Ebola in America

Meadmaker said:
Aaahhh, but what about the commercial flight that CDC cleared the worker for, despite the 99.5 degree fever. Surely that was ridiculous, wasn't it?

Well......from what I've read, ebola is a disease that is only contagious after symptoms appear. I'm not willing to say that the 100.4 threshold was a bad call. If someone one that flight gets sick, then it becomes clear that it was a bad call, but presumably that number was picked by someone based on the best available evidence at the time. If no one gets sick, then it's still the best available evidence.
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That was ridiculous. She was displaying symptoms. The 100.4 threshold wasn't set up for ebola, it's set up for fevers in general, most of which are caused by diseases which are not very dangerous, and where you want to avoid the problem of false positives. Given the extreme nature of ebola, they should not have been using the same threshold that they use for the common flu. In fact, she shouldn't have been flying at all, symptoms or no symptoms, simply because she was at high risk, just like everybody who worked with Duncan at the hospital.
 
Ziggurat said:
That was ridiculous. She was displaying symptoms. The 100.4 threshold wasn't set up for ebola, it's set up for fevers in general, most of which are caused by diseases which are not very dangerous, and where you want to avoid the problem of false positives. Given the extreme nature of ebola, they should not have been using the same threshold that they use for the common flu. In fact, she shouldn't have been flying at all, symptoms or no symptoms, simply because she was at high risk, just like everybody who worked with Duncan at the hospital.
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Thank you, Doctor Ziggurat.

Oh...you aren't a doctor? Your opinions are based on media accounts? What?


I'm not going to disagree with you about what should or should not be done. I simply don't know, and neither do you. My issue is that it isn't nearly as obvious as you make it seem. Qualified professionals have to examine what we know about the disease and come to sensible recommendations.

You seem to think they aren't doing that. I, on the other hand, am not so sure there's a problem. That's where those results come in. Whatever they are doing, nothing bad is happening because of it. That isn't the final word on the subject, but it does give a hint that maybe, just maybe, neither the government in general nor the President in particular is screwing up all that badly.
 
12AX7 said:
As a vet, I feel confident saying that the VA couldn't handle it; they can barely function as-is. Hell, an outbreak of athlete's foot would crumble the VA.

YMMV of course.
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The St. Loser VA is backed up by St. Louis University Med School. They're spitting distance apart, so we'd have a good response here. (Plus there's a hospital every other mile around here anyway.)
 
Meadmaker said:
Thank you, Doctor Ziggurat.

Oh...you aren't a doctor? Your opinions are based on media accounts? What?


I'm not going to disagree with you about what should or should not be done. I simply don't know, and neither do you. My issue is that it isn't nearly as obvious as you make it seem. Qualified professionals have to examine what we know about the disease and come to sensible recommendations.
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It's usually better to reserve such snark for cases where you've actually proven your opponent wrong. This isn't one of those cases. You're trying to defend the CDC's incompetence when even the CDC itself isn't. The head of the CDC has acknowledged that that nurse should not have flown (is that merely a "media account"?). Yet you treat the question as if it's a mystery. It isn't. Nor do you need to rely on my authority to determine that.
 
yodaluver28 said:
Please stop with the irrational fear mongering, it's helping no one, least of all you. Stay away from severely symptomatic (bleeding, vomiting, etc.) Ebola patients and you will be fine.
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When In Worry,
When In Doubt,
Run In Circles
Scream And Shout....
 
I agree the CDC has made mistakes;the problem I have is turning that into an Obama Bash. The CDC mistakes seem to have been the kind of bureaucratic screw up you get no matter which party is in the White House.
What really gets to me is you know that if Obama had put in some of the travel restrictions the bashers are screaming for him to do,they would be yelling about how Obama is attacking the individual liberties of Americans.
 
dudalb said:
I agree the CDC has made mistakes;the problem I have is turning that into an Obama Bash. The CDC mistakes seem to have been the kind of bureaucratic screw up you get no matter which party is in the White House.
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Especially when talking about a large organization that is dealing with a particular situation that it normally doesn't actually have to deal with. It's not normally dealing with actually containing ebola within the US. Yes, it should be prepared for it, but even if it is well prepared, encountering the actual situation can reveal shortcomings you weren't aware of.

