Ebola Virus

Northstar wrote:

biochem wrote:I'm seeing more and more calls for quarantine. I'm actually in favor of quarantine. It is a time honored proven to work infection control method. However for it to work, people must choose to comply with it. There are 2 basic ways to do this, the carrot (reward driven) or the stick (force or punishment driven). In most cases a combination of carrot/stick works the best. To date I've seen a lot of stick and precious little carrot.

The policy also needs to be consistent, which it is not remotely at the moment. Example, the staff caring for the doctor patient in Bellevue now are not themselves under quarantine ,even though they are caring for a very ill Ebola patient. There are many dozens and dozens of folks coming back and forth from West Africa who have been working with Ebola cases up close and personal. Only the one nurse is being harassed on the subject. Others are let in unmolested and let go about their lives unmolested. Why this one woman gets picked to be publicly abused...

Now, I personally think she should quarantine herself and so should all the rest of them, call me cautious, but I understand her dander is up now. She is being singled out and that is patently unfair and unjust.

I am also fairly appalled at this practice of health workers going over there for a few weeks and coming back, dozens and dozens of them going on these Ebola work abroad short trips. This... the more people the bigger the chances of something going very wrong. How about paying a lot fewer to stay for the duration instead of all this in and out short term stuff???

The short term stuff also means a constant renewal of inexperienced people over there rather than ones used to working with Ebola. This does not serve the sick people over there as well as experienced staff would.

The whole thing just comes off as slipshod, pasted together and haphazard, which is very very troubling.

I have no problem with all of them being quarantined for the 21 day period since last possible contact. I know the one nurse was singled out, but she did make a target for herself by her actions and words so in this she is partially to blame, especially since she is in the medical profession and should understand the public's concerns. It feels like now she is doing it just to spite the public and to flip them the middle finger.

Zakharra wrote:
I have no problem with all of them being quarantined for the 21 day period since last possible contact. I know the one nurse was singled out, but she did make a target for herself by her actions and words so in this she is partially to blame, especially since she is in the medical profession and should understand the public's concerns. It feels like now she is doing it just to spite the public and to flip them the middle finger.

Um. She was just a nurse coming back from a stint with Doctors Without Borders. She did not ask for any of this nor did she have an agenda for anything but getting home. The State of New Jersey picked her out and proceeded to treat her with coldness, rudeness and a complete lack of dignity or respect... or simple basic courtesy. The sort we owe anyone, let alone someone who has literally just been risking her life to help other people. This was stupid, disgusting, bullying and utterly unnecessary.

Surprise! It angered her. I suspect it would anger anyone with a backbone. The cavalier manner in which NJ walked all over this nurse is asinine and darn poor tactics, at the very least. Some courtesy and respect would have gotten them a lot farther, and that applies to Maine also. By now she believes she is fighting for the civil rights of all healthcare workers, and everyone else as well. And she is probably correct about that.

She is still being singled out, frankly. Are the people taking care of the Ebola patient in New York under quarantine? No. How about all other healthcare workers returning from the affected countries? No. In fact, some of them were just at the White House. It is patently unjust to single out one nurse like this.

Why are they doing that? Uppity woman talks back to big macho male governors, perhaps? Do I sense a peeing contest on the guys' parts? Yeah. And politics. Gotta look tough to the voters. Can't let that nurse get away with telling us to follow the science.

I think it is necessary for it to be pointed out that visiting businesses or public transportation can cause huge distress to the owners of those businesses right now. Regardless of the science, that is just true. Simple courtesy suggests one not do this. And she has not, I point out. A bike ride threatens no one.

I think returnees and people caring for Ebola patients in less than level 4 containment facilities should be paid to stay home or in safe living conditions and given help with things like grocery buying etc for 21 days. But this needs to be done with courtesy and respect. These are not optional things in a civilized nation, people.

The rest of us also need to chill out and get ourselves educated. There is way too much harrum scarrem nonsense out there. Two of many such drooling moron incidents: A school told a teacher to stay home because she visited... Dallas, Texas. The city. Not the hospital where Mr Duncan died. This is idiotic. People pulling their kids from a school because another teacher had been in some African country... that happened to be thousands of miles from the Ebola zone is both idiotic and ignorant of geography. As stupid is pulling a kid out of school in LA because there is an Ebola patient in New York and a teacher just got back from Miami. Geez, people grow up and turn on the old BS filters.

