France 'on alert’ amid Guinea Ebola outbreak

Nasty little virus indeed it is :

Ebola hemorrhagic fever (Ebola HF) is a severe, often-fatal disease in humans and nonhuman primates (monkeys and chimpanzees) that has appeared sporadically since its initial recognition in 1976.

The disease is caused by infection with Ebola virus, named after a river in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (formerly Zaire) in Africa, where it was first recognized. The virus is one of two members of a family of RNA viruses called the Filoviridae. Three of the four species of Ebola virus identified so far have caused disease in humans: Ebola-Zaire, Ebola-Sudan, and Ebola-Ivory Coast. The fourth, Ebola-Reston, has caused disease in nonhuman primates, but not in humans.

More here : www.webmd.com...

For a more in depth factsheet the World health organisation (WHO) have some info here : www.who.int...

And also this from ebola.emedtv.com...

France has called for extra “vigilance” among domestic medical services following an unprecedented Ebola outbreak in former French colony Guinea.

Social Affairs Minister Marisol Touraine said no cases had been reported in France, but warned that because of the numbers of travelers arriving from the West African country, she had put medical services “on alert” for any suspected cases in France.

More info from France 24 here : www.france24.com...

With a fatality rate of 90%, medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) has warned that Guinea is facing an unprecedented epidemic of Ebola that would test the weak health systems across West Africa.

Talk has it that any "suspected" cases of people who are travelling by air will be instantly place into quarantine on the plane and that also a couple of hospitals in France have been chosen to deal with an eventual outbreak.

Sadly it looks as if the boundry police are going to also have to come up with much stricter methods in stopping illegal immigration into the country...

France's DGS public health authority placed hospitals and emergency services on alert, a spokeswoman said.

Further instructions were sent to health authorities in the larger Paris region regarding passengers arriving at the Charles de Gaulle international airport, though no measures had yet been taken to restrict travel.

Link : www.reuters.com...

Shucks knows how this type of virus can be contained without eventual disastrous consequences to the populations in other countries too?

To be continued...

Kindest respects

Rodinus

reply to post by Rodinus


I was thinking about the Ebola last days. Glad to see at least one country out of the "Third World" started to pay attention to this.

Our current civilization depends in great part of commercial exchange, that could be a problem now.

All we need is one single case of Ebola in Europe or America, and pseudo zombie apocalypse paranoia will be triggered. Sadly, it will represent just another business opportunity for some people. I wonder if that could be the "boost" Obamacare needs.

reply to post by Rodinus


I would have thought that the whole of Europe, indeed, all the world should be concerned at the state of affairs pertaining to this disease, and its viral cause, and should have been concerned about it whether it was coming toward their borders at the time or not.

The fact is that this virus needs wiping off the face of the planet with all possible haste. Failing to contain and destroy the virus will have horrific consequences, and the outbreak has already claimed lives at its origin point, as it might with its 90% mortality rate. That is cause enough for concern. The fact that it may transfer to France is a concern of course, but no more so than the idea of it existing in any place, at any time.

What I would say, is that if it makes its way to France, lets say Paris for example, the results could be unprecedented. Paris being the hub that it is, with visitors, travelers, and businesses all over the place, would be an ideal place for the virus to increase its footprint, and spread to other nations across the globe. I can think of little more terrifying, than the prospect of a pandemic outbreak of Ebola HF.

By comparison to Ebola, plague had a 66% mortality rate, and that was during the pre-antibiotic period. When the Black Death blew through Europe, it devastated its population to the point where it took one hundred and fifty years for population levels to return to normal. Ebola HF has a 90% mortality rate, NOW! Even with all our medical technology, all the advances in medicine, treatment, DNA sequencing, even with all that in mind, Ebola could potentially cause much greater devastation.

scary, I always assumed we received shots as kids for this sort of thing..

my friend at lunch today told me a story!

her friend was recently in Bali, met a young girl whom they took a liking too, young orphan girl!

when they came home, they paid for her to come to Australia for English Classes for 5 weeks.

the day she landed, she got terribly sick and started coughing up blood!

she's now in quarantine, still extremely sick!

might try and find out if that young girl was indeed Balinese!

