Ebola: Facts, Opinions, and Speculations.

Dallas Commissioners Will Declare State Of Disaster Tomorrow Over Ebola

While the message from the President is 'keep calm and avoid bodily fluids', it appears the commissioners in Dallas are slightly more concerned at the potential for Ebola to escalate:

*DALLAS COMMISSIONERS TO DECLARE LOCAL STATE OF DISASTER TOMORROW: NBC-TV
*DALLAS COUNTY CONSIDERS DECLARING STATE OF DISASTER FROM EBOLA
*DALLAS DISASTER DECLARATION WOULD ACTIVATE EMERGENCY PLAN
While we are not sure where a "state of disaster" ranks relative to a "public health emergency" such as the one in Connecticut, we are certain of one thing - it will mean civil liberties will be reduced as government takes control.

BREAKING>> Emergency Dallas Commissioners Ct. Meeting Set for tomorrow at 2pm to declare Local State of Disaster
— Meredith Land (@MeredithNBC5) October 16, 2014

Is this the quote?

a reply to: ripcontrol

Yes thats the one as another poster said martial law in Dallas should be interesting if this is true

a reply to: ripcontrol

Which nurse do you think it is?

When was this CNN report? Which hour? Thanks.

a reply to: ripcontrol

Dallas County Considers Declaring State of Disaster From Ebola

Oct. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Dallas County Commissioners will vote tomorrow to declare a local state of disaster caused by the Ebola virus.

The county “has the potential to suffer widespread or severe damage, injury, loss or threat of life resulting from the Ebola virus,” according to a proposed draft of the declaration.

The county has been preparing contingencies since a Liberian visitor to the U.S. died at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas on Oct. 8. Two health-care workers involved with the man’s care have tested positive for the virus.

VIDEO: First U.S. Ebola Case Confirmed in Dallas, CDC Says
Approval of the proposed order would implement the county’s emergency management system, according to the declaration.

and

Dallas leaders prepare to request state disaster declaration

Dallas County leaders are preparing to request a state disaster declaration because of the Ebola crisis.

The commissioners will meet Thursday to request additional state funding and resources.

The cost to the county for the first Ebola patient alone, Thomas Eric Duncan, was more than $1 million.

There have now been three people diagnosed in Dallas.

The latest, 29-year-old Amber Vinson, is a nurse who had extensive contact with Duncan before his death.

She is also the first Dallas patient to be transferred out of state for specialized treatment.

a reply to: ~Lucidity
I wondered about this, too. Nurse 1 was supposed to be in "good" condition, right?
The 2nd nurse walked onto the plane (with assistance).

a reply to: ~Lucidity

You would have to ask

I think its the first one..


It was about the 9 to 9:30 news CNN

They had they Head of the Nurses union or some such...
Mixed with the news release


The second nurse would be one hell of a three card monty but.. I am thinking the first one..

Thursday's developments include:

• In northeast Ohio, one person has been quarantined and six others have quarantined and are monitoring themselves for Ebola after coming into contact or being near Ebola-stricken Texas nurse Amber Vinson, Ohio Department of Health spokesman Jay Carey said. Several Texas and Ohio schools are closed as a precaution against exposing faculty and students.

• Texas nurse Nina Pham is being sent to a National Institutes of Health hospital in Maryland for specialized Ebola treatment.
Nurse's Ohio family 'self-monitoring'

• A top health official in Texas apologized for what he called mistakes in how Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas handled its first Ebola patient -- a Liberian national who was initially told to go home after he came in complaining of a fever and saying he'd recently been in West Africa.

• Federal officials are considering barring 76 hospital workers who treated an Ebola patient from boarding airplanes.

• A Yale doctoral student who recently returned to Connecticut from Liberia and has a fever is in isolation at Yale-New Haven Hospital and is being tested for Ebola, officials at the hospital said Thursday, adding that results should be available within 24 hours.

www.cnn.com...

I wonder what would happen if we sent someone to the white house petition site and had them request that Dr. Friedman be sent to Texas and tried for murder..

You think people would sign it..

Kinda interesting. I'm still digesting the information myself.

the o-man solution is to appoint a CZAR -CNN coverage on an interview

A second line

Well there is no middle finger icon

It wont do anything so yeah!!!!

hope the planes do NOT crash in a storm..

After I write this short story


I have a new thread coming

a reply to: ripcontrol

Not a bad solution. The CDC dude needs help.