Meanwhile many thousands of people in the USA will die of influenza this winter. Actual deaths of actual Americans. Thousands of them. Is any of this stuff happening over Flu? No. Yet it is the actual horrible killer stalking America... like it does every year.

Perspective and calming breaths.

And please stop scapegoating a nurse with the guts to tell politicians they are rude and wrong and her civil rights -and those of all of us, do not forget- and the rule of law will not be junked because these guys are ready to sacrifice her to public hysteria and macho grandstanding. YMMV

If one is still fretting about an epidemic of something or other here focus on what is within your own power to affect. Stock up your cupboards and home health supplies etc. This hurts nothing and may help sometime. Including calming nerves a bit. You and I can control this sort of thing. What Mama Nature will choose to do with germs on the loose is not. So, go with what you can affect, your own preparedness and Boy Scout and Girl Scout virtues and getting educated about epidemics and the like from a variety of calm and sensible sources. This is practical and useful. Scapegoating that nurse is not.

I want to be clear about an AIDS reference I made in a recent post. No one is getting HIV from blood transfusions or blood products anymore, well, not in the USA. That has not happened since the early 80s before there were tests for HIV in donated blood etc. Back then a lot of people here did get HIV from these sources and died of it. Ms Coulter's assertions that the only hets who got HIV were junkies are just untrue. And dangerous. Hets do get HIV even now. About 1/3 of current HIV infections in America are in hets. That is as per the CDC website. Worldwide, the vast majority are hets. 36 million or so vs 500,000 or so gay deaths in America. Political points are more powerful when based in accurate information, regardless of side or party or whatever.

Northstar wrote:

Zakharra wrote:
I have no problem with all of them being quarantined for the 21 day period since last possible contact. I know the one nurse was singled out, but she did make a target for herself by her actions and words so in this she is partially to blame, especially since she is in the medical profession and should understand the public's concerns. It feels like now she is doing it just to spite the public and to flip them the middle finger.

Um. She was just a nurse coming back from a stint with Doctors Without Borders. She did not ask for any of this nor did she have an agenda for anything but getting home. The State of New Jersey picked her out and proceeded to treat her with coldness, rudeness and a complete lack of dignity or respect... or simple basic courtesy. The sort we owe anyone, let alone someone who has literally just been risking her life to help other people. This was stupid, disgusting, bullying and utterly unnecessary

*snip*

As a health care worker, she should have realized how people would react. The public rarely reacts intelligently to scary and frightening things. It almost always reacts in a more emotional level because its so large. So she and the others should have realized, that submitting to the 21 day quarantine from time of last possible contact would assuage most public concerns about her or any health care worker from being infected and contagious. I think that she should have done as asked. It's not a permanent imprisonment, but for most people, something that is reasonable and will ease all concerns about it, realistic or not. I think that all health care workers that have gone to Africa to help should expect the same and not bitch and moan about it because they feel it infringes on any perceived rights. Part of their job is to help people, and coming back to the US, part of helping us is assuaging any concerns about them being infected and contagious. 21 days or less (the time depending upon the time of last possible exposure. Not when they leave the country, but last exposure, so please get that right) isn't forever and isn't a unreasonable amount of time out of their lives.

Zakharra wrote:

Northstar wrote:Um. She was just a nurse coming back from a stint with Doctors Without Borders. She did not ask for any of this nor did she have an agenda for anything but getting home. The State of New Jersey picked her out and proceeded to treat her with coldness, rudeness and a complete lack of dignity or respect... or simple basic courtesy. The sort we owe anyone, let alone someone who has literally just been risking her life to help other people. This was stupid, disgusting, bullying and utterly unnecessary

*snip*

As a health care worker, she should have realized how people would react. The public rarely reacts intelligently to scary and frightening things. It almost always reacts in a more emotional level because its so large. So she and the others should have realized, that submitting to the 21 day quarantine from time of last possible contact would assuage most public concerns about her or any health care worker from being infected and contagious. I think that she should have done as asked. It's not a permanent imprisonment, but for most people, something that is reasonable and will ease all concerns about it, realistic or not. I think that all health care workers that have gone to Africa to help should expect the same and not bitch and moan about it because they feel it infringes on any perceived rights. Part of their job is to help people, and coming back to the US, part of helping us is assuaging any concerns about them being infected and contagious. 21 days or less (the time depending upon the time of last possible exposure. Not when they leave the country, but last exposure, so please get that right) isn't forever and isn't a unreasonable amount of time out of their lives.

