Posted on 10/17/2014 12:22:04 AM PDT by elhombrelibre
The Belize coast guard is refusing to allow passengers from a cruise ship to come ashore because it’s carrying a Texas hospital worker who handled a lab specimen from the man who died of Ebola in Dallas, according to news reports from Belize. A White House official confirmed to the Associated Press early Friday morning that that the unnamed Dallas health care worker is on the ship and is “self-quarantined.” But the White House did not identify the country.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
The story is poorly written.
But from what I can tell, the hospital worker is a woman and may have or may not have handled Ebola blood work.
I don’t think the female hospital worker who may have or may not have handled a vile of Duncan’s blood has a wife.
But yes, there is not only an abundance of caution there is also an abundance of panic.
Can’t catch it on the bus, Gus
This just keeps getting stupider and stupider.
If it were a vial of blood, it could be tested. But since it was a vile, no tests were needed.
So how did Belize know that this person was one of the caretakers? Was he or she wearing a shirt that said “I took care of Duncan the Ebola patient and all I hope I got was a lousy T-Shirt?”
According to this article, the affected person is a nurse from the Texas hospital, and has symptoms consistent with Ebola. Big difference between this and the WaPo article....
I went on one cruise once and will never go on a cruse ship again as the only thing worse would be being locked in a Turkish prison or having Ebola.
Fair or not, it sounds like the cruise line is the deepest pocket.
Your intelligence is on a par with obama’s.!!
People can do stupid, irrational things while in the throes of panic, like killing a dog without even testing it for exposure, let alone bothering to gain any understanding of whether or not the species has any history of transmitting Ebola to people (they don’t). History is rife with examples of such, on a much wider and uglier scale than we’ve seen thus far. So, panic can be bad and more often than not is bad.
But, at times, panic is a completely rational response. Our government doesn’t seem to know what’s going on, medical professionals are donning wholly inadequate protection while dealing with a virus that is well-known to be rapidly fatal, then flying off on shopping trips and going on cruises, despite two of their coworkers now diagnosed. So, glib failure to grasp the potential consequences of your actions can be bad, too. This can cause panic in and of itself.
It means Belize officials are much smarter than the American officials.
The WP story that has been updated in the last 90 minutes states that the hospital worker is exhibiting no symptoms of Ebola. It is not even known if she handed the blood work.
If that is the case, then people are panicking for no reason.
It does feel like a war game. First planes, now a cruise ship, what next, Amtrak, subways and busses or will it be a convention center or Disneyland?
Go find one-hundred people on the street and see how willing they are to be quarantined for three weeks. Marginal paid people? They won’t stay home because they can’t afford it. Party-people? Can’t stay home for more than five days max. Druggies? Can’t stay home that long without someone delivering their daily or weekly drugs. Teenagers? Zero chance because they won’t accept an entire weekend in the house.
A logical person working for the health industry needs to have this mindset....if they handled a Ebola patient....they can come to work and be monitored two or three times a day. But they ought to be forced into absolutely no trips, and no trips to public forums or shopping centers.
Everyone involved has made huge mistakes. The Dallas hospital, the CDC, Duncan and some hospital workers.
However, that is not reason to quarantine all even those who may have been may have been tangentially exposed.
Those who are seeking further quarantine are essentially asking the Federal Government to establish, without due process, a system for the arbitrary quarantine of American citizens.
Likely the flight to Cleveland and cruise to Belize were booked well in advance and not trips taken on a whim. If the CDC or their employer did not specifically tell them not to travel, why would they cancel their plans that may have been costly and made well in advance?
Those who are seeking further quarantines are essentially asking the Federal Government to establish, without due process, a system for the arbitrary quarantine of American citizens.
Until there’s a better handle on preventing transmission of infection to medical professionals, that’s the bare minimum of what needs to be done. Is it a pain for these individuals, yes. Is it panic? Won’t know that until after the fact. It could be entirely rational and the difference between stopping a disaster in the making or unintentionally creating it.
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