah's was the fifth body. The crowd, seething beneath a sky of low clouds, erupted in anger.

"If the government can't work it out, let them give it up," said Marvin Gweah, 28, another son. "Let the international community handle this."

Five body collectors in full protective suits clambered up the cliff in the rain, carrying his father's body in a black plastic bag, resting to readjust their grip, and steadying themselves on the slippery path. Eric Gweah, his face twisted in anguish, led the way, shrieking "Papa!" and throwing his hands up in the air, nearly losing his footing.

"Stand up! Stand up!" a woman following the body collectors shouted at another woman who had fainted. A cacophony of wailing and sobbing rose as all of Rockspring Valley below seemed to sway in grief.

A new 120-bed treatment center, Island Clinic, operated by Liberian health workers under the W.H.O., opened here on Sunday, bringing Liberia's total beds to 450. The agency is hoping to open two additional centers with a total of 400 beds here in the capital over the next month, but is unable to find international workers to operate them, Mr. Veyrenche said.

Last week in Bong County, in central Liberia, the International Medical Corps began operating a treatment center built by Save the Children. The Medical Corps and Doctors Without Borders are the only international organizations operating treatment centers in Liberia.

Sean Casey, the leader of the Medical Corps in Liberia, said he hoped to increase the center's current capacity of 10 beds to 70 beds over the next six weeks. But because of the fear of Ebola and the time commitment required of foreign volunteers, the organization has been unable to draw doctors and nurses from its usual pool, he said. The organization is recruiting health workers for the first time in the Philippines, Jordan and Ethiopia.

Like most experts here, Mr. Casey was skeptical of the American military's plans to find and train 500 health workers a week.

"It took us a few weeks to just open 10 beds," he said. "It worries me that some of their facilities will be open before they're ready."

Here in Monrovia, the first city to face Ebola's full onslaught since the virus was discovered in 1976, entire families are dying at home, unable to get a ride in one of the city's few ambulances or gain admission to overcrowded treatment or holding centers.

"We came here for the husband last week, we're back today for the wife, and maybe next week we'll be back for the children," said Alexander Nyanti, 23, a body collector who was picking up the corpse of Lorpu David, 30, in a central Monrovia neighborhood off Gurley Street.

A week earlier, his team visited the same house to retrieve the body of her husband, Sam David, the first Ebola death in that community. The couple shared one room with their two children and the wife's younger sister.

"The little boy is not feeling all right," John Sackie, the community's chairman, said as four collectors pulled Ms. David out of a dark room in the back of the house, each grasping a limb.

Others from the community may have been exposed. Teddy Momo, 36, the husband's nephew, said he had taken the ailing Ms. David to an Ebola treatment center, riding in the front passenger seat of a taxi as Ms. David shared the back with her two children and sister.

Turned away because of a lack of beds, they took the taxi back to Gurley Street. But Ms. David slipped and hit her chin on a rocky path leading to her house; a neighbor carried her home, where she died immediately, Mr. Momo said.

Even if there were enough treatment centers, not all families would send their sick relatives to them. Deeply distrustful of the government and fearful of becoming social outcasts, families often lie about the cause of death, furthering the contagion throughout their communities.

In front of the gate at the John F. Kennedy Medical Center's maternity ward, a pregnant woman lay dead in the back seat of a taxi. She had died during labor and did not suffer from Ebola, her family insisted. But a hospital worker said the woman had been bleeding from her mouth, so she had been turned away from the maternity ward. When the body collectors finally opened the taxi door, they found that she had vomited blood.

In the Matadi neighborhood, community leaders, including a member of the local Ebola task force, said emphatically that another death, of a 24-year-old man, had resulted from epilepsy. But again, the body collectors found blood coming from his mouth, more evidence of the virus.

In a neighborhood called PHP, community leaders who had gathered in a mosque explained that a 75-year-old woman had died of a stroke. Absolutely no Ebola, they said, as Mark Korvayan, 37, the leader of a team of body collectors, nodded.

But as his team went to pick up the body from a dank room, Mr. Korvayan said that he had picked up the woman's daughter and nephew from the same room in the past month.

"They're trying to cover it up," he said. "It's our third time here."

As he had often seen, this community, caught up in its own denials, continued to engage in funeral practices that helped spread Ebola, he said. "They told me that somebody even bathed the old woman's body."

Quote from: Crazy_Ivan80 on September 25, 2014, 05:16:47 AM
The world gets to see how things go when the West isn't involved, or is barely involved. Let it be a rude awakening for the West's many detractors

QuoteThe fall in the number of new cases shown in figure 1 is largely attributable to a sharp drop in the number of confirmed new cases reported from Liberia. Notably, there were no new reported confirmed cases from the capital, Monrovia, which in previous weeks has reported a surge in cases.

These data differ from credible reports obtained from responders in Liberia, who indicate a deterioration of the situation in the country, and in Monrovia in particular. In addition, there have been a large number of suspected new cases (and deaths among suspected cases) reported from Liberia over the past week, which are not included in Figure 1, but are set out in table 1.

Quote from: Lettow77 on September 25, 2014, 06:27:38 AM
Tim, i'm surprised Ebola-chan's got you so worked up. You realize this is, of course, merely an African matter?