Your mileage obviously varies from mine. Such is life.

People have been coming back from the Ebola zone in Africa for months with no hassles. There is no reason this woman, who just got off the plane after a long and exhausting journey, would expect a governmental freakout on her arrival. Get real.

How many of us want the government free to lock up anyone for 21 days, without rational reason or any court oversight? Um, nope.

A judge in Maine has taken the nurse's side and told the government to back off now and told her essentially what I've said here... and what she was already doing; be sensitive to the distress of others, rational or not. Do your temp checks etc, which she already was. Let's not make out like she was sashaying into public businesses etc. She was not.

Funny how folks are so willing to make the civil liberties of others 'so-called' or 'perceived'. Even when there is no rational reason for it. Irrationality is certainly a fact of life, but that does not mean the law should give in to it. As the Maine judge in this case has now pointed out. Civil liberties are not 'perceived' and if you are willing to trash those of others... who will defend you when it is your turn to get in the clutches of government gone off the rationality rails?

I don't object to a 'voluntary with a bit of social pressure' quarantine, as long as they are paid their normal salary and given help with grocery buying etc. It is the rude bullying crap that appalls. That is just plain stupid. And so is the ignorance on display in America over all this. Folks should educate themselves rather than continue acting like nitwits. For starts, they might come up with better reasons why their objections should be heeded.

Because I am not so sanguine as the CDC about how Ebola is or is not spread by those quite ill with it, though I do accept that in a person with no symptoms it has not amplified sufficiently to be contagious, even if present. Too many healthworkers who have been careful have gotten sick with it. Something is off here. But 'I'm scared' is not going to work as a rationale. People wanting to impose serious and involuntary quarantine on persons who have no symptoms and are not contagious and thus present zero actual danger to others need to come up with rational reasons for why that should be put in effect.

Panicky mob rule is never, ever, a good idea. Ever. It never, ever, turns out well for anyone.

For anyone wanting to indulge in the medical equivalent of listening to a police scanner...

http://www.promedmail.org

http://www.healthmap.org/promed

http://www.healthmap.org/en/ ---give this one a bit to load, looks like not much at first. Patience is rewarded, though.

Your mileage obviously varies from mine. Such is life.

People have been coming back from the Ebola zone in Africa for months with no hassles. There is no reason this woman, who just got off the plane after a long and exhausting journey, would expect a governmental freakout on her arrival. Get real.

How many of us want the government free to lock up anyone for 21 days, without rational reason or any court oversight? Um, nope.

A judge in Maine has taken the nurse's side and told the government to back off now and told her essentially what I've said here... and what she was already doing; be sensitive to the distress of others, rational or not. Do your temp checks etc, which she already was. Let's not make out like she was sashaying into public businesses etc. She was not.

Funny how folks are so willing to make the civil liberties of others 'so-called' or 'perceived'. Even when there is no rational reason for it. Irrationality is certainly a fact of life, but that does not mean the law should give in to it. As the Maine judge in this case has now pointed out. Civil liberties are not 'perceived' and if you are willing to trash those of others... who will defend you when it is your turn to get in the clutches of government gone off the rationality rails?

I don't object to a 'voluntary with a bit of social pressure' quarantine, as long as they are paid their normal salary and given help with grocery buying etc. It is the rude bullying crap that appalls. That is just plain stupid. And so is the ignorance on display in America over all this. Folks should educate themselves rather than continue acting like nitwits. For starts, they might come up with better reasons why their objections should be heeded.

