Posted on 08/10/2014 12:46:23 AM PDT by Smokin' Joe
I have spent a little time compiling links to threads about the Ebola outbreak in the interest of having all the links in one thread for future reference.
Please add links to new threads and articles of interest as the situation develops.
Thank You all for you participation.
http://www.genewatch.org/uploads/f03c6d66a9b354535738483c1c3d49e4/brief6.pdf
“The ATCC also supplied 17 shipments of organisms to Iraq
between 1986 and 1991, one of which was tularaemia”
The American CDC is now predicting up to 550,000 Ebola victims by the end of this year.
You can argue over the numbers, but once the numbers get “big” it really does not matter. LONG BEFORE numbers that high are reached the general populations in the worst hit countries will panic. Infrastructure, such as it is, will surely break down. So will law and order. It will be panic fueled chaos.
Desperate people will do desperate things. MANY will flee, and enough of them will be infected for this thing to spread.
This should be obvious, but it bears repeating anyway.
https://peerj.com/articles/556/
“Evidence that ebolaviruses and cuevaviruses have been diverging from marburgviruses since the Miocene”
Now THIS was an interesting paper for me.
The WHO, and FReepers here have arrived with figures on the same order of magnitude. (hundreds of thousands). I pray that doesn't happen, but it looks as if nothing short of a miracle will stop the outbreak short of that.
Yes, the 'privileged' of those societies, the wealthy (and there are some), and even those capable of exerting meaningful force (militarily or paramilitarily) will all try to escape, whether infected or not.
That precedent has already been established.
With the relatively short quarantine of the West Point slum in Monrovia we saw the reaction to authority that can be expected when things start to get bad. People will either show their most noble and heroic natures, or the worst will come out. So it is under pressure.
It is likely these reactions will spread the disease further afield, to other countries and districts, and will require what many will feel is an unseemly level of force to interdict. The cure, in that instance, will be as ugly as the disease.
I think it is folly for anyone to assume human nature is any different in any group of humans which has a cross section of society, regardless of technological level, average IQ, or any of the other factors some people presume would make behaviour any different here under similar circumstances.
The only defense against suffering such ugliness ourselves at home is to prevent the disease from ever getting loose on our shores.
Thank you for checking! :^)
Well said....
Total agreement with you. The best offense in this case is a good defense.
This out of control outbreak in Africa has been a bit of a learning experience for me as well. While I found what has happened in Africa to be awful yet not surprising, I have been somewhat surprised by the reactions here in the US, and specifically on this forum and elsewhere like twitter.
In fact, emotional reactions to some other topics have also been a learning experience for me.
It seems that domestic politics is one thing, but geopolitical issues be they disease or reckless posturing by sovereign states, or even the recent secession effort by Scotland has drawn totally unexpected reactions, from my perspective.
I think you might be correct in saying that we here in the US as a society, in general are just as prone to being just as unpredictable, selfish, irrational and fearful of the unknown, as anyone else in the world..
I find that observation to be somewhat unsettling..
It will get to the slums of Lagos. Cairo. Mumbai. Mexico City.
There will be millions of panicked refugees.
Unless drastic measures are taken it will spread worldwide.
I’m thinking that the surrounding countries over there will be closing their borders no matter what eventually, but as mentioned, the wealthy and well connected will likely escape to other locales.
Like you, I hope that it doesn’t get loose here.
I have been reading a huge number of medical journal articles about Ebola, many of them published this year. Although some of the articles are decades old, I hardly think my information is outdated.
The current Ebola outbreak is so big we are now seeing many 1 in 100 and some 1 in 1000 clinical expressions of Ebola that don't fit that diagnostic protocol.
I actually do not know what you mean with that.
We already know that the early symptoms of Ebola are similar to symptoms of several other diseases. We also know that the severity of Ebola is highly variable. Some patients show minimal or no symptoms.
The little boy described in the article obviously has a combination of immune system components that makes him less susceptible to the symptoms of Ebola. Being less symptomatic, he would shed less virus--that hardly makes him a superspreader. A superspreader is someone who actually passes a disease to more than the average number of other people, and the phenomenon of superspreading is caused by a number of factors, some of which have nothing to do with the pathogen itself. Since the boy was in an Ebola treatment facility, he was hardly spreading the disease.
The virus particles would have to survive. Ebola virus is very susceptible to drying out, which happens quickly in tiny particles.
That CIDRAP article (which is not a study) looks a lot like a PAPR advertisement to me. This isn't to say that PPE isn't important for patient care providers--it is--but it is important to understand context.