Quote from: Fate on March 23, 2014, 11:39:39 PM

Meh. Since the initial 1967 outbreak Ebola and Marburg have only killed 3000 people. Ebola doesn't spread quickly because it requires direct contact with the host's fluids to become infected. You don't need Outbreak style spacesuits to prevent spread. Gloves and gown are enough.

It'd be much more contagious if it spread via a fecal-oral route like polio or respiratory droplets like influenza.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 25, 2014, 06:36:48 AM

Quote from: Lettow77 on September 25, 2014, 06:27:38 AM
Tim, i'm surprised Ebola-chan's got you so worked up. You realize this is, of course, merely an African matter?

Nope, it's definitely going blow up in some other 3rd world slum somewhere, whether in south/southeast Asia or Latin America.

Quote from: Crazy_Ivan80 on September 25, 2014, 05:16:47 AM
The world gets to see how things go when the West isn't involved, or is barely involved. Let it be a rude awakening for the West's many detractors

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 25, 2014, 06:36:48 AM
Nope, it's definitely going blow up in some other 3rd world slum somewhere, whether in south/southeast Asia or Latin America.

Quote from: Lettow77 on September 25, 2014, 06:50:33 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 25, 2014, 06:36:48 AM

Quote from: Lettow77 on September 25, 2014, 06:27:38 AM
Tim, i'm surprised Ebola-chan's got you so worked up. You realize this is, of course, merely an African matter?

Nope, it's definitely going blow up in some other 3rd world slum somewhere, whether in south/southeast Asia or Latin America.

I can see why you are worried then, but I don't suppose America will stand by and let Puerto Rico writhe in anguish.

Quote from: Lettow77 on September 25, 2014, 06:50:33 AM
I can see why you are worried then, but I don't suppose America will stand by and let Puerto Rico writhe in anguish.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 25, 2014, 07:31:25 AM

Quote from: Lettow77 on September 25, 2014, 06:50:33 AM
I can see why you are worried then, but I don't suppose America will stand by and let Puerto Rico writhe in anguish.

Even Puerto Ricans have more sense than West African witch doctor worshippers.

QuoteThey dont bathe their dead with the whole family present, they just drop the suspension and put an oversized spoiler on the corpse.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 24, 2014, 05:46:41 PM

Quote from: Zanza on September 24, 2014, 12:27:02 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 24, 2014, 02:29:12 AM
If three quarters of the population of S. Leone, Liberia and Guinea contract the virus and 70% die that's 52.5% off the population dead just from that. That's 11 million people. How many more will die from starvation, other diseases and injuries that can no longer be treated, and conflict over dwindling food and medical supplies?

The 70% in the article reference the number of patients in quarantine. The article gives a figure of 550.000-1.400.000 victims. That's admittedly terrible, but way short of your number.

Once hundreds of thousands have contracted the disease there will be no stopping it from spreading throughout the population until it burns out. What I wrote is just an extrapolation of that.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 25, 2014, 06:08:45 AM

Quote from: Crazy_Ivan80 on September 25, 2014, 05:16:47 AM
The world gets to see how things go when the West isn't involved, or is barely involved. Let it be a rude awakening for the West's many detractors

We'll just be criticized for not intervening in time. That's just how it goes.

Quote from: Lettow77 on September 25, 2014, 06:50:33 AM
I can see why you are worried then, but I don't suppose America will stand by and let Puerto Rico writhe in anguish.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on September 25, 2014, 07:31:25 AM
They dont bathe their dead with the whole family present, they just drop the suspension and put an oversized spoiler on the corpse.

Quote from: Zanza on September 25, 2014, 08:25:52 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 24, 2014, 05:46:41 PM

Quote from: Zanza on September 24, 2014, 12:27:02 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 24, 2014, 02:29:12 AM
If three quarters of the population of S. Leone, Liberia and Guinea contract the virus and 70% die that's 52.5% off the population dead just from that. That's 11 million people. How many more will die from starvation, other diseases and injuries that can no longer be treated, and conflict over dwindling food and medical supplies?

The 70% in the article reference the number of patients in quarantine. The article gives a figure of 550.000-1.400.000 victims. That's admittedly terrible, but way short of your number.

Once hundreds of thousands have contracted the disease there will be no stopping it from spreading throughout the population until it burns out. What I wrote is just an extrapolation of that.

What you wrote is an extrapolation of the extrapolation in the article based on an erronous understanding of what the article talks about.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 25, 2014, 06:36:48 AM
Also, Fate Lied, Millions Died!

Quote from: Fate on March 23, 2014, 11:39:39 PM

Meh. Since the initial 1967 outbreak Ebola and Marburg have only killed 3000 people. Ebola doesn't spread quickly because it requires direct contact with the host's fluids to become infected. You don't need Outbreak style spacesuits to prevent spread. Gloves and gown are enough.

It'd be much more contagious if it spread via a fecal-oral route like polio or respiratory droplets like influenza.

Quote from: Caliga on September 25, 2014, 07:14:39 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 25, 2014, 06:36:48 AM
Nope, it's definitely going blow up in some other 3rd world slum somewhere, whether in south/southeast Asia or Latin America.