Because I am not so sanguine as the CDC about how Ebola is or is not spread by those quite ill with it, though I do accept that in a person with no symptoms it has not amplified sufficiently to be contagious, even if present. Too many healthworkers who have been careful have gotten sick with it. Something is off here. But 'I'm scared' is not going to work as a rationale. People wanting to impose serious and involuntary quarantine on persons who have no symptoms and are not contagious and thus present zero actual danger to others need to come up with rational reasons for why that should be put in effect.

Panicky mob rule is never, ever, a good idea. Ever. It never, ever, turns out well for anyone.

I tend to blame Chris Christie for this whole fiasco. The man has the personality of a rabid wolverine and all the finesse of a sledgehammer. Hu succeeds not by working with the opposition, but by running over it with a Mac Truck. And he has created an environment in New Jersey where the people that work for him have learned to do the same. That usually works for them, but in rare cases when it goes bad (like in this case with the nurse), all hell breaks loose.

I tend to side with the people who quarantined the nurse.

After all, people with "faith based" organizations like Samaritan's Purse have self quarantined for months now. It seem only people with a sense of entitlement feel the rules do not apply to them because consequences are for other people. The doctor(!) who wandered through New York City while infected with the Ebola virus is a perfect example of that.

Common sense, not to mention some common courtesy, would indicate that people at high risk should comply with quarantine when returning from the hot zone. Of course true common sense would be to prevent movement in and out of the hot zone to begin with, or be prepared to expend a vast amount of resources to to contact tracing the way the Nigerians did to stamp out the Ebola outbreak in that nation.

Ebola is a force of nature, so your or anybody's personal beliefs or ideals simply don't factor into the response. Actions really do have consequences, and with a dangerous virus there is no passing the consequences off to your political or ideological opponents without consequence to you (unlike, say, economic policy). The fact that for essentially political reasons the United States has not taken a proactive, unified and effective response to the Ebola virus yet means that the situation could get far worse.

Somewhere Stephen King is either laughing or gagging...

Thucydides wrote:I tend to side with the people who quarantined the nurse.

After all, people with "faith based" organizations like Samaritan's Purse have self quarantined for months now. It seem only people with a sense of entitlement feel the rules do not apply to them because consequences are for other people. The doctor(!) who wandered through New York City while infected with the Ebola virus is a perfect example of that.

Common sense, not to mention some common courtesy, would indicate that people at high risk should comply with quarantine when returning from the hot zone. Of course true common sense would be to prevent movement in and out of the hot zone to begin with, or be prepared to expend a vast amount of resources to to contact tracing the way the Nigerians did to stamp out the Ebola outbreak in that nation.

Ebola is a force of nature, so your or anybody's personal beliefs or ideals simply don't factor into the response. Actions really do have consequences, and with a dangerous virus there is no passing the consequences off to your political or ideological opponents without consequence to you (unlike, say, economic policy). The fact that for essentially political reasons the United States has not taken a proactive, unified and effective response to the Ebola virus yet means that the situation could get far worse.

Somewhere Stephen King is either laughing or gagging...

She clearly has an aggressive personality to put it mildly. But would she have reacted the same, if she hadn't been treated like a serial killer? If instead of the Mac truck approach, if she had been asked nicely and compensated for her compliance would she have been so hostile and aggressive?

biochem wrote:She clearly has an aggressive personality to put it mildly. But would she have reacted the same, if she hadn't been treated like a serial killer? If instead of the Mac truck approach, if she had been asked nicely and compensated for her compliance would she have been so hostile and aggressive?

Politeness costs nothing, and should be used I recall some SF story that had a cultural matrix where killers were expected to murder politely and had much greater problems if caught, with discourtesy. Fiction is our cultural imagination, and SF is our cultural imagination about possible futures.

I like the chance of a vaccine that will protect against both rabies and ebola: At present, rabies is killing more in Africa than ebola, although that may not be true next year. We can expect something to get through R&D. After that comes the labor to have effective manufacturing and distribution.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/fayeflam/20 ... r=yahootix

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/ebola-vac ... 15120.html

On this last list, Inovio is interesting because they make synthetic vaccines. If they can make it work, it should be good.

An alternate view:

http://personalliberty.com/ebola-epidem ... alse-flag/