I wasn't freaking out about Ebola until the Dallas woman

[PokerGuy]

Don't you come in here with your fancy graphics and science. I saw Outbreak. As soon as ebola hit our shores, we guaranteed fully 90% of our population would become infected. Baseless paranoia will always triumph over logic or reason.

Isn't an R value theoretical and depends greatly on the environment and countermeasures? In Africa with little or no infrastructure to contain ebola, I'd guess the R value is much higher. In the US, I would expect a fairly low R value. The problem is, based on the R value of 2 from that graph, it would be similar to HEP C . There are more than 3 million people in the US with Hep c. With the mortality rate we're seeing of 50% (or whatever it is now), that would be a LOT of dead people.

It's certainly not time to panic, but a healthy respect for the danger and taking logical steps to contain the disease are a good thing.

 

[steppinthrax]

Isn't an R value theoretical and depends greatly on the environment and countermeasures? In Africa with little or no infrastructure to contain ebola, I'd guess the R value is much higher. In the US, I would expect a fairly low R value. The problem is, based on the R value of 2 from that graph, it would be similar to HEP C . There are more than 3 million people in the US with Hep c. With the mortality rate we're seeing of 50% (or whatever it is now), that would be a LOT of dead people.

It's certainly not time to panic, but a healthy respect for the danger and taking logical steps to contain the disease are a good thing.

Hep C takes decades to kill. There was a nurse who contracted Hep C from a pt. and didn't find out about it until 35 years later (retired). Ebola shows up in a few days. I'm curious how those Ro values are calculated, do they take in account a packed airplane with a bathroom used by 100 different people that has never been cleaned in a month?

 

[WelshBloke]

What would stop some terrorist from snatching that shit and using it as a starting point to make more viruses....

Why would they do that?

What with there already being lots of cases of the disease in Africa and the scary terrorists already being there.

They probably already have vats of the stuff.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

That to me was the biggest bunch of BS I've ever heard. So humans are incapable of communicating that someone may have Ebola and instead they rely of some software to record the info. How about getting up out of your chair and walking to the department head to report it.

Because as far as everyone knew the system was working. When the job is run run run that's what anyone would do.

 

[DrPizza]

What,

A home invasion, gunpoint, gloves, snatch that shit, leave real quick to some private lab....

Yes there is a problem of her being in the apt. She needs to be transported to a specialized quarantine facility.
Every surface of the apt needs to be sprayed down with detergent/bleach etc....

It would take quite a bit of sophistication to do anything with the sample in "a lab." Anyone who can afford the equipment can afford a private flight to Liberia to get all the contaminated material they want.

 

[DrPizza]

I agree with this...

Look at this link (http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/01/health/ebola-us-reader-questions/index.html)

Read the twitter post questioning if it can become airborne?

I was always told that it's impossible for it to happen, but based on this it's saying the virus mutates with every new person it affects. So it's possible it can become airborne?????

Lots of things have mutations. That's what drives evolution. If the mutation is favorable, individuals with that mutation tend to survive and outproduce. Look at the variety of dogs we have in just a few thousand years. Now, remember, a few thousand years is a few thousand generations for dogs. I.e., in humans, you're only a couple of generations removed from people who lived 100 years ago.

Now, with viruses, bacteria, etc., they're reproducing more often than once a year. So, we can see mutations, and changes in population on much shorter time scales.

Now, I've done nothing yet to address your fears of a mutation to make it airborne. However, have you seen any dogs that have wings and can fly? Have any mutations in birds led to birds that have lungs and can breathe under water? The mutations necessary for effective airborne transmission of Ebola are pretty significant.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Now, I've done nothing yet to address your fears of a mutation to make it airborne. However, have you seen any dogs that have wings and can fly? Have any mutations in birds led to birds that have lungs and can breathe under water? The mutations necessary for effective airborne transmission of Ebola are pretty significant.

That's a ludicrous comparison; we're talking about viruses versus complex organisms. So instead, let's discuss that time HIV became airborne and... oh, right.

 

[Jaskalas]

That's a ludicrous comparison; we're talking about viruses versus complex organisms. So instead, let's discuss that time HIV became airborne and... oh, right.

He's taking a great deal of effort to explain one very simple point, which another poster did quite well. It's not likely to ever become airborne. Which is besides the point... transmission via sneeze or cough is not airborne, but they still cover an entire room full of people.

 

[steppinthrax]

He's taking a great deal of effort to explain one very simple point, which another poster did quite well. It's not likely to ever become airborne. Which is besides the point... transmission via sneeze or cough is not airborne, but they still cover an entire room full of people.

