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[Nmaro Makari]

Sierra Leone Declares Ebola Public Health Emergency

Mother Nature is back with a vengeance it seems.

Thoughts, news, debate, bring it all here.

[Ché Biko]

The people treating the infected are sometimes falling victim to the disease themselves, with fatal consequences. That's dedication...

[Ibrahim Tash-Murkon]

WHO doesn't think it'll spread outside of the region but it is likely to persist for awhile. The customary treatment of the dead (lots of physical contact) in the area is being educated against with some success and that's helping with infection. Doctors are also being deployed to help in care. Ebola has no cure but it can be treated very much like the flu, if you can help the body while the virus just runs its course survival isn't impossible.

[Ché Biko]

http://www.peoplesworld.org/cuba-leads-in-the-fight-against-ebola-in-west-africa/

[Silas Vitalia]

Humans are interesting creatures in how we collectively respond to perceived sensational risk versus actual risk.

I think more people die every year choking on peanuts, for example.


:/

[Esna Pitoojee]

To play the devil's advocate, there isn't really much we can do about people choking on peanuts. I mean, better education (Heimlich maneuver, etc) will help stop deaths, but that won't en people accidentally choking on a peanut.

Ebola, on the other hand, is something we can contain through known measures.

[Jace]

There's also, you know, the contagiousness aspect. If someone choking on peanuts started to spread to those around them, holy shit that would be a news story.

[Morwen Lagann]

There's also, you know, the contagiousness aspect. If someone choking on peanuts started to spread to those around them, holy shit that would be a news story.

This would've been funnier during the Bush administration, let me tell you.

[Jace]

There's also, you know, the contagiousness aspect. If someone choking on peanuts started to spread to those around them, holy shit that would be a news story.

This would've been funnier during the Bush administration, let me tell you.

There is an Axis of Evil out there. Peanuts. Pretzels. Cashews. And they mean to do us harm.

[Lyn Farel]

To play the devil's advocate, there isn't really much we can do about people choking on peanuts. I mean, better education (Heimlich maneuver, etc) will help stop deaths, but that won't en people accidentally choking on a peanut.

Ebola, on the other hand, is something we can contain through known measures.

I think Silas could have used another example, like measles, that kills approximately 500.000 people per year.

Ebola is "nothing of the same scale", it's just impressive and sensational as it is an extremely nasty virus that kills dirty and quickly, without any proper remedy. However, it actually only kills one out of two infected (which is quite big), but can be reduced to 10% with proper treatment. Which is still big, but considering how bad it is at contaminating and expanding while killing very quickly... : you have to be in physical contact with infected people, and especially with bodily fluids. Which means a near to zero chance of expanding if proper quarantine measures coupled with proper medication are taken. I mean, does the infected patient that got back in the US spread the thing ? Or the one in France more recently ? Nope.

Ebola is mostly a third world problem that could be resolved with proper measures, like most diseases that we consider outdated in our countries and still ravaging some third world ones.


Edit : reading the last news, a lot of critics are calling Sierra Leone on what they consider to be more of a PR stunt than a really effective series of measures, that are overall badly applied or not seriously enough.

[Silas Vitalia]

Lyn is right, perhaps the wrong metaphor.

The point is we are worried about and have disproportionate responses to things that kill people in sensational ways, vs things that kill people in less dramatic media ways.


We raise more money for Breast Cancer than Heart Disease, when Heart Disease kills 600k a year and gets $50m in funding, and breast cancer kills 50k and gets $250m in funding.

Deaths from auto accidents, alcohol, tobacco, preventable sorts of things and their funding and response versus things like terrorism and their disproportionate response.

People are worried about shark attacks and dying in airplanes, even those things kill so few people a year as to be statistically insignificant.

Anyway not that Ebola isn't scary and going to bring a lot of misery to people, but the media is being irresponsible as usual with coverage.

[Katrina Oniseki]

Ebola is spread via contact with bodily fluids. So does HIV and hepatitis.

There are (for us Americans), over 1.2 million people in our country that are HIV positive. There are about 3.2 million with Hepatitis-C. There are maybe two or three (that's just a 2 or 3. Not million. Count it on one hand please.)  with Ebola, or at least less than ten confirmed cases. If we're generous, we can add another 20 unconfirmed.

Have you suddenly contracted HIV yet? What about Hepatitis-C? No? Well you probably won't suddenly contract Ebola. As it turns out Ebola is actually much LESS contagious than the other two. It's hard to contract, even if you are exposed, as long as you follow basic sanitary practice like washing your hands.

BUT WHAT IF IT MUTATES TO BECOME AIRBORNE?!!?

Yeah no, highly unlikely. Viruses mutate almost constantly. All viruses do that. How many of them have suddenly become airborne just to fuck with us? Is HIV airborne, despite having a far greater prevelence? What about Hep-C again? No, huh? So what makes Ebola special?

Maybe this would be a good place for Arista to chime in, since she's actually a Biologist. Maybe not a virologist, but closer than me nonetheless.

How likely is it that Ebola will suddenly mutate to become the next airborne scare? Because, to be honest... that's extremely rare from what I understand.

[Lyn Farel]

The article I read on that recently told that probabilities for that to happen were extremely low. Except if it goes pulmonary or through aerosols caused by some treatments (which has been demonstrated on animal models).

[Mizhara]

"How likely is it that Ebola will suddenly mutate to become the next airborne scare? Because, to be honest... that's extremely rare from what I understand."

Someone never played Pandemic.

What? It's a highly accurate outbreak simulator, surely.

[Jace]

Ebola is spread via contact with bodily fluids. So does HIV and hepatitis.

There are (for us Americans), over 1.2 million people in our country that are HIV positive. There are about 3.2 million with Hepatitis-C. There are maybe two or three (that's just a 2 or 3. Not million. Count it on one hand please.)  with Ebola, or at least less than ten confirmed cases. If we're generous, we can add another 20 unconfirmed.

Have you suddenly contracted HIV yet? What about Hepatitis-C? No? Well you probably won't suddenly contract Ebola. As it turns out Ebola is actually much LESS contagious than the other two. It's hard to contract, even if you are exposed, as long as you follow basic sanitary practice like washing your hands.

BUT WHAT IF IT MUTATES TO BECOME AIRBORNE?!!?

Yeah no, highly unlikely. Viruses mutate almost constantly. All viruses do that. How many of them have suddenly become airborne just to fuck with us? Is HIV airborne, despite having a far greater prevelence? What about Hep-C again? No, huh? So what makes Ebola special?

Maybe this would be a good place for Arista to chime in, since she's actually a Biologist. Maybe not a virologist, but closer than me nonetheless.

How likely is it that Ebola will suddenly mutate to become the next airborne scare? Because, to be honest... that's extremely rare from what I understand.

While I get the point you are making, the HIV comparison is a bad one. HIV is spread through very specific bodily fluids, not all of them. You can make out for hours on end with an HIV+ person and never become exposed unless you both have open wounds in your mouths. I just had to point out the difference. Carry on.