something in media use fear sex or some personal tragedy to some movie star or other famous person and it doesn't have to be real.
While in the checkout line learned the Queen is mad because a new princes will be named Dianna. Now there is a real important piece of news.

I'm having trouble making sense of your reply, actually.

comes the commercial to sell you something.

As far as I know, nothing is being sold that has anything to do with Ebola or this story.

Turn on any "news" station today and there will be Ebola stories told which I think are blown all out of proportion but the reason they are there is to grab your attention using the fear factor that you yourself are in danger of catching the decease. Then while you tremble in front of your TV on comes some hemorrhoid preparation commercial.

The news this morning had an ad for Toyota and one for some new drug that makes having sex after menopause less painful. The news about Ebola was unrelated to either. I don't need a new car, and don't have the other problem, so I ignored the ads, as usual.

They are attempting to get people to watch their coverage by talking up the danger and playing to fear. With the goal of higher ratings, and thus more advertising dollars.

should the Americans with Ebola be allowed into the Us...23.4 % Yes...76.6% No..

a white American gets the sickness.

It could save many lives. I hope more is learned from these patients.

to get sick before coming to the aid of their countrymen?

It requires huge resources to finance that kind of research. Which nation are we talking about? Ask the researchers in that country what the handicaps are. I bet corruption is a factor. So is the unwillingness to acknowledge a problem. Look at how AIDS is dealt with.
It is awful for the people who deal with these issues.

Unless they come up with a vaccine, but with the random breakouts over the last 38 years or so, there's not a big enough market for them to make any money on any kind of treatment. An African researcher said as much on TV here in Canada. He has developed a promising treatment (along side some Canadian scientists) and were unable to get any help from any of the US regulating bodies or pharmaceutical companies. He said money was clearly part of it.

I don't think they were 'waiting' for white Americans to become sick, I think, however, it's easy to turn a blind eye to an illness happening on the other side of the ocean. And I think it's difficult to get funding for an illness that isn't a profit-maker. IRR (rate of return) and all that.

The researchers studying Ebola have been working on a vaccine for decades. But retro viral hemorrhagic fever diseases like Lassa, Ebola, etc. are very very difficult. That has not stopped the research, but it is slow going because of the way the viruses act.

This has nothing to do with the race of those afflicted.

that Ebola has been around quite a while and when an American Doctor gets it all of a sudden there is a cure. Sure, they have been working on a vaccine for a while but out of the blue we hear about it.
I have gotten way too cynical.

are ignorant about science and are easily led around by both fear merchants and conspiracy nutjobs.

Even on DU we're seeing people who appear to be deathly afraid that they'll catch Ebola. It makes no sense.

And yet, I'm not seeing anyone saying that we should shut down flights from West Africa. It's all about the two sick medical workers who may have sacrificed their own lives to help people. I think it's just weird.

sent to the CDC and the Georgia hospital containing death threats. It was in the news today.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/atlanta-hospital-receives-hate-mail-for-treating-aid-workers-stricken-by-ebola-9645199.html

these days and you can cause panic by finding a flour on the floor of a grocery store. The internet allows people with limited real world skills to pretend to be experts in all things and still find a community to belong to.

I've recently begun to think that the average person is a lot dumber than I previously believed.

It's a disease worth being afraid of. I know I'd feel better if it wasn't being shipped around the globe and into the US. Some stories are now telling us there may be an airborne strain. Is it worth death threat? Absolutely not.

I think we can blame history and Hollywood in equal measure. Diseases do spread with transit. Hollywood has convinced us in every zombie and alien spawn movie that the "thing" cannot be contained despite the best efforts of the greatest minds.

Don't forget there were recently stories of a vial of smallpox being found in the closet of a lab after several decades. It wasn't tracked. No one knew it was even missing. If this is our best then our best isn't good enough.

Now we have scientists recreating the Spanish flu.

