Pixie (poster)
Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2014 9:04 am Post
subject: A potential timeline to watch:
Nigeria: Weekend of August 23: Evidence of tertiary cases comes to light as a result of odd happenings at hospitals in Nigeria.
Liberia: September 1 - Labor Day weekend: Evidence of secondary cases related to the dispersal of patients and the to looting of mattresses, etc., from the isolation center in West Point, Monrovia.
Mid-September Evidence of tertiary cases in West Point, Monrovia.
Once cases are reported from around Nigeria (because the lid cannot be kept on media reports about them any longer), the wealthy and expats will begin to leave Nigeria in earnest, some of them taking the virus with them.
I worry about the MCF and other facilities becoming overwhelmed, at some point in all this, to the point that HQ makes the decision to pull its people out due to safety concerns.
This virus will act the same way as it has acted so far, wherever it touches down in a clinic or hospital. In Nigeria medical workers have been reassured that the virus has been effectively contained in Lagos. It won't take much to set off other clusters in medical personnel who believe those reassurances.
In Liberia and Sierra Leone, medical facilities still do not have sufficient protective equipment for health care workers. If the New Ebola virus gets a foothold in West Point, there simply will not be enough workers or gloves. New Ebola was never supposed to get into a place like West Point, was never supposed to be able to gain a foothold in such a messy urban setting. It wasn't supposed to be possible, it wasn't supposed to happen.
That's the thing about this virus. Quite a lot is happening with New Ebola that was never supposed to happen. That should prove cautionary.
http://www.trust.org/spotlight/ebola-when-will-it-end/?tab=liveblog
“Join our live online debate today at 14.00 GMT with a panel of government and health experts discussing key questions raised by the world’s worst ever Ebola outbreak.
You can send the panel your comments and questions by logging in below or via Twitter hashtag #Eboladebate Here’s the panel:
Lewis Brown: Liberian Minister for Information (Liberia), Francis Kasolo: Coordinator, WHO Sub-regional Ebola outbreak coordination centre (Guinea), Jorges Castilla Echenique: Health Sector Coordinator for ECHO in West Africa (Guinea), Johan Von Schreeb: Professor of International Disaster Medcine, Karolinska Institut in Sweden (Sweden), Anja Wolz: MSF Emergency Coordinator recently-returned from Kailahun, Sierra Leone (Germany), Korto Williams: Country Director for ActionAid Liberia (Liberia)”
As I have said all along, the idea that it cannot survive in an urban setting is contraindicated by common sense. There are far more common contact surfaces and opportunities for unintended personal contact in an urban setting than there are in rural areas. That would increase the probability of spreading the disease, not diminish it.