CDC mobilizing: Dallas Hospital confirms First Positive Ebola Case in the US

a reply to: RifRAAF

That is old & is from the 6 Aug. She was placed in the same
hospital as the missionary in Atlanta who had been n Liberia.
Said she was responding to treatment. This information was
from your source.

Cheers
Ektar

a reply to: RifRAAF

Don't trip. That radios station just announced they are in fact awaiting test results on a family member who is exhibiting symptoms.

Good show bringing that dirt.

originally posted by: joho99
a reply to: adomol



I was thinking why the USA first?

One possibility is he suspected he might have it and traveled to the USA for better care.

He lives here. He moved to Dallas from Liberia a week ago. At least that's what's being reported here.

originally posted by: RifRAAF
Possible second case?
www.freerepublic.com...

I'm reposting your link at the top of the page for others. The radio link in there confirms they are awaiting results for another possible case right now. I just heard it.

If confirmed you get the prize for announcing it first here…

a reply to: Gully

That is the official statement.
Not sure they would really like to announce expect people to head to this country seeking treatment.

But i do know for sure as the numbers grow it will happen more and more.

a reply to: intrptr

So not only was he infectious while he was here, this may be confirmation that he did infect others. This could get ugly faster than I had thought. I still wonder how many people he actually came in contact with while he was infectious both knowingly and unknowingly.

He left Liberia on the 19th arrived on the 20th, showed symptoms on the 24th, was hospitalized on the 28th, and already there is possibly one more that was infected by him and showing symptoms in just 6 days? Could he be carrying a mutated strain that has a shorter incubation period?

Why have there not been any mention of his condition with him being in hospital since Sunday? We are not Africa and should be hearing whether he is responding to the great care this country provides and the reason stated that this would never spread here, where are the updates, it has been 3 days now?

According to the director of the CDC during yesterday's press conference, incubation is usually 8-10 days but can be as short as two or as long as 21. a reply to: SpaDe_

a reply to: whatnext21

This AP credited article was posted about 10 minutes ago, but I'm not certain how current the info is. link

State health officials described the patient as seriously ill. Goodman said he was able to communicate and was hungry.

The hospital is discussing if experimental treatments would be appropriate, Frieden said.

Also, from an Austin, TX news station

While doctors at Presbyterian treat the patient, the CDC and Dallas County health officials will begin a "contact investigation," which requires interviewing everyone the patient contacted.

Dallas County Health Director Zachary Thompson said that includes four or five children, several adults, and the emergency medical personnel -- about a dozen people in all.

"What we're hearing is that the individual was a traveler," Thompson said. "Then we're hearing they might live here. All this has to be flushed out in this contact investigation."

I truly hope the patients' family aren't infected.

a reply to: SunnyRunner360

Right, but contact to show of symptoms in 4 days?? That seems rather quick to me if it turns out to be confirmed. I am starting to think that he was already infectious upon arrival, but was unaware.
I have felt a little under the weather before and just shrugged it off until it was bad. He could have done the same thing thinking it was just jet lag or stress.

a reply to: SpaDe_

Yeah. It isn't really a precise science. What are symptoms? Fever, headache, muscle/joint ache, and weakness. I feel 3 out of 4 every time I travel. Haha. And a lot of times I'm not really conscious of it. If he had no reason to make note of those symptoms he may have forgotten by the time the more severe symptoms arose.

It's just a waiting game. I'd say that a week is ample time for any new cases to be found... so I'm just not gonna worry and wait.

a reply to: Olivine

If he symptoms are already undergoing for quite a while no treatment will help him survive, Ebola is something that in order to have a chance it needs to be caught in time.

I wonder how many people will be flooding hospitals in the area where he came from thinking that they are symptomatic.

Mass hysteria, that can create problems of healthy people mixed with people that could be infected.

That is how pandemics start to spread.

They weaker the immune system the faster it takes. With traveling from Africa to here he must have been under some stress which would cause his immune system to weaken. I'd like to know the airports he came in on. If could spread it at he time of travel that plane need to be found right away, along with the airport.

a reply to: ObjectZero

No, supposedly he didn't exhibit symptoms while been screened in the airport, (or the airport was no doing a good job of screening people from infected areas), so he would not have been infectious during that time.

So is a big chance that he didn't infected anybody during traveling.

a reply to: Olivine

Maybe they will try the experiment of taking blood from the two survivors we brought back from Africa to treat??

It really makes me wonder why they went to all the trouble with the two we brought here to treat, but not the same for this guy?

Something doesn't add up to me... We have CNN and other news publications stating that no one should panic or worry, because it's hard to contract Ebola unless you have direct contact with bodily fluids of someone who is sick.

Now, with patient zero do we know how this person had direct contact with bodily fluids? Also, why is it that we have doctors, or experts in the field of dealing with Ebola getting sick too? It's obviously rather easy to contract the disease if we see these experts in the field, who know all the precautionary measures to take are still getting sick...

If anything, it seems rather simple and not difficult, like the narrative I keep reading/hearing about all over the news.

Incubation period of 2 to 21 days, so yes, secondary cases could be showing by now.