My main concern is: Is there any therapy that cannot be affected remotely? If not I don't see the point in bringing such a virus here. What is the risk-benefit? If there is no benefit then, again, why transport the disease here?

I don't think so. My likelihood of being exposed to it approaches zero to a huge degree. Should I worry about driving to the airport to pick up my sister-in-law this afternoon? I do worry about that, and intend to drive exceptionally carefully while doing that. It poses a genuine, quantifiable risk.

Ebola? No detectable risk that I can identify of contracting Ebola. Perhaps you're more at risk than I am, but I doubt it very much.

With epidemics (Ebola is not, yet) one of the things that makes them so terrifying is the seeming randomness and helplessness in preventing infection. Let's be honest: Infection has that appearance.

We may see people as being silly and over-reacting but their fears are not wholly unfounded. If some poor soul had his foot trodden upon by a horse several Tuesdays in a row we may think him superstitious for refusing to join us at the livery stable on Tuesday but his apprehension would still have a valid basis.

I get vaccinated each year as soon as the vaccine is available Ebola is not only not an epidemic in the United States, it's highly unlikely to become one here, due to its limited method of transmission and our less primitive living conditions. Although there is no vaccine available for Ebola, the likelihood of the kind of physical contact required for transmission would militate against there being any real risk to most Americans.

Back in the 1970s, a relatively close friend of mine contracted anthrax and died in California. She was a textile artist and had purchased a shipment of uncombed wool from somewhere outside the United States. The wool contained anthrax spores and she developed the disease and died from it. I had very limited contact with her during that time period, and no other cases were reported, despite her being treated in a local hospital. She was the only case from that exposure, and anthrax is far more contagious than Ebola.

I did visit her in the hospital while she was ill. She was in an isolation unit, and I had to gown and mask up to enter. Sadly, that was the last time I saw her, but I was not particularly concerned about the exposure, since adequate protection was supplied by the restrictions. The same situation applies to these hospitalized Ebola patients. They pose little risk to others, given the isolation protocols in use.

Influenza? That's another matter. Very dangerous, yet we commonly ignore that risk as a population.

And it's lethality and it's symptoms are horrific. With influenza you stand a fair chance of beating it unless you belong to a high-risk demographic.

That it is likely to NOT be an epidemic is not the same as saying it CAN'T be an epidemic. What are the risks and what are the benefits to allowing such a disease into the US. If the odds it becomes a problem are one-in-a-million but the benefit is dead-flat-zero then why bring it into the US?

It's not IF the next pandemic hits us; it's when. Whatever that disease is the chance you'll contract it this year is near zero. But the odds are cumulative and it cannot be escaped. A risk without a benefit is what makes people look askance.

The probability of a U.S. epidemic of Ebola is extremely, extremely low. So low, in fact, that it's not something that concerns me in any way. It's a news story. I'm following it, because I follow all kinds of news stories. I'm reading about Ebola, because I'm interested in communicable diseases in general, and have been all my life. I'm odd that way.

the finding of vaccines, the containment of the disease and the cure of the sick. Contagion, from Soderbergh and Outbreak from Wolfgang Peterson. Even World War Z depicts the eventual defeat of the infected and the end of the Zombie Wars.
So when addressing actual 'reality based' epidemic, 'Hollywood' depicts a victory and control of the disease, and it often does so even in the thriller genre. Hell, even the Stand is won in the end, virus and evil both contained and defeated.

But the disease progresses rapidly. By that time you are already contagious with what you thought was the flu, and body secretions that are dry can have the active virus for several days in stable temps. It requires isolation and few hospitals have multiple isolation wards. It could easily overwhelm our medical resources. I have two degrees in the medical field and the thought of an outbreak in a major city is scary.

researchers who are working on it. We also have security here that would be hard to duplicate in Africa. Would you rather we send all these scientist and care providers over there to set up a research lab and then bring them back here when they are ready to come?