:hmm:

I don't think there is much population exchange between slums in Monrovia and slums in say Rio de Janeiro.

QuoteEbola Epidemic Worsening, Sierra Leone Increases Quarantine Restrictions

By ADAM NOSSITERSEPT. 25, 2014

FREETOWN, Sierra Leone — Acknowledging that the Ebola epidemic sweeping Sierra Leone was worsening, officials here put hundreds of thousands more citizens under quarantine on Thursday, sealing off more than a quarter of the country and warning travelers not to get out of their vehicles in the districts under isolation.

Nearly all of the country's 14 districts are now under either total or partial quarantine, with over one million people affected, as the disease advances into new areas. Infection rates have been rising in the capital, Freetown, a dangerous development because of the city's density.

In an address to citizens late Wednesday night, President Ernest Bai Koroma acknowledged that the new quarantine orders would "definitely pose great difficulties for our people," but he suggested that officials had little choice. Makeni, the largest city in the country's Northern Province, is in one of the newly quarantined districts, and foreign health care workers are particularly worried about a surge in infections there.

In what appeared to be an acknowledgment that official statistics had so far been misleading, the government said the country's plight was "worse than what was being reflected in reports," adding that there was a "desperate need to step up our response."

A Western diplomat here called Mr. Koroma's newest restrictive order, coming after a three-day national lockdown that required every citizen to stay inside, "a mitigating measure reacting to a worsening situation." The diplomat added, "Tahe numbers are not getting better."

The World Health Organization, echoing the government's increasingly worried tone, said Thursday that the "situation in Sierra Leone continues to deteriorate," noting a "sharp increase" in new Ebola cases in Freetown, rising to more than 80 for the week ending Sept. 21.

The W.H.O. said Thursday that there had been 597 deaths in the country and 1,940 Ebola cases, nearly a third of the total for the three West African countries most affected; the other two are Guinea and Liberia.

Over all, the W.H.O. reported, there have been 2,917 deaths from Ebola. At least 2,909 people have died in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, with 6,242 reported Ebola cases over all, according to its latest report. Nigeria and Senegal have recorded a total of eight deaths and 21 cases of infection.

The numbers for Sierra Leone come from the Ministry of Health, and diplomats and international health officials say they are largely inaccurate, substantially underplaying the gravity of the situation on the ground. "Even a 2-year-old child can look at them and see they don't add up," the Western diplomat here said.

The W.H.O. added a veiled caveat to the statistics in its latest report as in the preceding one, saying that they were "subject to change" because of "ongoing reclassification." Indeed cemetery workers here in the capital report that Ebola deaths far exceed what the government has so far acknowledged.

In contrast, in Guinea, the W.H.O. reported, the number of new cases appears to be rising more slowly.

"The situation in Guinea, although still of grave concern, appears to have stabilized," the W.H.O. said, observing that the number of new cases in the capital, Conakry, was moderate and stable.

The outbreaks in Nigeria and Senegal were "pretty much contained," the health organization's Africa office reported this week, noting that Senegal had recorded only one case of infection at the end of August, and that Nigeria had not found any new cases since Sept. 8.

The streets of Sierra Leone remained uncharacteristically quiet and uncongested Thursday, three days after the government completed the national lockdown intended to "sensitize" citizens on Ebola's dangers and to root out hidden cases. Officials acknowledge that the economic slowdown because of Ebola continues to bite hard.

Mr. Koroma pronounced the lockdown a success, saying it had "achieved its objectives." But with the latest measures, it seemed clear that the government was determined to go further, adding new restrictions to citizens' movements.

With hospital beds well below what are needed for the number of cases, a national health care system that is "invisible," as one leading foreign medical worker here put it, and the international response only now gearing up, the government here is left to pursue the only means at its disposal: coercion.

Travel through the districts under isolation to those that are not is now restricted to the hours between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. In individual infected chiefdoms — traditional administrative units — within the newly quarantined districts, Mr. Koroma took the extraordinary step of warning citizens not to "travel to any other chiefdom until further notice."

The president, sounding grim, said in his speech that "the life of everyone and the survival of our country take precedence" over whatever hardships the latest measures might impose. He vowed to "overcome and free our land from this evil virus."

Quote from: LaCroix on September 25, 2014, 11:09:30 AM
there hasn't been an ebola outbreak like this before, correct? so, isn't it difficult to say exactly how it will progress over the next year? people and communities adapt, so i suspect the trajectory of the outbreak isn't going to play out the way authorities suggest.

Quote from: derspiess on September 25, 2014, 12:24:42 PM

Quote from: LaCroix on September 25, 2014, 11:09:30 AM
there hasn't been an ebola outbreak like this before, correct? so, isn't it difficult to say exactly how it will progress over the next year? people and communities adapt, so i suspect the trajectory of the outbreak isn't going to play out the way authorities suggest.

Some people like to panic.  Like Tim.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 25, 2014, 12:42:30 PM
US is spending 750 million.  EU is spending 15.

Quote from: Liep on September 25, 2014, 12:43:43 PM
Are you sure about those numbers? Denmark alone is sending about 10 million dollars.

Quote from: derspiess on September 25, 2014, 12:24:42 PMSome people like to panic.  Like Tim.

