And the CDC says its still safe as long as you wear the gear. No its not. The people in Africa are getting it with protective gear. Its BS. How come the guy’s family has not come down with it? I don’t get it.
How do we know they haven't?
It may be that some people are immune and others are not. Like the flu or some other infecting disease,some people catch it while others do not even after being exposed to it.
Yes they repeat the CDC talking points. In a matter of 60 seconds they say this newly infected person was wearing all the gear and then when reporter asks the question he said that staff IS safe as long as they wear this protective stuff.
They likely have it by now and are being hidden from the public to prevent panic. Remember they were being quarantined in a private home at an “undisclosed” location. I am doubtful we will ever hear from them again.
I don't get it either (meaning, I'm not sure), but here's what I think:
The attack rate among doctors and nurses is HIGHER than in the general population. This is an important clue that needs to be explained.
Doctors and nurses wear PPE. The general population doesn't.
The PPE gets contaminated during routine care. When they take it off, they're getting a few virions on their skin.
The ID50 is TINY.
So, even though touch is the way most people in Africa get it, HCWs PPE is collecting the virus and making touch exposure more dangerous. I wonder if increased skin temp under the PPE has something to do with it? Lots of viruses are highly temperature adapted, for example, flu loves 34 degrees instead of 37, which makes the tip of your nose just perfect.
All that is speculation. What is reality is that the dominant paradigm in the industry just got blown up and we are moving into a phase of real, serious crisis, which will be accelerated by the flooding of our borders with refugees from Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea, most of whom are incubating disease (not sick yet), and who will therefore sail through the screening.
“How come the guy’s family has not come down with it? I don’t get it.”
I suspect what happened is that feds offer some bribe to people that may have been exposed, say $1M, if they keep quiet. Obviously, in most cases, the money would go to the survivors.
The above plan works fine, as long as the offer is on the table, but this person wasn’t considered high-risk, so he never got the offer and likely went to the media first. The media then went to CDC and CDC knew it was too late to contain the news.
I simply don’t see how Duncan’s family, at least some of them, cannot have it by now. Let’s watch that Dallas judge and see if he keeps making public appearances, or not...
If any of you are former or current military members you know how carefully your chem gear must be worn to afford protection.
The military chemical warfare gear is much more protective than any of the protective suits I’ve seen in the media, being worn by those exposed to ebola-infected persons. I know there are “level 2” and up to “level 4” protective suits, and that only a couple of medical facilities in the USA offer level 4 protection (I think one is at the CDC in Atlanta).
But the real difference is in the procedures used to remove the protective gear. Once the gear is contaminated, the military member goes through a several-step process to get the gear off. You don’t just peel it off and throw it on the ground.
In the military chem-gear it is assumed that a pinhead-sized drop of nerve gas is lethal, and stuck to your chem suit could possibly contaminate you after you’ve cleared the target area following a chemical attack. So, the procedures for removal of the gear assume the outer garments are contaminated with lethal gas or biological agents. The removal of the gear takes longer than putting it on — maybe 30 minutes of a step-by-step process.
First comes the shower, which removes the contaminants from outside the garments. This does not appear to be part of any protocols I have seen being employed by medical personnel. If this is not done, there is a significant danger of touching the contaminant during the process of peeling off the outer layers of protective garments.
After that, there is another shower after the outer gear is removed, this time after the inner garments are also removed.
I think that is a likely way some of these “protected” hot zone workers are getting the virus on their skin. They’re not decontaminating and removing the protective garments carefully enough.