I am nervous, as I work in a hospital. They mention care being taken in Paris, but many African immigrants arrive by boat, down here in the south (through Marseille).
I wouldn't be surprised if a case ended up in one of these hospitals before being recognised as being ebola. We recently had some immigrants arrive in our hospital with TB.

Agit8dChop
scary, I always assumed we received shots as kids for this sort of thing..

No you wouldn't as there no approved vaccine for Ebola. There a experimental one buts its unproven and a very recent thing.

If they vaccinated you against everything you would be a pin cushion.

Agit8dChop
my friend at lunch today told me a story!

her friend was recently in Bali, met a young girl whom they took a liking too, young orphan girl!

when they came home, they paid for her to come to Australia for English Classes for 5 weeks.

the day she landed, she got terribly sick and started coughing up blood!

she's now in quarantine, still extremely sick!

might try and find out if that young girl was indeed Balinese!

Could be a dozen things. TB most likely. But that area has its own hemorrhagic fevers native to the area too. No way to tell though without blood works done and more symptom information.

reply to post by TrueBrit


And don't forget the 1918 Spanish Influenza epidemic... (that could have been called a pandemic) :

The influenza pandemic of 1918-1919 killed more people than the Great War, known today as World War I (WWI), at somewhere between 20 and 40 million people. It has been cited as the most devastating epidemic in recorded world history. More people died of influenza in a single year than in four-years of the Black Death Bubonic Plague from 1347 to 1351. Known as "Spanish Flu" or "La Grippe" the influenza of 1918-1919 was a global disaster.

Link here : virus.stanford.edu...

All it takes is just one infected or should I say "incubating" person to step into another country and the consequences are just not imaginable...

Kindest respects

Rodinus

reply to post by Bluesma


Just for info Blues, Rumour says that the Timône hospital is one of those cited on the list of hospitals who are being prepared. Heard this from a customer of mine who works there. (But have not seen any confirmation anywhere)

Kindest respects

Rodinus

Maybe This Will Cause the "Purge" Need to Follow the Georgia Guildline Stones or Unite Humanity, or the "Judgment Day", etc.....????

I think it woulb be better that a virus be the "judgment" than an individual, group, or nation.

(Two Cents Tossed...Swissssh)

Regards,

Oh, they're paying attention to it. You can bet on that. You just won't hear about it until it has to come out.

Just like they're paying very close attention to things like Bird Flu. It's just not common knowledge.

Letting people know just exactly how closely they watch these thing and try to prepare doesn't do much except make people panic, and if they know extra scrutiny is being is being paid, it may just drive the potential "patient zero" of any outbreak that much further under the radar, complicating the situation.

reply to post by ketsuko

Oh, they're paying attention to it. You can bet on that. You just won't hear about it until it has to come out.

a bit like that missing plane..
a global community needs global stories..

reply to post by UNIT76


It does, but this one isn't a good one to use unless they really want to panic people. If they start wanting us all to panic ... then it's time to get really suspicious. There's plenty of stuff going on right now to keep people at a constant state of nervousness while going about their lives more or less normally. Starting to report on a killer Ebola pandemic ... that has the potential to cause widespread panic and the breakdown of society if handled incorrectly.

reply to post by Rodinus


Thanks Rodinus, for sharing your account, & I'm happy to hear that France is taking measures...

So far, the only country outside the continent of Africa, is Al Arabia Saudia, & yours...as far as I can recall..

My immediate reaction to the situation (due to my obsession with football) was this posted in soficrow"s thread here on ATS:

Call me crazy, but why am I having difficulty trusting the Nigerian Minister of Information?

From your previous post, a couple of pages back, & sourced @ www.ibtimes.com... :

Senegal has closed its border with the country, and Nigeria was gripped by fear of contamination when some of the country’s leading media outlets reported that a 15-year-old woman died of the disease in the country’s Edo State last week.

The Nigerian Minister of Information, Labaran Maku, stated Wednesday that the woman actually died of dengue fever, squelching fears that Ebola had spread to Africa’s most populous nation.