Quote from: derspiess on September 25, 2014, 12:39:15 PM
Gleefully panicking, then.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on September 25, 2014, 12:46:33 PM

Quote from: Liep on September 25, 2014, 12:43:43 PM
Are you sure about those numbers? Denmark alone is sending about 10 million dollars.

The EU number is from the EU budget, and doesn't include individual country contributions.

The article I read only mentioned Germany's 2 million.

10 from Denmark is nice.

Quote from: Lettow77 on September 25, 2014, 06:27:38 AM
Tim, i'm surprised Ebola-chan's got you so worked up. You realize this is, of course, merely an African matter?

QuoteLiberia: Dead Ebola Patients Resurrect?

By Franklin Doloquee
Two Ebola patients, who died of the virus in separate communities in Nimba County have reportedly resurrected in the county. The victims, both females, believed to be in their 60s and 40s respectively, died of the Ebola virus recently in Hope Village Community and the Catholic Community in Ganta, Nimba.

But to the amazement of residents and onlookers on Monday, the deceased reportedly regained life in total disbelief. The New Dawn Nimba County correspondent said the late Dorris Quoi of Hope Village Community and the second victim only identified as Ma Kebeh, said to be in her late 60s, were about to be taken for burial when they resurrected.

Ma Kebeh had reportedly been in door for two nights without food and medication before her alleged death. Nimba County has had bizarre news of Ebola cases with a native doctor from the county, who claimed that he could cure infected victims, dying of the virus himself last week.

News of the resurrection of the two victims has reportedly created panic in residents of Hope Village Community and Ganta at large, with some citizens describing Dorris Quoi as a ghost, who shouldn't live among them. Since the Ebola outbreak in Nimba County, this is the first incident of dead victims resurrecting.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 25, 2014, 04:26:13 PM
The zombiepbocalypse is upon us! :w00t:

Quote from: derspiess on September 25, 2014, 04:18:21 PM
Dead Ebola victims are resurrecting.  Not sure if it's a good thing or bad thing.

http://allafrica.com/stories/201409240829.html

QuoteLiberia: Dead Ebola Patients Resurrect?

By Franklin Doloquee
Two Ebola patients, who died of the virus in separate communities in Nimba County have reportedly resurrected in the county. The victims, both females, believed to be in their 60s and 40s respectively, died of the Ebola virus recently in Hope Village Community and the Catholic Community in Ganta, Nimba.

But to the amazement of residents and onlookers on Monday, the deceased reportedly regained life in total disbelief. The New Dawn Nimba County correspondent said the late Dorris Quoi of Hope Village Community and the second victim only identified as Ma Kebeh, said to be in her late 60s, were about to be taken for burial when they resurrected.

Ma Kebeh had reportedly been in door for two nights without food and medication before her alleged death. Nimba County has had bizarre news of Ebola cases with a native doctor from the county, who claimed that he could cure infected victims, dying of the virus himself last week.

News of the resurrection of the two victims has reportedly created panic in residents of Hope Village Community and Ganta at large, with some citizens describing Dorris Quoi as a ghost, who shouldn't live among them. Since the Ebola outbreak in Nimba County, this is the first incident of dead victims resurrecting.

Quote from: garbon on September 25, 2014, 12:36:40 PM

Quote from: derspiess on September 25, 2014, 12:24:42 PM

Quote from: LaCroix on September 25, 2014, 11:09:30 AM
there hasn't been an ebola outbreak like this before, correct? so, isn't it difficult to say exactly how it will progress over the next year? people and communities adapt, so i suspect the trajectory of the outbreak isn't going to play out the way authorities suggest.

Some people like to panic.  Like Tim.

Is he really even panicking? Just seems like he's gleefully pasting various articles about doomsday.

QuoteDoor-to-door searches during the three-day curfew in Sierra Leone identified more than 350 suspected new cases of Ebola, according by the top US diplomat in the country. Charge d'affairs Kathleen Fitzgibbon said teams of volunteers had also discovered 265 corpses, of which 216 had since been buried.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 25, 2014, 06:49:37 PM

Quote from: garbon on September 25, 2014, 12:36:40 PM

Quote from: derspiess on September 25, 2014, 12:24:42 PM

Quote from: LaCroix on September 25, 2014, 11:09:30 AM
there hasn't been an ebola outbreak like this before, correct? so, isn't it difficult to say exactly how it will progress over the next year? people and communities adapt, so i suspect the trajectory of the outbreak isn't going to play out the way authorities suggest.

Some people like to panic.  Like Tim.

Is he really even panicking? Just seems like he's gleefully pasting various articles about doomsday.

I don't see what's gleeful about it! :angry:

Quote from: derspiess on September 25, 2014, 04:18:21 PM
Dead Ebola victims are resurrecting.  Not sure if it's a good thing or bad thing.

http://allafrica.com/stories/201409240829.html

QuoteLiberia: Dead Ebola Patients Resurrect?

By Franklin Doloquee
Two Ebola patients, who died of the virus in separate communities in Nimba County have reportedly resurrected in the county. The victims, both females, believed to be in their 60s and 40s respectively, died of the Ebola virus recently in Hope Village Community and the Catholic Community in Ganta, Nimba.

