Posted on 08/27/2014 12:24:17 PM PDT by PJ-Comix
This is not good. If medical personnel who know to take precautions catch and die from ebola, think about the spread among the rest of the population in the Congo.
BTW, this is the latest Ebola update from WHO. Conspicuously MISSING is the latest stats. None posted at WHO since August 22 which is a record length of time since this latest outbreak started spreading fast a few months ago. What's up? Has there been an institutional breakdown now preventing the collection of stats?
FYI
individuals who were in contact with the clinic staff
Not good.
This is looking worse and worse.
This doesn't sound like "medical personnel who know to take precautions". The surgeons and nurses, presumably more so, but third-world hospital conditions just the same.
I was an administrator at one of the country's most famous hospitals for twenty years.In the 80's I was invited to visit with an African physician who spent a short time training at my hospital.He was a top staff member of the Muhimbili Medical Center in Dar Es Salaam,Tanzania.While there he gave me a tour of the hospital and I was stunned...speechless.This was the largest and most important hospital in the entire country and to call it primitive would be to heap praise upon it.IOW...you can be damn sure that the medical workers dropping like flies in Africa aren't able to come within 500 light years of the infection control procedures that you'd find routinely practiced at Snowshoe Community Hospital in Deadhorse Montana.
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Perhaps the aide workers and doctors who were reporting local infection rates have bugged out -or are dead.
I think it just represents a breakdown of reporting due to the rate at which health care workers and aides are being infected. Ie, individual quarantine and PL3 aren’t working. This is evidenced by Liberia going to area-wide quarantines enforced by soldiers.
human to human transmission is not a new designation, it just means that humans catch it from other humans ( just like in the west africa outbreak and previous outbreaks)
this terminology does not suggest that the disease is airborne. before people go around in a panic it is useful to understand standard epidemiological definitions
Just wait until authorities get out into bush country. Many horrors await...
Thanks for the comment.
Personal protective equipment, as you are no doubt aware, is not supposed to be the primary protection against spread of pathogens. That’s handled by general sanitation and cleanliness, with the PPE acting as backup.
In highly unsanitary conditions, PPR, even if available and used, is very likely to be inadequate.
They know the precautions - they don’t have the equipment.
They don’t even have gloves, let alone other one-time use supplies, masks, isolation gowns, negative-pressure rooms.
Do they even have bleach? Carbolic acid?
soiled linens?
little/no human waste disposal?
no biohazard disposal?
non-filtered, well water?
reused needles?
no iodine/bacine soap use?
insufficient PPE?
shared straws for oral rehydration?
rectal to oral thermometer useage without sterilization?
Am I getting close?
Oh,you’ve been there....
Probably a big factor but western doctors have gotten it too. Its extremely contagious.
“non-filtered, well water?”
That episode of Walking Dead where one of the walkers had fallen into the well.
What happens if this virus gets into the ground water? It would survive there.
You're correct and I admit that I did a poor job making my point.Even if you're familiar with the correct procedures you don't have the equipment/supplies/basic sanitary conditions to effectively employ them in West Africa.
Consider wearing the protective equipment in summer in West Africa, for 12-14 hours.
without air conditioning.
It sounds like CDIF or MRSA type infections...even though bacterial, it gets in EVERYTHING in a hospital environment.....although ebola is a virus and a MUCH MORE efficient killer.
We did MOPP4 training in Ft. Jackson, SC in AUG. We were supposed to wear full MOPP4 for 3 hours, and OPFOR was VERY generous in their employment of CS gas to simulate a gas attack. After about 30 minutes, I took off my M17a1 Mask and told my foxhole-buddy, "I'd rather die in a gas attack" than stay in MOPP4.
Absolute misery.
We had heat casualties and dehydration by guys sitting still in their foxholes. I can't imagine being in West Africa moving bodies, buckets of puke/blood/bodily waste, bringing food back and forth, etc.
In South Korea we were forced to stay in MOPP4 for 12-14 hours in August. They threatened LORs and Art 15 for anyone caught taking their gear off. As I recall 24 people ended up in the hospital.
They even wanted the depot maintenance guys who had been scheduled for 2 years to climb the 400 foot tall radio tower in MOPP4. Those guys packed up and said we’ll be back in 2 years.
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