A large organization is going to encounter these sorts of things. It's very hard to keep track of all the moving pieces.

Overall, I think the CDC has handled things pretty well despite the mistakes.
 
bonzombiekitty said:
Especially when talking about a large organization that is dealing with a particular situation that it normally doesn't actually have to deal with. It's not normally dealing with actually containing ebola within the US. Yes, it should be prepared for it, but even if it is well prepared, encountering the actual situation can reveal shortcomings you weren't aware of.
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Depicting the CDC as an ungainly bureaucracy that doesn't have basic infectious disease control protocols already prepared, and needs more than five months' warning to adapt them for a specific strain of infectious disease, doesn't really make the agency seem less incompetent.
 
Depicting the CDC as a very large bureaucracy that does have basic infectious disease control protocols already prepared and has quickly adapted them for a specific strain of infectious disease, doesn't really make the agency seem incompetent.
 
Ziggurat said:
It's usually better to reserve such snark for cases where you've actually proven your opponent wrong. This isn't one of those cases. You're trying to defend the CDC's incompetence when even the CDC itself isn't. The head of the CDC has acknowledged that that nurse should not have flown (is that merely a "media account"?). Yet you treat the question as if it's a mystery. It isn't. Nor do you need to rely on my authority to determine that.
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I think the important point that you are missing is the degree of the problem. Earlier you said that mistakes were "too obvious to ignore." Above, you characterized the CDC as "incompetent". And somehow, whatever happened is connected to the President.

No, I just don't see it.

Should the nurse have flown? The CDC head says no, so that seems like a no. However, it appears that no one has gotten sick because of it, and the protocols in place said it was ok for her to fly. Should they revise the protocols? You say she was "exhibiting symptoms". Well, she had a body temperature of 99.5. Does that make her a risk for Ebola transmission? I don't know.

And what is special about airplanes, anyway? Wouldn't she present just as much risk on a bus, or in a grocery store? Should she have been quarantined?

To answer my own question, I think the answer about airplanes is that they can move someone to a far away place, and moreover, they can put you in contact with people who are going to several different far away places. Suddenly an infectious disease can be transported to several different cities in one day. However, that can only happen if the patient is a risk for transmission. Was she?

When the head of the CDC said the nurse shouldn't have flown, was it because of the risk of disease, or was it because he feels we should be extra cautious, or was it, really, a PR move? Was it simply a case that there was no significant risk, but he knew that there was a chance of panic?

At any rate, they let her fly, and then said she shouldn't have. Obviously, there has to have been some mistake somewhere, and I don't doubt that a bit. However, it's the accusations of incompetence, the political grandstanding, the overall hype that I object to. I will go along with the idea that the CDC was imperfect, but before I call "incompetent", and indict the whole government especially the President, I'm going to need some more evidence. Right now, I can only look at the consequences of the mistakes that they made, and use those consequences as a guide. Right now, I'm seeing some fairly good results. I think they are probably doing something right. They might not be doing everything right, but they're doing ok. They get at least a B.
 
And the fiance of the guy who died can't find a place to live. Apartments managers "don't want the publicity" that would come from the coverage.
Teh stupid burns...
 
rwguinn said:
And the fiance of the guy who died can't find a place to live. Apartments managers "don't want the publicity" that would come from the coverage.
Teh stupid burns...
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Sadly she might need to change her name and move far away from Dallas.
 
Just have an agent rent the apartment but show up and sign the lease with her real name. By the time the manager discovers the ruse she is already in so the manager gets the additional attention of having the apartment that he is evicting the fiancé of the ebola patient from. Who is going to want to rent that apartment then?!
 
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