But to the amazement of residents and onlookers on Monday, the deceased reportedly regained life in total disbelief. The New Dawn Nimba County correspondent said the late Dorris Quoi of Hope Village Community and the second victim only identified as Ma Kebeh, said to be in her late 60s, were about to be taken for burial when they resurrected.

Ma Kebeh had reportedly been in door for two nights without food and medication before her alleged death. Nimba County has had bizarre news of Ebola cases with a native doctor from the county, who claimed that he could cure infected victims, dying of the virus himself last week.

News of the resurrection of the two victims has reportedly created panic in residents of Hope Village Community and Ganta at large, with some citizens describing Dorris Quoi as a ghost, who shouldn't live among them. Since the Ebola outbreak in Nimba County, this is the first incident of dead victims resurrecting.

QuoteA professor in U.S. is telling Liberians that the Defense Department 'manufactured' Ebola

By Terrence McCoy September 26 at 3:17 AM

Last week, President Obama announced an ambitious — and expensive — plan that effectively placed the U.S. military at the forefront of the global fight against the worst Ebola outbreak in history. In an effort that could cost as much as $750 million in the next six months, he assigned up to 3,000 military personnel to West Africa to "combat and contain" what officials call "an extraordinarily serious epidemic."

As those military doctors and officials begin what will be a difficult task, among the challenges they face are rumors that spread fear — fear of Ebola, fear of quarantine measures and fear of doctors. Already, several medical workers have been murdered in Guinea — throats slit, bodies dumped in a latrine. Then six Red Cross volunteers were attacked earlier this week while they tried to collect the body of an Ebola victim.

And now, in what may plant further seeds of mistrust and suspicion, a major Liberian newspaper, the Daily Observer, has published an article by a Liberian-born faculty member of a U.S. university implying the epidemic is the result of bioterrorism experiments conducted by the United States Department of Defense, among others.

And while some commenting on the article were critical, the number who praised it was telling. "They are using" Ebola, wrote one, "for culling the world population mainly Africa for the...purpose of gaining control of the Africans resources criminally."

The piece purports to describe scientific findings from various "reports," which are not cited in detail, and even references the bestselling thriller, "The Hot Zone."

"Reports narrate stories of the US Department of Defense (DoD) funding Ebola trials on humans, trials which started just weeks before the Ebola outbreak in Guinea and Sierra Leone," wrote Delaware State University associate professor Cyril Broderick.

Under the headline, "Ebola, AIDS Manufactured by Western Pharmaceuticals, US DoD?", it says: "the U.S., Canada, France, and the U.K. are all implicated in the detestable and devilish deeds that these Ebola tests are. There is a need to pursue criminal and civil redress for damages."

Worse, in the same breath, the semi-intelligible article suggests groups trying to stop the epidemic — Centers for Disease Control, the World Health Organization and Doctors Without Borders — are all somehow in on it. The piece puts them on a list of those "implicated in selecting and enticing African countries to participate in the testing events."

Broderick, who is listed as an associate professor in the Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources at Delaware State University, defended his article in a brief interview with The Washington Post. "There are many references to what was contained in my letter," he said. "You may read the letter and double-check the sources listed. They are available and legitimate."

But are they? Broderick drew on research published in several conspiracy Web sites, including Global Research and Liberty Beacon. He discussed a 1996 book called "Emerging Viruses: AIDS & Ebola — Nature, Accident or Intentional?," written by a man who called himself a "humanitarian, clinician, prophet, scholar and natural healer." One of Broderick's sources claimed Tulane University, which once worked on test kits for hemorrhagic fever in West Africa, has "been active in the African areas where Ebola is said to have broken out in 2014."

"Ebola has a terrible history, and testing has been secretly taking place in Africa," Broderick wrote, going on to praise the famous Ebola account "The Hot Zone" as "heart-rending," but written "to be politically correct."

Broderick declined to answer whether he is concerned his article, published in Liberia's Ebola-devastated capital, would convince locals that Western doctors are trying to harm them. "I refer you to the articles and reports published," he said. "I hope you can understand them. They are unambiguous. I am happy that our government has taken the lead in counteracting the infection to curtail the infections and death."

His claims represent a pervasive, pernicious and crippling problem facing the fight against Ebola: misinformation. Across Liberia and Sierra Leone, where the CDC fears Ebola could eventually infect 1.4 million people, there is such distrust of the medical community that some don't even think Ebola exists.

Some in West Africa, reported the Economist, "fear that the government wants to sell the blood of Ebola patients, or that it will remove patients' limbs for ritual purposes. Others think health workers will inject them with Ebola; or that the ubiquitous chlorine disinfectant spray will give them the disease; or simply the virus is an invention to help the government bring in donations."

Broderick's article played on those fears — and attempted to substantiate them. By drawing from conspiracy-obsessed American sources — one of which said the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, were planned by the American elite — its author took rumors circulating in the United States and injected them squarely into the most Ebola-ravaged place on Earth.

Such rumors are "commonplace" in Liberia's capital, according to Ramen IR, an international affairs blog: "They become strengthened through mass dissemination and the credibility gained through publication. The public is then mobilized through misinformation. This tendency is especially high in post-conflict zone like Liberia, where the 14-year civil war still fills the country with memories of violence distrust."