Assuming it doesn't mutate to a airborne version. It can still mutate. Similar to the way HIV mutates preventing medications from countering the present mutation. The experimental drug that they used on the previous people may no longer be effective.

 

[zanejohnson]

hahaha HAHAHAHA!!!!

let me clear some things up for you guys......considering, i live and work in the metroplex, and as a matter of fact, i was downtown and at the state fair the day this all came out...


first off...... dallas, is POOR AS FUCK...maybe not the city itself, but the people here.. it's a shitfest, the state fair, was literally a shitfest.... the homeless problem here is so completely out of control, after we left the fair, we caught the train deeper downtown and into deep ellum, and it was chaos, SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO many homeless people, SOOOOOOOOOO many people getting arrested leaving the fair, and the way it works here, when there's cops taking someone down to the ground, Texans, just look the other way, you dont film the cops. this is Dallas fucking Texas... they will come after you next if you do.... that vid of them spraying the vomit/bodily fluids off the sidewalk with a pressure washer..... i believe it... i dont doubt it one bit.....that's typical texan mentality, "clean it up quick, out of sight out of mind, and sweep it all under the rug...

Dallas IS a place where this really could turn into an epidemic... and with as hard as it is to get to a hospital as it is (or private doctors that refuse to accept medicaid/medicare, anything but cash pay only) because we're such a hardcore right wingbat shit crazy state..... yeah.... i could completely see infected people avoiding going to the doctor/ER, could totally see familys hiding sick family members/dead family members

 

[steppinthrax]

hahaha HAHAHAHA!!!!

let me clear some things up for you guys......considering, i live and work in the metroplex, and as a matter of fact, i was downtown and at the state fair the day this all came out...


first off...... dallas, is POOR AS FUCK...maybe not the city itself, but the people here.. it's a shitfest, the state fair, was literally a shitfest.... the homeless problem here is so completely out of control, after we left the fair, we caught the train deeper downtown and into deep ellum, and it was chaos, SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO many homeless people, SOOOOOOOOOO many people getting arrested leaving the fair, and the way it works here, when there's cops taking someone down to the ground, Texans, just look the other way, you dont film the cops. this is Dallas fucking Texas... they will come after you next if you do.... that vid of them spraying the vomit/bodily fluids off the sidewalk with a pressure washer..... i believe it... i dont doubt it one bit.....that's typical texan mentality, "clean it up quick, out of sight out of mind, and sweep it all under the rug...

Dallas IS a place where this really could turn into an epidemic... and with as hard as it is to get to a hospital as it is (or private doctors that refuse to accept medicaid/medicare, anything but cash pay only) because we're such a hardcore right wingbat shit crazy state..... yeah.... i could completely see infected people avoiding going to the doctor/ER, could totally see familys hiding sick family members/dead family members

So your're saying Dallas TX is (Africa + 1)

Do doctors in TX have med degrees?

 

[zanejohnson]

So your're saying Dallas TX is (Africa + 1)

Do doctors in TX have med degrees?

pretty much... urban sprawl, tons of "little mexicos" everywhere, endless low budget housing complexes surrounding the downtown area...

there's two main hospitals in the immediate downtown area, presby (for poor people) and medical city Dallas (for rich people/people with insurance), there's also Baylor medical center, but it's more for longer term stuff and surgeries..

ebola patient one is in presby, the man who came off the flight from Liberia....and now ebola patient 2, who was the child that was living in the apartment that is now "quarantined" APARTMENT COMPLEX (low budget housing, that they had i think something like 9 people living in?)...the kid that also went to school in the following days after patient 1 was admitted to presby...

 

[doubledeluxe]

You don't need terrorism or mutations for this to become a major problem.

Right now the issue worrying people should be the long incubation period and the fact that many Americans will go to school and work sick and those without health insurance will spend up to 12 hours sitting in an emergency room with 100 other people waiting to see a nurse.

 

[lozina]

I dont know if that R0 number is going to be of any significance to telling how deadly a disease would be. Spanish Flu afterall only had an estimated R0 of 2-3

Having said that, not worried about Ebola at all. The fact it is not contagious until symptoms show is a big plus for us. And that it is not airborne like Spanish Flu.

 

[sportage]

Probably one the ISIS terrorists in Mexico waiting for a chance to cross the border. Good thing Rick has been wearing his smartifying glasses lately and is on the case.

R U kidding???
Rick got the hell out of Helena. He's in iOwa.
Rick Perry, "Ebola isn't contagious unless there are signs of illness".
"Now you have to excuse me, I have a plane to catch".
F-king Schmuck.