"Nigeria is prepared right now to curtail any outbreak particularly given reports that few counties (sic) on the West Coast like Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea have reported cases of Ebola fever and given our proximity to these countries Nigeria is ready, the [Health Ministry] has every precaution including getting with vaccines and medicines to ensure that should there be any incidence in Nigeria, everything would be dealt with precision,” Maku said, according to Nigerian newspaper This Day.

Nelson Dafe, a journalist at Nigeria's News Express newspaper, said via online chat that many of his fellow Nigerians are not concerned about the Ebola outbreak.

"Here in Benin City in the mid-west of southern Nigeria, people are not talking about it. I doubt if they are even aware about the outbreak of the disease," he wrote.

1. Hold Up, Wait A Minute! See bolded text above; Does Nigeria have some special Ebola vaccines & medicines that I'm not privy to???

2. WT? The tone of the Nigerian sources in the article implies that they don't want citizens to be aware of an Ebola outbreak...or try to minimize awareness/education...to prevent panic?

3. This is a thread (excellent, by the way) about how Ebola "Could Become Global"...Well, I truly hope Nigeria is being truthful about the matter of NO cases & that cases don't spread to Côte d'Ivoire as both countries have national teams playing in the World Cup in Brasil in less than 70 days... (Sourced @ www.fifa.com...).

Hopefully, the players & fans who may travel with their teams across the Atlantic will not be exposed...FIFA should be proactive in assisting them out of those areas, I think...

So, Rodinus, we know that Guinea has those flying into France; could you comment on other possibilities of nations outlined above? I know Ivory Coast might be one...

Positive thoughts & prayers sent your way with the precautions...Until it becomes less murky, stay away from people as much as you can...

i hate too be a spoiled sport,,(huge Pelle fan,) but,,,,







might be a lot of concern here.

Bob@home:

Nvm...

Lives could be @ stake here, mon....

reply to post by BurningSpearess


right here

Players

Dwayne DE ROSARIO
David EDGAR
Ali GERBA
Atiba HUTCHINSON
Bob LENARDUZZI
Dale MITCHELL
Branko SEGOTA
Paul STALTERI

now shhh game is on,,,

reply to post by BobAthome


They'd have to get someone who is not obviously sick in there, and he'd have to come into close enough contact to enough people to spread his direct body fluids on them.

Just from my experience in a football stadium, unless you are actively trying to infect someone you're talking about a limited pool of people in a limited radius around the sick person - even yelled droplets only fly so many feet - and anyone who might get unlucky enough to brush up against him and contact sweat going in or out or in a restroom directly before or after for a time.

Anyone newly infected shouldn't be able to infect anyone else although, if they get enough infected fluid on them, they might be able to pass that on for a very limited time, themselves.

Then, you have to worry about where they all go, which is the bigger worry (assuming the infected person manages to infect many others).

But it would be much worse if Ebola were like the cold or flu in communicability.

reply to post by ketsuko


What about (speculation) of evidence that Ebola is possibly now transmitted through the air much like other viruses???

I'm hoping that this is wrong of course, but this new strand seems to be spreading more rapidly & has a unique signature...

reply to post by BurningSpearess


I was thinking the same thing. There is only one known form of ebola that is airborne but it only affects monkeys. It's called ebola Reston and was first discovered in affected monkeys just miles from Washington DC, scary stuff.

I may be wrong but it may be possible for a small mutation in the make up of the ebola that could lead to humans contracting the Reston strain. I'm not sure if it would be airborne or spread through contact. Don't pay too much attention to me though, I'm more for doom-porn than microbiology.



As for France, could they not close the door on African countries? I think I read that other countries in Africa have shut the borders with Guinea. I would.

reply to post by ketsuko


yep, i agree with what you've typed back there..
where the global story is concerned;

It does, but this one isn't a good one to use unless they really want to panic people.

i see echoes of the dictators dilemma, "is it better to be feared, or loved?"
and echoes of 'the carrot & the stick'

thanks for cattle-prodding the conversation along