"Unfortunately," Ramen IR wrote, "articles like Dr. Broderick's commonly circulate in Liberia's local media."

Many readers of the article were equally critical of Broderick's reasoning. "These are the kinds of publications which are going to do more harm to our fight against Ebola than good," one said. "Dr. Broderick could have waited till this thing was contained before publishing his speculations. Dr. Broderick has inadvertently placed an anti-Ebola weapon in the hands of ebola skeptics!"

Said another: "My God, this is why Liberians will continue to die, they can believe every half wit who writes with a dictionary and a cut and paste right click of the mouse. Dr. Broderick, I felt sorry for you but I am angry, amazed, and totally shocked at your ignorance."

"It does not take research to discover this professor is a crack pot," wrote another.

But see also: "This paper is creating awareness so that African will refuse any vacination as a biogun that they manufacture and use as a weapon of mass destruction only to anihilate African race."

And, "aids and ebola are perfect examples of recent forays into the germ warefare research the US is pursuing."

Quote from: derspiess on September 26, 2014, 09:57:32 AM
Well, he is a doctor.  At Del State, no less.

QuoteOfficials at the university first became aware of Broderick's article on Friday, after The Post reported on its contents, Holmes said.

He declined to comment on whether the university had spoken to Broderick, citing a policy of keeping "personnel issues" private.

"A lot of people can have tenure at a university and then they'll go out and commit mass murder, okay," Holmes said. "We didn't know that they would do that before they were granted tenure.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on September 26, 2014, 07:24:58 PM

Quote from: derspiess on September 26, 2014, 09:57:32 AM
Well, he is a doctor.  At Del State, no less.

:lol:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2014/09/26/delaware-state-wont-interfere-with-free-speech-of-professor-spreading-ebola-conspiracy-theories/

QuoteOfficials at the university first became aware of Broderick's article on Friday, after The Post reported on its contents, Holmes said.

He declined to comment on whether the university had spoken to Broderick, citing a policy of keeping "personnel issues" private.

"A lot of people can have tenure at a university and then they'll go out and commit mass murder, okay," Holmes said. "We didn't know that they would do that before they were granted tenure.

Quote
Lack of Ebola volunteers has doctors scrambling to catch up

DONALD G. McNEIL JR.

The New York Times News Service

Published Friday, Sep. 26 2014, 7:16 PM EDT

Last updated Friday, Sep. 26 2014, 7:32 PM EDT


Doctors and nurses are finally volunteering to fight the Ebola virus in West Africa after a long period of paralyzing fear in which almost none stepped forward.

But, experts say, even though money is now pouring in from the World Bank, the Gates Foundation and elsewhere, and the U.S. Army is to start erecting field hospitals soon, there is likely to be a long gap before those hospitals can be fully staffed to care for the growing numbers of people sick with Ebola.

"As a result, thousands of people will die," Dr. Joanne Liu, president of Médecins sans frontières (Doctors Without Borders), which treats more patients than any other entity, said Friday. "I can't say the exact figure because we don't know how many unreported cases there are. But thousands for sure."

Because months went by this summer in which almost no volunteers could be found, and because it takes time to train them and get them to Africa, there remains a yawning gap between the number of medical professionals needed and those in place to do the work. Each 100-bed hospital needs a staff of 400, about 40 of whom are foreign doctors or nurses. Meanwhile, about 600 Ebola cases are being recorded every week, according to the World Health Organization, and that number doubles every three weeks.

"If we had 1,700 staffed beds right now, we could maybe turn the tide," Dr. Liu said. "When we hear the pledges, we ask for timelines. Some say eight to 10 weeks. They're going to wake up to a much bigger problem at Christmas."

The first U.S. troops with orders to build 17 100-bed hospitals are arriving in Liberia now. Other countries, particularly Britain and France, are under pressure to do the same in Sierra Leone and Guinea.

But the U.S. military now plans to staff only one 25-bed hospital for infected health workers with members of the quasi-military Public Health Service.

"Who will staff the rest?" asked Dr. Liu. "It needs to be hands-on. You have to chip in and expose yourself."

Ebola field hospitals ideally contain three separate tents for confirmed, probable and suspected cases; separate toilet and washing facilities for each; and a double fence outside so relatives can talk without touching. They also contain separate dressing and undressing rooms for staff members wearing protective gear, and possibly laboratory and kitchen tents.

Quote from: Liep on September 26, 2014, 09:29:33 PM
Danish journalists are slowly arriving in Monrovia, it's the ones usually covering war zones that got the job. Doom and gloom incoming!

Quote from: Liep on September 27, 2014, 12:10:52 PM

Quote from: Liep on September 26, 2014, 09:29:33 PM
Danish journalists are slowly arriving in Monrovia, it's the ones usually covering war zones that got the job. Doom and gloom incoming!

A very chilling report where the journalists followed a body collecting team was the first.

QuoteGuinea residents 'refusing' Ebola treatment
Residents say people frightened to go to clinics because of conspiracy theories that they will be killed by doctors.
Last updated: 27 Sep 2014 14:56

Residents of the Guinean capital Conakry, hit hard by Ebola, say they are afraid to seek treatment at hospitals for fear of being poisoned by doctors, as the death toll across West Africa passed the 3,000 mark.

