http://www.who.int/csr/don/2014_08_22_ebola/en/
“Between 19 and 20 August 2014, a total of 142 new cases of Ebola virus disease (laboratory-confirmed, probable, and suspect cases) as well as 77 deaths were reported from Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone.”
Up to 140+/day now.
Ungood.
If these numbers are correct, and I'm not ever sure they are, the deaths comprise over 50% of the new reported cases. This is inline with the expectations.
if the disease were running rampant and not in a burnout phase, the number of new cases would far exceed the death rate, probably reducing it to the 30%-40% range.
Either these numbers are bogus as to the new cases, or grossly inaccurate, or my assessment based on them is correct.
It cannot be both ways..
So again, based on those numbers, the outbreak has matured. But that does not mean controlled in the regions it is located at. It means that the outbreak is not spreading beyond those areas. It will, in the end, probably kill as many as 60% of the populations there before it is over.
To me, as a analyst of the data and the news, (which is what I do everyday of the week), This outbreak is not out of control. It remains isolated to the regions involved. Unless that changes, it's controlled in my mind. And I certainly have compassion for those trapped in these areas by the disease, but unless they are hermits and avoid contact with family members, friends and their fellow citizens, about 60% of them are going to succumb to the disease. It's a no brainer...
Unfortunately for them, they will not avoid that contact as we would here in the US. So that is their Achilles heel.