Really? You claimed previously that you have read a substantial amount of the pertinent medical literature. I guess you haven't, after all.
From a histology study of a chimp dead from the Taï Forest strain of Ebola (which used to be called "Ebola Côte d'Ivoire"): As described previously in experimental cases, lymphocytes and epithelial cells were apparently unaffected; the present case provides significant additional information confirming that the main target of viral infection is the macrophage system, which appears to be the most important site of viral replication.
Here is an abstract from a paper describing experimental infection of rhesis monkeys with Ebola Zaire (the paper is behind a paywall; I think it shows tissue sections):OBJECTIVE: The source of infection or mode of transmission of Ebola virus to human index cases of Ebola fever has not been established. Field observations in outbreaks of Ebola fever indicate that secondary transmission of Ebola virus is linked to improper needle hygiene, direct contact with infected tissue or fluid samples, and close contact with infected patients. While it is presumed that the virus infects through either breaks in the skin or contact with mucous membranes, the only two routes of exposure that have been experimentally validated are parenteral inoculation and aerosol inhalation. Epidemiologic evidence suggests that aerosol exposure is not an important means of virus transmission in natural outbreaks of human Ebola fever; this study was designed to verify that Ebola virus could be effectively transmitted by oral or conjunctival exposure in nonhuman primates. Please note the bolded section: this is important. This paper was published 18 years ago; the epidemiological evidence still shows that Ebola is not transmitted through airborne routes. Also, I have to point out that an experimentally generated aerosol, involving virus-laden liquid dispersed by an atomizer directly into an animal's face, has no equivalent within the natural context. It shows that inhalation of virus can cause disease--virus that can be inhaled in the form of droplets--but it does not show that humans aerosolize virus.
Here are some histopathology pictures: The top left picture shows the viral particles inside a lymph cell. The top right picture shows a section of lymph node. Various lymph cells show red in their cytoplasm, indicating that the virus has penetrated inside those cells. The big red crescent is a nodule of endothelial cells, many of which have been destroyed by virus. The picture at the bottom is a section of monkey lip containing epithelial cells on the top and endothelial and lymph cells on the bottom. Notice how the virus is oozing between the epithelial cells, but not penetrating them. You can be exposed to Ebola by physically touching someone; this could explain why. Of course, they could also be covered with drops of vomit or feces.
In order for a virus to infect a cell type, it must be able to bind receptors on the cell surface. Ebola does not recognize epithelial cell surface receptors.
Now, I could go on and on, linking to histopathology pictures and studies examining the tropism of Ebola virus, but the end result is the same. Ebola is not tropic for epithelial cells. It is tropic for fibroblasts, macrophages, and endothelial cells. The liver typically has a very high viral load, and from there, the virus enters the blood.
If you are who you say you are (I have no way of verifying nor do I expect you to post personal information to do so), I'm not surprised that you cannot see outside your box to how the general public interprets what is coming out of the CDC/WHO/et al. Every scientist I've worked with has the same problem. That's why they hire people like me. They have the self-awareness to recognize their own blind spots and most aren't so supercilious they believe that anyone without their CV is automatically stupid.
Of course, I am not about to publish my CV online. But the fact that I know what I am talking about should be pretty apparent, at least to people who are familiar enough with the scientific world to recognize the typical language use of an expert.
Unlike you, I do not assume the general public is too stupid to understand complex topics. They can understand, if the topic is explained adequately and at their level. This is why I take the trouble to explain these things, instead of just assuming that overwhelming stupidity among the general public prevents them from understanding. Public health officials have always tried to explain the mechanisms of disease transmission to the public--because public understanding is crucial to stopping those chains of transmission.
However, in your insistence that the public is incapable of understanding the nuances between droplet transmission and airborne transmission, what you are really telling me is that you do not/cannot understand the distinction. That does not mean that other members of the public cannot understand, however, so I will continue to explain.
The message from the CDC and the WHO is pretty consistent, and is solidly based on the current knowledge about Ebola. Obviously, both the CDC and the WHO assume that the public is educable in this matter.
BTW, claiming that scientists hire you means nothing. As far as I know, not a single administrative or IT person has ever become a scientist because they happen to work for us. I will say, however, that their services are critical to our ability to continue scientific work and I really do appreciate admin/IT support.
Proven infection control measures aren't working.
Infection control never works when it isn't used. That's the whole problem here.