Local resident Tairu Diallo said on Friday that people living in his neighbourhood refused to seek medical help and instead stayed at home, trying to alleviate their symptoms with drugs bought at a pharmacy.

Diallo said people think doctors at hospitals inject patients with a deadly poison.

"If we have a stomach ache we don't go to hospital because doctors there will inject you and you will die," he said.

Many Guineans say local and foreign healthcare workers are part of a conspiracy which either deliberately introduced the outbreak, or invented it as a means of luring Africans to clinics to harvest their blood and organs.

Earlier in September, eight people, including journalists and Ebola-related educators, were killed in southeastern Guinea. 

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Friday that the death toll in West Africa has risen to at least 3,091 out of 6,574 probable, suspected and confirmed cases.

Liberia has recorded 1,830 deaths, around three times as many as in either Guinea or Sierra Leone, the two other most
affected countries, according to WHO data received up to September 23.

An outbreak that began in a remote corner of Guinea has taken hold of much of neighbouring Liberia and Sierra Leone,
prompting warnings that tens of thousands of people may die from the worst outbreak of the disease on record.

The WHO said Liberia had reported six confirmed cases of Ebola and four deaths in the Grand Cru district, which is near the border with Ivory Coast and had not previously recorded any cases of Ebola. Liberia's chief medical officer, Bernice Dahn, said that she is placing herself under quarantine for 21 days after her office assistant died of Ebola. Dahn, who has represented Liberia at regional conferences intended to combat the ongoing epidemic, told the Associated Press on Saturday that she did not have any Ebola symptoms but wanted to ensure she was not infected.

Ivory Coast President Alassane Ouattara said on Friday that his country will lift the controversial suspension of flights to countries affected by the Ebola virus. He said there was no longer a reason to restrict air travel.

There are no reported cases of Ebola in Ivory Coast.

Nigeria and Senegal, the two other nations that have had confirmed cases of Ebola in the region, have not recorded any new cases or deaths in the last few weeks.

QuoteBeds scarce, staff scarcer, in Liberia's overrun Ebola wards

They carry photos, bags of food -- and hope. But what the families idling at the gate of this Ebola centre in Monrovia lack is news of the fate of their sick loved ones inside.

George Williams brought his wife and daughter to the Island Clinic on Tuesday and since then has had "no news, no contact with my family".

"I trust the doctors and the government," he says.

But his faith draws hoots of laughter from the 40-odd others also waiting. For days, they say, no news of their family has ventured beyond the clinic's barbed-wire and high walls -- only cadavers.

The keeper of the clinic gate, in protective white gear from head to toe, looks like he is transported from outer space to this sweltering, misery-infected African city.

The crowd's noisy complaints fall silent as the gates open, and two Red Cross trucks, each carrying a dozen body bags, emerge.

A woman cries out, then two -- and then anger surges again.

"I want to see my son!" Janjay Geleplay, hard-faced, demands.

She brought 12-year-old Joshua on Sunday from the "72nd" district of Liberia's capital, where "there is a lot of Ebola".

"We get no record from the authorities. They always say we should wait. I come here every day. I want to see my son! Maybe he is already dead," she says, dry-eyed.

The Island clinic opened on Sunday. By the next day its 120 beds were full.

"As of Friday, we had 206 patients," a spokesman for the UN's World Health Organization, which runs the centre, told AFP.

Like all the NGO-run Ebola centres in Liberia, the Island is under-resourced and overrun by demand, forced to fill in for a public health infrastructure that has been decimated by 14 years of civil war and grinding poverty.

"There is supposed to be a system to allow the patients to talk to their families while keeping a distance of several metres (yards) -- but apparently it's not up and running yet," a clearly embarrassed WHO official there says.

Of the four west African nations affected by the Ebola outbreak, Liberia has been hit the hardest, with 3,458 people infected, and 1,830 killed by the disease.

A total of more than 6,500 infections, almost all in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, have been recorded since the beginning of the year according to a WHO count as of Saturday. Of those, 3,091 people have died so far.

- More beds, few aid workers -

On the other side of Monrovia, a 160-bed Ebola clinic run by Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres, MSF) had to turn away patients for days.

A Belgian aid worker, forced to act as a "bouncer" there, quit and returned home, traumatised by the need to turn away the sick and dying.

"A lot of people are saying this is the hardest mission they've ever had," an MSF colleague says, requesting anonymity.

But the colleague also pointed to progress, saying that "slightly fewer arrivals" since Thursday has meant no one needed to be turned away -- "perhaps because new centres have been opened".

International efforts are finally building speed to get critical supplies and staff to stricken nations, following a call for fresh aid by US President Barack Obama, and along with fast-track funding from the International Monetary Fund.

The UN has estimated that nearly one billion dollars will be required to effectively fight the disease.

"In the next two to three weeks, we'll have over a thousand beds available in Monrovia," Frank Mahoney, the representative of the US health body Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, says.

The WHO is planning on creating 500 new beds within the month, and MSF plans to have a total of 400 beds, while Obama has also charged the US army with setting up beds.