It seems to me the safest way to study and defeat this disease just exactly what they have done.

what I believe would be some of the more reasonable concerns that would be brought forward for any such situation. I have my own apprehensions but I'm not so concerned as to feel the need to make a strong protest.

I come into contact with patients and bodily fluids and linens and equipment. Do you?

Am I panicked or deathly afraid or issuing death threats to Emory and/or the CDC? No. Concerned? Yes. Concerned about the flights. Concerned about the incubation period. Concerned about the amount of time the virus is able to live on surfaces. Concerned about protocols not being properly followed. Concerned about accidents.

And sanctimonious lectures from anyone -- especially anyone likely sitting *safely* in the comfort of his or her home -- won't change that.

I'll just gear up, follow protocols, go about my work, and hope for the best -- whether influenza, Ebola, MRSA, C. diff, you name it.

I know I do.

Too many opportunities for mistakes, accidents, or folks who generally thumb their noses at following
protocol.

Hubby is an MD--with some training in infectious tropical diseases many years ago (not Ebola)
and he is VERY concerned about Ebola being transferred to this country.

those out panic-buying duct tape and sheeting and those who are completely pooh-poohing this. We just don't know enough, and I do welcome the research by Emory and the CDC.

being transferred here are the first--or among the first--humans to receive
this new treatment. No way to know what the outcome will be--or whether
it will prove effective in short run, but allow disease to return, and if it does, how
does that affect the infectiousness nature of Ebola? Dealing with
a lot of unknowns.

on the MCAT, but chose a different direction. My reasons for doing that were complex, and I sometimes regret not taking that road, but I did not. You apparently made the choice to become a medical worker.

All medical workers face a higher risk of infectious disease than people not in medical professions. It's a known risk to anyone choosing that as a career. It was known to the doctor now being treated in Georgia for Ebola, too. I admire his dedication. I hope for his recovery. That, however, has nothing to do with my post in this thread.

My daughter is a respiratory therapist and her daughter is a nurse. They to are concerned.

a career change for me, and what an eye opener. I'm AMAZED at some of the stuff I see going on: visitors walking barefoot from patient rooms to ice machines; visitors sitting on the floor, then on patient beds or in waiting areas; visitors not always donning PPE in isolation rooms, then bellying up to the salad bar in the cafeteria; coworkers and visitors putting their feet up on upholstered chairs (no one is taking bleach wipes to those puppies); coworkers not always wearing gloves when touching used linens... ugh. I'm turning into Sheldon Cooper with his "bus pants."

I'm not freaking out over Ebola or Emory or the CDC, but anyone who thinks healthcare workers always follow protocols is deluding themselves. Not to mention the mistakes and accidents as mnhtnbb and I both mentioned.

BINGO.

And it's not like they cannot easily FIND OUT about it..... and viruses in general.

Also....they've been studying ebola for years here in the USA. There was even an incident where the virus mutated into an airborne strain..... in VA!!!! The monkeys died of it but the workers didn't, even tho' they tested positive. The airborne strain was not fatal (or even more than like a cold if I remember correctly) to humans.

There's a whole very good book about it.

The Hot Zone by Richard Preston

http://www.amazon.com/Hot-Zone-Terrifying-Story-Origins/dp/0385479565/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1407266036&sr=1-1&keywords=the+hot+zone+by+richard+preston

so many more people than Ebola has over time. It's a much greater threat, and it's endemic throughout the world. Much scarier than Ebola, frankly.

That WAS creepy

They read the descriptions of the symptoms and hemorrhages of Ebola, which sound like something from a horror movie, and remember the dumbed-down movie about a killer disease and think they've just heard about Patient Zero being deliberately moved here to kill us all.

And they won't get a flu shot because they know someone who got one once who then got the flu.

For people who do have a better grasp on how these things work, it's the other passengers on other flights from these regions that are a tiny bit more worrisome. Then again, I live somewhere where whooping cough is making a big comeback due to human ignorance.

