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+--- Thread: What will you do if/when Ebola gets here? (/showthread.php?tid=14740)
RE: What will you do if/when Ebola gets here? - unknownjulie - 10-12-2014
The reason this Ebola is more scary than say, Hep C, is that it appears more virulent somehow- when the person is near death. Yes, it is spread by fluids, but I myself have had workplace exposure to Hep C and did not get it. I am not so sure I would be so lucky with Ebola. That is why it freaks people out. The CDC uses the same language as they use with HIV or Hep C, but somehow this Ebola is different. As long as only a small number of cases are in the US- then it will be contained, but if there is more, then I worry. Nigeria stopped it by closing completely the hospital where it was initially treated. That has not been done in Dallas.
RE: What will you do if/when Ebola gets here? - Derrick Barnicoat - 10-13-2014
Other countries have successfully stopped an ebola outbreaks. My family is actually from Uganda and there was an outbreak there in 2012. It was stopped within the same year and their hospitals and clinics are not remotely as good as ours. In fact often, in Uganda people will suffer with diseases like this at home as outpatients because the hospitals are small.
Anyway, I think it is worrisome that cases of ebola have spread in the states but I am confident that we can handle it. The media is just sensationalizing the recent outbreak for some reason and I would like to know why. Usually when the media gets people all riled up about something like this it is to distract from something else that is much worse. This current outbreak is not the first. In fact, ebola was first seen in humans in the late 70's and there have been several outbreaks that have been dealt with since and succesfully stopped.
It's just scary because it is like fast acting AIDS, but in a way this makes it less likely to spread.
RE: What will you do if/when Ebola gets here? - unknownjulie - 10-13-2014
Derrick, that's good first hand info. It's just weird the way this strain has spread. I agree the media is hyping it like crazy, but we've never had it here, and it is scary.
RE: What will you do if/when Ebola gets here? - Midnight Rambler - 10-13-2014
This strain is no different from previous outbreaks, it's just been able to spread to a lot more people because it's now in urban areas instead of remote rural places like all the previous ones have been. As for how it spreads, it's a matter of evolutionary survival. HIV and HepB/C can only spread through body fluids and intimate contact so they cause a relatively low-level disease that allows the infected person (who likely doesn't know they're even infected) to come into close contact with many people before they fall seriously ill.
Ebola and similar diseases take the opposite approach - while the method of transmission is the same, they make the victim severely sick in a way that causes vomiting, diarrhea, and bleeding, which spreads the virus around much more than if the person was just going about their life. That makes up for the fact that the person either dies or recovers within a relatively short period.
RE: What will you do if/when Ebola gets here? - unknownjulie - 10-14-2014
Well, now, it's very obvious with the second case, that the hospital in Dallas needs to be closed. Period. For at least a month, and fully decontaminated.
RE: What will you do if/when Ebola gets here? - unknownjulie - 10-15-2014
Clarification- of course I don't want Africans sick either. I would like the entire disease stopped completely for everyone, but why just sit there (CDC) and let it spread around the world?
The mistakes in Dallas point to the "McMedicine Model". This is how it works: Let's divide up the tasks and treat the nurses like a cog in the wheel. Let's not allow ONE nurse to exclusively care for ONE patient - because it might cost more money. Let's not allow for sufficient time for the "suiting up and suiting down"- because it might cost more money. Let's not have proper thought or analysis of the situation- because that might take more time, and you know, time is money. Let's have the lab samples sent through the normal tube system, because walking it down would take more time, hence more money- etc... And all it will take is one uninsured/underinsured healthcare worker, who really needs the money and doesn't feel they can "call in" or "be kept home unpaid during quarantine", and goes into work sick...
The business model of medicine has failed and it is time for the Gov't to step in. Profits cannot be put in front of human beings health and safety.
RE: What will you do if/when Ebola gets here? - Derrick Barnicoat - 10-15-2014
There is an important statistic I heard the other day. More people die everyday from AIDS than the amount of people who have died, period, from Ebola, which mind you has been doing it's thing since the late 70's.
And the key to stopping this disease in its tracks is helping africans get rid of it in their countries so it doesn't come here. It is a contagious disease if people have it anywhere in the world it can come here.
RE: What will you do if/when Ebola gets here? - unknownjulie - 10-15-2014
And another important statistic is that 1 in 20 of the dead from Ebola has been a healthcare worker. What exactly is going to happen when these people quit showing up to work? Evidently, when someone is near death, this thing is much more highly contagious. Every single case needs to be treated in a CDC supervised, dedicated facility in the US.
RE: What will you do if/when Ebola gets here? - Wao nahele kane - 10-15-2014
I'm wondering when the peanut gallery will step back in and tell us everything is A-okay and chastise anyone discussing realities that challenge their ignorant faith in this nations powerful rendition of Oz.
Step on up, tell us how things really are again. I so like fairy tales.
RE: What will you do if/when Ebola gets here? - VancouverIslander - 10-15-2014
Derrick is bang on with this one. Ebola is a remarkably small risk for developed countries for a large number of reasons. Firstly, it's main method of transmission in Africa is contact with bodies during funeral rites, and secondly contact during treatment of the illness. There is a whole lot of sensationalism happening right now in the media and on the internet. UKJ, you are making some significant assumptions about what did or did not happen in Dallas and pointing fingers at the CDC, who have an awful lot better information and expertise than any of us here on this message board, including me, and my background is microbiology and biochemistry (including pathogenesis of infectious diseases). There have been what - 2 or 3 cases in the US so far. Hardly out of control. The expense and efforts we put in to airport screening likely would be much better spent controlling Ebola at the source - in Africa. People in North America are probably as likely to be struck by a meteorite as get Ebola, and much more likely to win the Powerball lottery. This is the first year that Ebola has killed more people than Hippos in Africa, just to give you a little context. Medical supplies and training as well as education and changing Funeral rites in Africa, can end this outbreak. Hysteria and overreaction in North America will do no good.