Jean-Pierre Veyrenche, in charge of the construction of clinics in Monrovia for the WHO, says the task is especially complicated in the dense Liberian capital.

"You need 5,000 square metres (5,400 square feet) for a 100-bed clinic -- not easy to find in a big city like Monrovia, with marshy terrain. And the heavy rains are an enormous obstacle, as is the high water table which makes it impossible to dig latrines and is forcing us to build septic tanks out of concrete."

Like all NGOs and political leaders, he appeals for more aid workers on the ground.

"I think people are scared," Veyrenche says, "No one knows how to deal with Ebola in an urban zone, and in such numbers.... But the international humanitarian community must act. There are ways of working here. You can't get Ebola from stepping down onto the runway."

A group of aid workers in Monrovia noted the same problem. "Supplies are coming in, but what we're still missing are healthcare personnel," one of them tells AFP.

After a devastating earthquake in Haiti in 2010, 820 NGOs mobilised with on-the-ground efforts, he says. In Liberia, there are fewer than 10.

Outside the Island clinic, 32-year-old Finley Freeman handed his homemade meals over to the gatekeeper to deliver to his mother.

He has not seen her for days but gets his news directly.

"I talked to her on the phone last night. She keeps praying," he says.

QuoteExclusive: No Ebola Treatment at Sierra Leone Holding Center


MAKENI, SIERRA LEONE—

Dozens of very sick people sat on the floor in an empty university building in central Sierra Leone.

They waited in filthy conditions.

With the nearest treatment center a 16-hour drive away in Kailahun, there is no way to treat the sick, despite the likelihood they are infected with Ebola.

According to Osman Bah, the Makeni government hospital director, Ebola cases have spiked in recent weeks.

"More than 100, 150 cases, because we have sent 56 patients to Kailahun," he said. "This morning we have had more than 100-110 patients."

This university complex is being used as a makeshift holding facility because the sick people have nowhere else to go.

Highly contagious patients lie in the open.

One woman sat on the floor, too sick to stand.

Other victims huddled together on beds.

One young child was laying alone.

They waited and hoped for a space in the next ambulance.

Growing numbers of Ebola outbreak hotspots are emerging in new locations across the country.

"We get phone calls every day from districts over the whole country, and those districts are absolutely overwhelmed," said Axelle Vandoornick, a medical field coordinator for Doctors Without Borders.

There is no way of telling which patients are Ebola-positive.

Despite this, they are kept together.

"Ninety-nine percent of the cases that we have isolated are positive of Ebola," said Bah, the medical director.

Medical staff at the containment center have little training or experience dealing with Ebola.

Protective equipment is inadequate.

One makeshift ward was empty.

Beds were filthy.

Pill packets sat among piles of clothes left by a departing patient.

Twenty-five confirmed Ebola patients left for Borders treatment center in Kailahun one recent night.

Four died during the 16-hour journey.

Doctors Without Borders' Vandoornick said numbers are increasing.

"Every day we have ambulances arriving and when we open the door there are dead bodies inside the ambulance alongside non-cases potentially," Vandoornick said. "So that is the first source of contamination."

When two new patients were brought in to the center, one young boy showed symptoms for Ebola.

Despite the risk, his mother would not leave his side.

"It's too much," said Karimo Konteh, an ambulance driver. "Every day I pick up 10, 15, 14, 12 patients, everyday. ..."

Vandoornick said some districts have no Ebola treatment facilities of their own.

"They don't have [enough] capacity of Ebola centers in their district, so basically they are trying to send their patients to us," Vandoornick said.

Bah, the medical director, said he is not hopeful the situation will improve.

"For now the situation is not under control," he said. "We are hoping it will be better.

"But I am afraid, maybe it will get worse."

Quote from: http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2014/09/29/north-texas-hospital-evaluating-patient-for-potential-ebola-exposure/
Local North Texas Hospital Evaluating Patient For Potential Ebola Exposure

A North Texas hospital has a patient in isolation as they evaluate them for potential exposure to the Ebola virus.
Officials with Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas released the following statement Monday night:
"Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas has admitted a patient into strict isolation to be evaluated for potential Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) based on the patient's symptoms and recent travel history. The hospital is following all Centers for Disease Control and Texas Department of Heath recommendations to ensure the safety of patients, hospital staff, volunteers, physicians and visitors. The CDC anticipates preliminary results tomorrow."
It is unclear what specific symptoms the patient has or what the patient's travel history was.

Quote from: Fate on September 30, 2014, 04:21:43 PM
I'm doing my residency at that hospital. Thank god I wasn't the on-call resident yesterday.  :ph34r:

Quote from: Zanza on September 30, 2014, 04:22:57 PM
I would expect a lot of new colleagues in space suits tomorrow morning. ;)

Quote from: Fate on September 30, 2014, 04:25:35 PM

Quote from: Zanza on September 30, 2014, 04:22:57 PM
I would expect a lot of new colleagues in space suits tomorrow morning. ;)

You don't need space suits when caring for Ebola patients. Goggles/facemask, gown, gloves, shoe covers are sufficient protection. Unfortunately Hollywood/media perpetuates the myth and sometimes health agencies go overboard. If this were an airborne hemorrhagic virus, then it'd be space suit time.