 

[MongGrel]

R U kidding???
Rick got the hell out of Helena. He's in iOwa.
Rick Perry, "Ebola isn't contagious unless there are signs of illness".
"Now you have to excuse me, I have a plane to catch".
F-king Schmuck.

:biggrin:

 

[boomerang]

R U kidding???
Rick got the hell out of Helena. He's in iOwa.
Rick Perry, "Ebola isn't contagious unless there are signs of illness".
"Now you have to excuse me, I have a plane to catch".
F-king Schmuck.

Meanwhile...

Obama decries income inequality in speech after $50,000-a-person fundraiser for Quinn

F-king Schmuck indeed.

 

[Pneumothorax]

You don't need terrorism or mutations for this to become a major problem.

Right now the issue worrying people should be the long incubation period and the fact that many Americans will go to school and work sick and those without health insurance will spend up to 12 hours sitting in an emergency room with 100 other people waiting to see a nurse.

You mean like the dumbfuck nurse who supposedly relied on a stupid ass computer program to tell the doctor that they may have a possible Ebola case rather than walking a few yards to tell him/her in person?!

 

[Oldgamer]

If we see more cases pop up in American then we can start panicking. But I find it interesting that they are trying so hard to downplay the seriousness of this. Must nurses have already reported though that they are not equipped on how to handle triage with possible ebola cases. It has been all over the news. Nurses coming out and saying that the hospitals are not giving them any real protocols or educating them. The fact that they didn't even bother to take in the fact that this guy in Dallas was from Liberia and traveled is very disconcerting to say the least. It's like hospital staff have become lazy and if they are dealing with someone who is of color they certainly don't take what they say about being ill very serious. Most times sending people of color back home.

 

[Londo_Jowo]

Why wait, start running around in circles waving your arms wildly. Don't forget to stop every few minutes to hyperventilate.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

You mean like the dumbfuck nurse who supposedly relied on a stupid ass computer program to tell the doctor that they may have a possible Ebola case rather than walking a few yards to tell him/her in person?!

Or the dumbfuck doc who didn't verify the information? Or the dumbfuck system which has nurses and other health care workers getting overworked to the point of early death?

 

[Genx87]

Texas is blocking Medicaid expansion too, so if this breaks out among the indigent uninsured, who knows when people will get around to seeing a doctor, and how many they will infect by then. I would just stay away from disease infested red states for the time being, to be safe.

Just stop. How does having or not having health insurance spread a virus? Most people wont go to the emergency room regardless of insurance status until they show symptoms. Ebola isnt an infection where you can schedule a visit with your primary.

 

[MrCassdin]

They predict 10,000 deaths in Africa by the end of the year, now it's in the US.

If the CDC came out and said "this is bad news, we need to take extreme measures to stop this now before it gets out of hand - you should be worried and cautious" then we would have a panic, run on banks, run on food, resources, etc. So the CDC isn't going to say it, even though they do understand and are behaving like, we're in danger.

Obama is sending 4,000 troops (not civilians from DHS or some other group) to Africa. Soldiers. With rifles. To Africa. With Rifles. With Rifles.

Yeah, nothing to fear.

 

[fskimospy]

They predict 10,000 deaths in Africa by the end of the year, now it's in the US.

If the CDC came out and said "this is bad news, we need to take extreme measures to stop this now before it gets out of hand - you should be worried and cautious" then we would have a panic, run on banks, run on food, resources, etc. So the CDC isn't going to say it, even though they do understand and are behaving like, we're in danger.

Obama is sending 4,000 troops (not civilians from DHS or some other group) to Africa. Soldiers. With rifles. To Africa. With Rifles. With Rifles.

Yeah, nothing to fear.

Or the CDC isn't saying it because due to Ebola's low rate of transmission that we don't need to take extreme measures because they would cause a panic for no reason. There's plenty of information on Ebola out there and it's all pretty clear. There's simply no cause for extreme measures.

 

[Paratus]

Just stop. How does having or not having health insurance spread a virus? Most people wont go to the emergency room regardless of insurance status until they show symptoms. Ebola isnt an infection where you can schedule a visit with your primary.

I think the argument is without insurance not only do they not go to the doctor when they have symptoms, they won't go until the symptoms are so bad an ambulance is required. This is due to the crippling cost of healthcare and increases the time they out in public and infectious.

I'd also add that for low income workers there are generally no sick days available and even for well paid employees an environment that frowns on missing work.

In countries with socialized medicine and required sick days, low income and high income employees would be more willing to take the time to visit the doctor at the first sign of symptoms reducing the time they are in public and infectious.