Posted on 04/16/2005 2:01:01 PM PDT by palmer
There is a special place in heaven for the doctors and nurses who died trying to save the Marburg victims. These are saints.
Just as there is a special place in Hell for those who ignored the call to stop this virus.
I agree, from the sound of it, the health care workers and family care givers are the ones most at risk, especially for those hopeless patients with 5 million viruses in each drop of their blood. Hard to imagine.
A ping about a good, in-depth article to those I remember from the Marburg threads.
Thanks for posting this, palmer.
One side note--I think we're supposed to excerpt NY Times articles. You may want to check it out & see if the moderators can help you.
(FR was sued for copyright infringement by the NY Times and LA Times, I believe).
And what is sad is that the families are afraid to send their sick loved ones to the hospital now.
So they're isolating themselves with people with the virus, and probably entire families will soon be wiped out.
I'm pretty sure the copyright case was with the Washington Post and the LA Times, not the NY Times. But I'll ask about it.
I saw the first mainstream newsclip on Fox News last night showing a team of white-clad bio hazard covered workers in Angola loading dead Marburg victims on a truck and hauling them away for burial. The news reporter mentioned how the locals are hiding their sick to avoid giving them up to the hospital where they'll never be seen again. Very sad and dangerous at the same time. News reporters are there now so hopefully we'll learn more about this nightmare soon.
Could you estimate how many bodies they were loading?
It was just a few bagged bodies I could see that they were sliding into the back of an open bed truck. Couldn't see how many were in the truck. The last of the clip showed a truck driving away with health workers standing in the back dressed in white from head to toe. Very spooky. The report came during a Fox news update. If they ever release another body count it may spark more news coverage. That may be part of what they're worried about.
The point was made by a commentary on recombinomics.com that white is the color traditionally associated with witchcraft.
Truthfully, and once again, I just do not expect to see any where near accurate numbers on this outbreak, nor any confirmation when it starts winding down (if that happens) or warning when it grows exponentially (if that happens). The numbers vary from source to source, from writer to writer, among news organizations with some clinging to old numbers, etc.
And in addition, I doubt that there are a cumulative total of 230 dead, with a total dead and alive case number of 250, meaning that there are only 20 now alive with the disease. Does anyone here believe that figure?
It may be the number of living victims who have been found and are being treated by WHO, or Doctors Without Borders, or some such, but that cannot be accurate for the number of total non-deceased cases of the disease.
In order to follow the initial curve, which was looking very accurate, there would HAVE to be over 100 cases right now of people with the disease, whether they are being treated or not by health authorities, unless the outbreak is levelling off.
Does anyone here think it's likely to level off, with the burial practices, and the habit of people lying to the medical authorities?
Does anyone think that WHO, which has been driven off by locals, has any real idea how many cases there are? Does anyone think that WHO will accurately report the actual number of Marburg deaths they in fact know about, without having the magic piece of paper from the CDC in Atlanta telling them it was in fact Marburg?
And those results, from the CDC, take two weeks. We're two weeks behind the curve, at the very least. And we know from other, earlier articles that the CDC has reported some false negatives.
I'm not ACTUALLY worried until there are proven cases outside Africa. That still may not happen. At this point, I am concerned.
I am sure your skepticism is justified. The numbers are probably those cases known to the WHO, or whatever reporting agency, and are probably a bit behind at that. It just seems logical to assume that the large majority of cases are not known to the agencies.
I don't think they are malfeasant, but I think they just don't have a handle on what is actually happening, given all the difficulties just finding bodies.
If I were a citizen and starting to get sick, or a relative was, I sure as heck would hide from those witches in the white suits who come and take corpses and relatives away, never to be seen again.
Agreed. After all the turmoil in Angola, anyone who says, "I'm from the government and I'm here to help you" is likely to be stoned, or attacked with sticks, etc.
Conversely, if I were in one of those dreadful spacesuits, which are so hot that you can only stay in them a few hours, and which take a long time to put on, disinfect, and take off properly, I would be leary of getting a hole it it from a stick or stone...
Still, I want numbers...good luck to me, I guess.
Bttt
It appears that WHO's Marburg plan is to wish it away, drive it back to the bush people and hope the news media continue to ignore it.
I think you have asked all of the right questions, and indeed, you are correct that the data are probably no longer believable.
At this point we have speculation, but it is worthwhile to consider:
1. Since the growth curve fit so well to data from such a long period, we would expect it to continue until something changes about the behaviour of people in Uigie. Therefore, has anything changed?
2. Could it be that finally everyone got scared and just decided to stay at home, for instance? That would mean that the disease would burn itself out and the epidemic would end.
3. By contrast, could it be that everyone just stopped going to the hospital so that they no longer have accurate data?
What I find a bit unsettling is the speed with which the growth seemed to stop. It was precipitious. One moment, we are growing exponentially, the next, all growth as stopped. The original 237 cases seem to die out and we have a grand total of 13 new ones. If true, this is unbelievably good news--they have stopped the epidemic cold and we can stop worrying about it. Perhaps I am somewhat the pessimist; I cannot quite believe that it was stopped that fast.
We'll see.
late to the party- ping
I can think of only two possibilities. Either the virus mutated into something far less deadly or harmless, or the government and WHO have lost the ability to track new patients.
This story certainly makes me think it is the latter.
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