Loam, I think it was you who asked about indirect contact, I've posted quite a bit about the dangers of indirect contact:

Overall, Ebola virus socio-ecology systems have shown to be linked by direct and indirect transmission through contact with objects from patients. For example, the blood or secretions of an infected person or objects that have been contaminated with infected secretions can reach humans from a variety of hosts/sources

Need of surveillance response systems to combat Ebola outbreaks and other emerging infectious diseases in African countries

And

Case identification and detection, contact tracing and patient clinical assessment and management are not the object of this Guidance document and instructions can be found elsewhere.1, 2 However, regarding IPC measures to be implemented during interviews for contact tracing and case finding in the community, the following principles should be kept in mind: 1) shaking hands should be avoided; 2) a distance of more than one metre (about 3 feet) should be maintained between interviewer and interviewee; 3) PPE is not required if this distance is assured and when interviewing asymptomatic individuals (e.g., neither fever, nor diarrhoea, bleeding or vomiting) and provided there will be no contact with the environment, potentially contaminated with a possible/probable case; 4) it is advisable to provide workers undertaking contact tracing and case finding in the community with alcohol-based hand rub solutions and instructions to appropriately perform hand hygiene.

Interim Infection Prevention and Control Guidance for Care of Patients with Suspected or Confirmed Filovirus Haemorrhagic Fever in Health-Care Settings, with Focus on Ebola
August 2014

And

Infection, although occurring indirectly through body fluids, is strongly suspected to occur through airborne as well as skin contact transmission.

Ebola Hemorrhagic Fever (EHF): Mechanism of Transmission and Pathogenicity

Someone else asked about mosquitos:

The susceptibility to infection of arthropod taxa can be assessed by virus replication after intrathoracic inoculation of virus. Turell et al. [8] reported that EBO virus, subtype Reston (EBO-R), failed to replicate in Culex or Aedes mosquitoes and in Ornithodoros ticks. However, Kunz et al. [9] previously reported that MBG virus could persist in Aedes mosquitoes for 3 weeks or more, indicating that certain arthropods exposed towasp.Altho the virus could be transient or persistent carriers of infection. Many potential blood-feeding arthropod vectors (phlebotomine flies, culicoids, ixodid ticks, mites, fleas, and wingless flies associated with bats) have not been tested by experimental inoculation. The susceptibility of insects used by humans or wild vertebrate reservoir hosts as a source of food (including termites, moths, and larvae [grubs]) also has not been explored. As will be discussed below, there has been recent speculation about the possible role of leafhoppers in filovirus ecology; therefore, experimental studies should determine the host range of EBO virus for plant-feeding bugs.

So mixed results of very incomplete studies. All subtypes need to be tested against all possible vectors present within the potentially affected area(s).

EBO and MBG viruses are similar in genome organization and have extensive sequence homology but do not share cross-reactive antigens [33]. The ecology of EBO viruses is certainly more complex than that of MBG. Operational hypotheses on the ecology of EBO virus must take into account the factors discussed below.

Geographic distribution
At least 4 genetic subtypes of EBO virus have been recognized: Zaire (EBO-Z), Côte d'Ivoire (EBO-CI) [34], Sudan (EBO-S) [35], and EBO-R. EBO-R was recovered in the Philippines [36] and from monkeys imported from the Philippines to the United States and Europe.

...

The occurrence of a distinct EBO virus subtype in the Philippines has important implications for filovirus ecology, since it implies that EBO group viruses may have been carried by migratory hosts at some point in their evolution.

Ecology of Marburg and Ebola Viruses: Speculations and Directions for Future Research

There are other animal hosts as well, it is airborne in pigs but they are asymtpomatic as are dogs.

Scary effing ish...

a reply to: LDragonFire

Well know that is already an experimental drug been tested as now by Glaxosmith, in Bethesda, but only on healthy people, I imagine that if a person is experiencing full symptoms of ebola they will want anything to help them survive.

So the biggest experiment will be the testing of the vaccines with consent.

Something bothers me about all this. It bothers me because the officials aren't mentioning it at all, as far as I know.

Namely: what about the other people on that plane Mr X came in on, who might also have come back from west Africa? Okay, we are told that Ebola isn't infectious until the patient is symptomatic and Mr X wasn't showing symptoms when he flew in to the US. We are basically being assured of that. He didn't spread the infection on the way in.

That's nice to know, but it doesn't mean there were no other people on that same plane who were already showing symptoms. I mean, Mr X didn't just start showing symptoms then collapse on the spot. It took time. Days. Enough time for him to go to a hospital and get sent home again.

Then two days or so later Mr X finally feels so ill he has to go back to hospital in an ambulance. Then they test him and confirm he's got Ebola.

Fact: a person could literally leave Liberia feeling absolutely okay and start to feel unwell during the flight. And once they show symptoms -- even if they are not severe -- they are infectious. So, there could be others.

And if there were any others they could be literally anywhere in the US by now. Or almost anywhere else in the world, for that matter. It would just depend if they were able to travel further before they got too sick to do so. And not everyone is the same: some people will be hit harder and go down quicker than others.

But here's the bigger worry: if there were people on that plane with Ebola and they were starting to show symptoms, then what about all the contacts they had, both within the aircraft and after they landed? How on earth will the various authorities track them all down? Can they do it before some of those contacts also start becoming sick and spread the virus still further?

And what about all the other flights going from W. Africa into the US (and other places) every day? The same scenario applies to all of them.

originally posted by: marg6043
a reply to: ObjectZero

No, supposedly he didn't exhibit symptoms while been screened in the airport, (or the airport was no doing a good job of screening people from infected areas), so he would not have been infectious during that time.

So is a big chance that he didn't infected anybody during traveling.

I just heard a snippet of news regarding a journalist who was covering Ebola over in West Africa say that prior to boarding to return to US her temp and that of those with her, photographer etc, were checked multiple times. Once they landed, the airport security never checked them once even though they said they returned from covering the outbreak. REALLY???? Not sure which airport it was, might have been a few of them.