If anyone wants to watch the hearing about the Ebola Threat that was live on C-Span today, here is the link:
http://www.c-span.org/video/?321494-1/hearing-ebola-threat-west-africa
It is 3 hours long, but good. (OK, I muted Patty Murray.) One thing that made me “rewind” and listen again, was (during the second panel) Senator Burr said that based on their (the committee’s) information, the RO was 5-20. Yowza!! That would explain the dramatic rise of numbers in the various models. The panel confirmed that the numbers being “reported” are only the numbers that are actually making it into the clinics, the confirmed cases are only the ones that made it to the lab, so the reality is the numbers are much, much worse. (As many have been saying for a while)
At one point during the first panel, Senator Burr was asking Dr. Anthony Fauci about taxis being the latest transmission tool, and he wanted to know how long the virus remained infectious on the seat of a taxi. Dr. Fauci said they don’t know and turned it into an answer about dead bodies, which wasn’t what Senator Burr asked. Also the doctor was asked if he thought that Ebola might get out of West Africa and become a pandemic, and he flatly said, “No.” He referred to the conditions of Africa, with virtually no health care whatsoever, and poo-poohed the threat of it getting out of Africa.
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R nought of 5 would be bad enough but R nought of 20 would be catastrophic.
The Nigerian event was R nought of what, 8 or 10 based on the Sawyer contact?
Another day of still NO stats update.
And the US is on the slippery slope to hell as an entire country.
"At one point during the first panel, Senator Burr was asking Dr. Anthony Fauci about taxis being the latest transmission tool, and he wanted to know how long the virus remained infectious on the seat of a taxi. Dr. Fauci said they dont know and turned it into an answer about dead bodies, which wasnt what Senator Burr asked."
It is very hard for Dr. Fauci to answer a question for which there is no answer. The studies on virus durability outside of the body simply have not been done. He is correct about the pandemic part. I don't know where or how Senator Burr got his information, but the R0 is close to 1.