Ebola and how it is transmitted from one person to another.

... yet few realize that the flu kills thousands every year, and many refuse to get immunized, despite tons of information. Being scared is easy. Reading is hard.

I like to read. I've found it very helpful over the years.

act on plenty of good information. Like many things, it makes no sense.

It's being hammered into peoples' heads day and night that they need to be afraid. Many of the MSM "news" shows have had multiple sensationalized segments with a "Should we be afraid of these people?" undertones. Anything for ratings. There's a substantial segment of the population that is just naturally fearful and/or are scientifically illiterate, and that's who they're targeting.

And, then there's the right-wing and their talk machine, who are using it to drum even more fear into their ignorant, easily-manipulated, bed-wetting audience. They are basically saying, "Look! These people brought Ebola to the US! If it gets loose, you're all going to die! And, it will all be the fault of the black guy in the White House/liberals, who let them in!" They hope their minions will spread that fear into the general public. They also have fomented the notion that the government is incompetent and not to be trusted. Therefore, no matter how long and how well they've prepared for something like this, they're going to do something stupid and that awful virus will somehow be unleashed into the general population here. Disease is just their latest boogeyman. They've been using it to try to scare people over the Central American children who have been trying to come here, too. Just look at the ones who have been screaming that they're all "disease-ridden."

What passes for news here is really fear mongering.

And our news media are quite skilled at keeping us scared shitless, particular when a scapegoat can be found for us to vent our fears on.

to allow the mainstream media to scare you.

Lived here over 50 years. A hundred million scare stories in that time...never believed a one of them thanks to my extremely sensible 88 year old mother. She believes nothing, and she is most often correct lol.

She survived World War II in England. She doesn't scare easy. I don't either.

Thank you mom.

Ebola is killing people "over there" in a spectacular way. That makes it exotic and unfamiliar, and it doesn't help when the news talks up the danger in order to attract more viewers.

Contrast that with Hantavirus. It's endemic to the US. It's spread by infected rats via bites, urine and feces. It's far easier to come into contact with those than the blood, vomit or diarrhea of an ebola victim. And the incubation period can be as long as 8 weeks, instead of 3 for ebola. Hantavirus causes a hemorrhagic fever, just like ebola. There is no treatment, just like ebola. And it's extremely deadly without modern medical care supporting the victim.

Coverage in the media? Virtually none. It's a familiar danger.

So people hear about ebola, hear Anderson Cooper talking about how dangerous it is, and then hear that infected people are being deliberately flown to the US. They react to what little they know, which is fear.

I was apparently bitten by a mosquito. A week later, I was in a coma in Desert Hospital in Palm Springs, CA. I had contracted Eastern Equine Encephalitis, and it came within a hair of killing me. A mosquito bite while picking up my fiancee to drive to her new home in California with me. A blood sample went to the CDC, which identified the cause of my encephalitis. I got counted among the cases of Eastern Equine Encephalitis in the United States for that year. I survived, and had no lingering effects, but spend two weeks in hospitals before being able to go home with my fiancee. We got married after I got well.

Now, I had given such a thing no thought in my life. Each year, a few people have something similar happen to them. It's a risk of living in the United States, as is hantavirus, or even plague. Every year a few people contract the plague, after being bitten by a flea from an infected squirrel. Plague is endemic in squirrels in Western states. It's out there, and people get sick from it. A few die.

Life is risky. Sometimes we know about the risks, and sometimes we don't. If we know the risks, we try to avoid them. In the case of Ebola in the United States, the risks are far lower than my risk of getting EEE. But I did, anyhow. Something will kill me someday.

I agree with you all the way. Life is a mortal condition and something will get you in the end, 100% guaranteed. I'm glad you survived EEE and got married.

Tonight I booked that flight to the East Coast I was planning when the uproar started on DU. For my birthday I am using up my "miles" before they expire. I plan to enjoy my sis and take ordinary precautions like washing my hands, which I do anyway. I want to see Niagara Falls just once -- well, twice when you consider we are going to drive to Toronto and see it from the other side as well. Yay, us.