Ebola outbreak: Famine approaches – bringing a fresh nightmare to West Africa

Sierra Leone’s fields are without farmers. Its crops go un-reaped. In the quarantine areas, feeding is patchy – some get food, others don’t. People then leave the enforced isolation in search of a meal, so Ebola spreads. In three West African countries where many already live a hand-to-mouth existence, the act of eating is increasingly rare.

Now we are starting to see things that will help spread it to the rest of Africa as you will begin to see a exodus in search of food.

I've updated the Ebola charts with the latest WHO update from Wednesday.

Latest Ebola Charts Start Here

This could be a bit of good news, and explain why Louise Troh and others who were close to Mr. Duncan aren't showing symptoms.
Ebola infections with no symptoms is possible

From the article:

So how could all the people who spent days in close quarters with a man sickened with Ebola manage to evade illness?

One possible explanation that has rarely been discussed is that people could be infected with Ebola without ever showing symptoms. The phenomenon is called "asymptomatic infection," and it is an unusual but potentially very real feature of the Ebola virus in humans.

No one knows yet whether people with asymptomatic infections are immune to the virus in some or all cases. But if they are, those people could be recruited to help fight the Ebola epidemic by treating patients.

Here is a link to the associated paper published in Lancet.

Since this is the speculations thread, what about people getting ebola and remaining asymptomatic but are still infectious? Anyone having information on this for or against please share.

a reply to: Olivine

A certain percentage of the population is immune to Ebola. Those who are asymptomatic have never been shown to spread the disease.They simply carry it and it never is able to replicate enough to the point that it begins to shed. The bodies immune system defeats it.

Again, all cases of Ebola documented (as far as records show...) to date can be traced back to direct contact with the virus, yes, even all those thousands in Africa. Most of them were intimately caring for sick family members while living in squalor.

Edit: Finding asymptomatic individuals has proven to be hard, but they would be invaluable to finding a vaccine or treatment.

a reply to: TC Mike

It has been linked in other threads, and there are articles in depth about it on CDC and WHO's sites.

Those who are asymptomatic have never been shown to shed the disease.

They can transmit the disease sexually and through contact with blood and fecal matter. This means you have the same chances of catching Ebola from an asymptomatic individual as you do to catch HIV from an HIV positive person.

It is very possible that someone who is asymptomatic could infect caregivers who are unaware (Drawing blood etc), but the virus does not get to the point that it sheds. This has been well documented based on past exposure with Ebola.

Many people reading this probably know I've been charting Ebola cases and deaths reported by WHO and creating projections since early August in the Ebola charts thread. Last night I got curious how accurate the very first projections I did back on August 4, 2014 had been.

Since then, I've normally been updating a different version of the same chart (Chart 3) that I created a couple days after that on August 6, 2014. That newer version of Chart 3 had a somewhat longer timeline, but it also had more aggressive projections.

Recently, reported numbers have been trending down from those more aggressive projections I made in the August 6th version of Chart 3. That appears to be primarily due to a decline in new reported cases and deaths in Liberia over the last month. WHO indicated a few days ago that they believe there is no decline in Liberia and that it actually is a problem with Liberia's ability to track, test, and report all cases and deaths as the epidemic grows there.

But it made me curious whether my original projections from August 4th might be more accurate than the more aggressive ones I did two days later. So I dug up the original projection and that's the first chart below. Then using the same exact projection lines, I overlaid the reported data up through the last WHO update yesterday. That's the second chart below.



The comparison pretty much speaks for itself. I expected and hoped to see something slowing Ebola down by now, and still hope to see that. But it isn't happening yet.

originally posted by: raymundoko
a reply to: TC Mike

Those who are asymptomatic have never been shown to shed the disease.

They can transmit the disease sexually and through contact with blood and fecal matter. This means you have the same chances of catching Ebola from an asymptomatic individual as you do to catch HIV from an HIV positive person.

I know you've mostly been the 'voice of reason/don't panic' guy, and you probably meant that to be reassuring, but it's not. In fact, it's downright horrifying.

HIV seems to spread quite effectively in this manner. I did a quick check, and more than 71 million people have been infected with HIV/AIDS.

And just because it might spread like HIV from an asymptomatic person to others does not mean that the newly infected will be asymptomatic. Ebola is a Biosafety Level 4 pathogen, whereas HIV is Biosafety Level 2. Many (most?) who catch Ebola from an asymptomatic person would themselves be symptomatic and would shed Ebola in the 'normal' way. So every single asymptomatic carrier is the potential start of an Ebola outbreak.

If this is correct - and I would expect it is, since recovered individuals can still transmit Ebola through sex for somewhere around 90 days - the implications are huge. For starters, airport screening won't catch asymptomatic cases.