There's nothing "hysterical" in my posts because I'm not hysterical. Concerned?
You have consistently insisted that Ebola must be airborne, and insinuated that the experts who actually read the scientific literature about it are either lying or do not know what they are talking about. Yet you cannot provide any data that would show that the experts are wrong. I believe that "hysterical" is an appropriate description of such behavior.
In an earlier post you defended the deflections performed by the scientists at the Congressional hearing by asserting that much is unknown about this virus and its transmission vectors, therefore the scientists couldn't provide the requested information and hence provided what little they could without admitting they just don't know. You then turn around and insist that you know enough to assure the world that only direct physical contact with blood/vomit/etc. will result in H2H Ebola viral transfer (though to give credit where due you did express some concern about the persistence of the virus in semen.) Which is it?
I know that you are looking for contradictions in what I have said, but there are none. Sorry to burst your bubble.
The epi data is pretty consistent: the virus is spread through direct contact with viremic patients or infected bodily fluids. This has been demonstrated multiple times and is not debatable. Spread by fomites is not a concern in the health-care setting, since surfaces are disinfected frequently, but the epi data on fomite transmission outside of the clinical setting is inconsistent. Could you catch Ebola by gathering up the wet bloody sheets of someone who just died of Ebola? You almost certainly will. Could you catch it by gathering up the dried-out sheets a week later? Probably not. Could you catch it by being in the room with someone who later turns out to have Ebola? Almost certainly not (unless they touched a surface with their vomit-covered hands and you touched the same surface minutes later). But there are clear gaps of knowledge, which have not been systematically studied. Epi studies are, by their nature, quite limited, and leave many questions unanswered.
Since you present yourself as the authority on the subject, please educate the rest of us on all possible transmission vectors. Perhaps you should offer to update the Congress since they didn't get the information regarding fomites from the scientists present.
I have been attempting to educate people. Some people refuse to learn, or want to believe that Ebola is more transmissible than it really is--I can't educate people like that. And I'm pretty sure that Dr. Friedan already told Congress everything that is known about transmission, and will continue to communicate the current knowledge about Ebola.
Or, more likely, the coyote is infected, and the travel of the group stops right there. The infection burns itself out as most, if not all, of the group dies.
I have a hard time trying to come up with a believable scenario of how a potential illegal immigrant who has Ebola could survive the journey to this continent in the first place. I see news that air travel is restricted, so how else can they possibly come here within the 21 day window of incubation?
exDemMom,
I like you. I like how you present your scientific case. I like what you have in your profile — though I can’t pretend to understand all of it. I look forward to following the scientific debate on this thread as it progresses.
I am one of those IT types who have experience supporting PhD researchers like yourself (I have since moved on to a more lucrative — and less demanding! role in my organization) and I appreciate your acknowledgement of the important role IT folks play in your research.
It is my experience however, that no matter how brilliant the PhD is in his/her research, odds are that when they opine on other things, they exhibit a striking lack of experience with reality — or shall we say — common sense.
Your continued denial of the possibility of Ebola entering the US through its porous southern border strikes me as an example of this lack of common sense.
There must be hundreds of ways in which this event could become reality, yet you fixate on only one scenario and admit that you can’t think of any other.
In this instance I think you are out of your depth.
I look forward to your continued entries on this thread regarding the state of knowledge regarding Ebola, but I would suggest that you confine your posts to the scientific debate and refrain from opinions about what may or may not happen at the border, about which you have no scientific method, but are only guessing.
Laurie Garrett covered the Ebola outbreak in Zaire in 1995. She talks with NPR's Scott Simon about the U.S. mission to send military and monetary aid to Africa to help control Ebola in the region.
Interview at link:
Ebola could come across our southern border via illegals, but IMO that will be vastly overshadowed by transmission via legal visitors and immigrants. In other words, we'll have a lot worse problems by the time transmission from Ebola-infected illegal immigrants entering from Mexico becomes even noticeable.
Where is air travel restricted? If someone isn't symptomatic yet, there is nothing to stop them from getting on a plane.
Transocean travel via ship still exists, crewmen could jump ship, and the passage would only take a few days. Being symptomatic is not guaranteed.
That is without intentionally bringing contaminated material, preserved, to become infected at a jihadi's leisure.
The actual infection, given a well-handled sample of the virus, could take place anywhere, any time.
I had a hard time believing that thousands of kids could show up nearly simultaneously on our southern border from as far away as central America, undocumented, in reasonably good condition given the trip, but they did.
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