Maybe I'll dig out my old copy of Albert Camus' The Plague and re-read it.

Last edited Tue Aug 5, 2014, 04:20 PM - Edit history (1)

People have been conditioned to fear first and ask questions later.

the highest level there is.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosafety_level#List_of_BSL-4_facilities

We, as the human race, need to be aware of it and study it carefully.

If it were to ever mutate to an airborne virus (like the flu), we should be very scared of it.

You, as an individual, do not need to be scared of Ebola. You have to encounter the body fluids (blood, vomit, etc) of someone infected... in the last stages of the infection... to catch it.

that said, it does tend to kill the human hosts... this one at around 60% of those infected, other strains have seen up to 90% lethality.

So far, our only defense is quarantine. And in Africa, with substandard measures on isolating victims from their families when sick or from even hospital workers... or when dead and the body is handled by family or funeral workers... we haven't always been successful at quarantine.

Still, I'm glad that the CDC are treating the two infected US health care workers as a serious risk, not that I believe the doctor or volunteer would even have allowed themselves to be transferred back to the US without the special facility and travel arrangements being utilized... and I'm glad for their sake that they are back here where they have, probably, the best chance to survive.

We, meaning those who are specialists in communicable diseases. They're the ones I listen to in situations like this, and the only ones I listen to. The CDC has an excellent website, full of information. It's a great place to go to learn about this. The news media is rather a poor place to go to learn much of anything. They're only good for letting you know something's worth checking out.

One of the common links binding the RW together is the desire to keep the US isolated and pristine, and not responsible for fixing the world's problems. This, along with racism, is what propels the demonstrations along the border. Flying a sick person in from another country is seen as another invasion of the isolation they crave. As for the virulence with which they voice their alarm, well, these people are not known for being quiet and peaceful.

-- Mal

when he caught it? Sometimes isolation technique is broken. Since it has up to 30 days to show up, a lot of people could be contaminated before anyone knew that isolation had been broken.

different from those managed by the CDC. No isolation is perfect, but after watching videos of conditions in West Africa, it's clear that isolation practices are not nearly as rigidly followed as they will be in Georgia.

The doctor was not in a protective suit 24 hours a day, but there were infectious people around 24 hours a day. I can't say when he was exposed or under what circumstances, but it's a far more primitive environment than is maintained here in the U.S., where state-of-the-art isolation strategies are being used in this case.

Those who believe that crap assume they will screw it up.

You either trust the government and it's track record, or you don't. The right wing paranoia that all government is inept means people assume they will screw it up.

always trust the government.

the War on Drugs, duck and cover, the Bay of Pigs invasion, response to Hurricane Katrina, the theft of Social Security funds, Project Oak Ridge, Operation Paperclip, the Tuskegee syphillis experiments, the weakening of internet security and encryption...

they have never been taught of the great heroism that the founders of many of our vaccines went through in the past. Either way they are pure idiots. This country should be ashamed of ourselves.

know that they're US citizens. As for the vaccine creators, I imagine very few DUers have read those biographies, although I certainly have.

about what is being done.

For me, they've been my key to history throughout my life. And medical biographies have been a constant source of informative reading for me since I was in my teens. Oddly enough, the first two medical biographies I read were a biography of Albert Schweitzer and one of Gordon Seagrave (Burma Surgeon) when I was a sophomore in high school. Through those I learned a great deal about Africa and Burma and the political realities of both places, along with interesting medical information.

Over the ensuing years, I've read scores of other biographies of physicians and other medical people. Each has taught me things about both medicine and history. It's been a great love of mine.

Any movie dealing with a virus starts this way - something is brought back to the United States and it quickly escalates to the point where a good portion of the country is infected.

Maybe some people don't know that. It seems hard to believe, though.

It's irrational for a reason. But I've seen enough people on twitter think we're about to witness a 28 Days Later deal here to know people actually think it's possible.

Truly it does.

not all but some

folks just do not handle sick folks

want them all bright sunny and healthy

A lot of people just cannot handle dealing with death and dying in any form. I don't think it's fear of catching something that is the problem. It's the whole death and dying thing. Scares the crap out of people. It's something that is difficult to overcome. Some can, but others simply cannot face the reality of the shortness of life, I think.

People who think they have a lot of friends are usually very much wrong - at the end of your life you'd be lucky to count on one hand the number of real friends you had.

as my sister said, times like this you find out who is in your life boat and who is not. That is surely true, some long time friends and family members faded into the background when things got rough, but then there were those 'casual' acquaintances that stepped up to the plate. Relationships change, it is difficult to accept, but ultimately we are happier not to have a crowded life boat.

My husband had a transplant for acute leukemia in 2010 that developed from MDS.

I worry more about the big paper wasp nest in my neighbor's tree. Bald-faced hornets scare the crap out of me. I've talked to him. We're going to knock it down on some -20 degree day this winter and burn it. Maybe we'll break the cycle of the things. Nasty critters. Of Satan, they are, I'm sure, and I'm an atheist.

I'm glad that the two Americans were brought back to the states and are receiving treatment. The treatment sounds promising and I'm sure their plights are providing valuable information to researchers. I sincerely hope they both will recover quickly.

Death threats against the hospital, its staff, or anyone for that matter are absolutely horrible and stretch the resources of the hospital in ways that should NOT have to be stretched, particularly at a time like now when I'm sure they need every available resource to deal with the reality of what is going on.

I do worry that not enough is known about this disease. I see people state with complete confidence that it is not an airborne disease, but do they really know that? Are they really completely sure? I hope they are.

So, yes, I worry about the incoming flights from areas where Ebola is present, and wonder if there's not more that could be done. I don't know what more could be done myself, that's not my area of expertise. I just hope that the powers that be are covering all of the possibilities.

It's been studied for quite a long time and its epidemiology is well-known. Its method of transmission is known and, since it is not a respiratory illness, it's extremely unlikely to become an airborne threat. The confidence level of that is extremely high, because it is not a respiratory virus by nature. There doesn't seem to be a path for it to alter to one, either. It's a blood virus.

Incubating patients traveling are a definite risk, and we may see a few isolated cases in the U.S. in the next couple of months, but the warning is out there and Emergency Rooms are on the lookout for cases. Everyone who presents with any of Ebola's symptoms are going to be questioned about their recent travel. In fact, I think that question should be asked of every ER patient. But, it's going to be asked of everyone who comes in with fever, belly aches, and any of the other symptoms.

Isolation and tracking of contacts will be done. All of that is being coordinated by the CDC, which has already issued bulletins throughout the country. Any cases that pop up will be very likely to be identified quickly, because it's such a severe illness. Contacts will be followed up if cases occur and any outbreak will be contained quickly.

If it were a respiratory illness and was spread by airborne processes, it would be much more worrisome. In West Africa, it spreads more readily, due to limited medical facilities and living conditions. That's not the case here or in other developed countries. The entire medical community is aware of Ebola right now, and there will be more false positives than cases, by far, out of an abundance of caution.

Americans -citizens of the fugging country - lily white ones at that.
It's over. The dream is now a nightmare of hate and division - selfishness and greed. Mememememememememememememememmemememmeemememememmee

"I don't have a disease. You're screwed if you do. Get away from me! Get off my lawn!"

Rand Paul's America

They have become a nation of sheeple.

so they have to rev up the sheep, I mean American public.

or, to be more precise, not educated on an issue

I remember the same garbage with AIDS

Bringing a level 4 pathogen into the US is irresponsible. I don't care how safe the doctors can be. Nothing prevents human error, and human error can cause the virus to spread.

People are delusional if they don't fear this disease.