Ebola Patient to be treated in Atlanta

[keen23]

This seems like the start of a movie or The Walking Dead, but it's real. I have some irrational fears about this. I've seen it go bad in too many Hollywood depictions to be totally fear free about introducing an active case of Ebola to the US, even under heavy quarantine.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/ ... story.html

[August]

I'm reminded of the mathematician in Jurassic Park. Nature will find a way. It scares me both logically and illogically.

[SquirrelySquirrel]

And all of the internet goes wild!!

Seriously, there are plenty of infectious diseases on our soil, and having read several comments on articles about this this morning, I would love to know what people would do if they were in that situation? If you, your spouse, your mother, your child had a scary-as-hell disease wouldn't you want them to be treated at the best possible place, and given the best possible chance of survival? I'm sure it's not PC to say this, but yeah, I'd want my husband (or whoever) the hell out of Africa and back in a freaking US hospital.

We just have to try to have faith in the CDC (I know, I know) that they're taking every reasonable precaution imaginable, and in the hospital staff. Sure it's scary as hell to imagine an outbreak, so I'm just focusing on how relieved and hopeful the family members must be feeling.

[docmom]

It scares me too but only illogically. Logically, they know what they're dealing with. Ebola is containable- containment has stopped all the other outbreaks. The reason it's not working in this one is that people are moving and escaping the containment zones and because until now, unaffected (developed) nations weren't helping inthe effort. So, logically, you shouldn't be worried at all about these two patients. You should worry about the guy on the plane who's just come out of the area and is either in the early stages or doesn't yet realize he's sick...

[Firiel]

I fully admit that I very well might feel differently if I lived in or near Atlanta, but this doesn't bother me too terribly much.

The thing about ebola is that you are not contagious when you are asymptomatic and you can't get it through casual contact. So is it possible one of the doctors may get infected? Yeah, though hopefully that won't happen due to the extreme precautions I'm sure they will take. But what are the odds that said doctor would be hanging out with his family or going to the store if he even noticed the slightest sign of symptoms? Very, very slim. And unless there are symptoms, he won't be spreading it.

[mirele]

I'm more worried about the people being evacuated from the area by missionary organizations. I seriously hope they're going to be quarantined in a nice hotel somewhere for three weeks (incubation time of Ebola) just for safety's sake.

[salex]

I am not as worried about the CDC patient as I am about the guy who is not quite feeling sick as he boards the flight out of Nigeria, after flying into the country with the man who brought it with him.

I occasionally participate in Mass Prophylaxis drills, and I'd happily never have to participate in the real thing.

[Rachel333]

I'm not worried, I know they're being extremely careful to keep the virus contained and even if it did spread it's much less likely to become an epidemic in the US than in west Africa. Like others have said, I'm more concerned about people traveling from that area who might have the virus but haven't shown symptoms yet.

[chaotic life]

Ebola spreads like HIV and Hep B, and the virus is able to live outside the living human host, just like Hep B. Also, CDC is not doing the patient care, Emory University Hospital is. I was pleased to hear this news today. I knew they were working on it yesterday. This is not like patient X who will bring it I unknown and spread it through casual sex unknown until too late, or put it into the blood supply.

[Trynn]

Doesn't Ebola hit too fast for that though? It's been a while, but don't you start feeling sick almost righ away after exposure?

I understand the family is concerned, but I still really don like the idea of bringing an active case to the states.

[Rachel333]

Doesn't Ebola hit too fast for that though? It's been a while, but don't you start feeling sick almost righ away after exposure?

I understand the family is concerned, but I still really don like the idea of bringing an active case to the states.

From what I understand it can incubate for up to three weeks before showing symptoms, and in that time someone can be contagious without knowing it. It spreads through contact with body fluids so it's not extremely contagious, but it seems easier to get than HIV.

[Firiel]

From what I understand it can incubate for up to three weeks before showing symptoms, and in that time someone can be contagious without knowing it. It spreads through contact with body fluids so it's not extremely contagious, but it seems easier to get than HIV.

No, a person is not contagious unless they are showing symptoms (see question 4):

http://www.who.int/csr/disease/ebola/faq-ebola/en/

EDIT: It can also be transmitted after a man has recovered from the virus through semen (though not through other fluids, it seems) for a long time (up to seven weeks!).

[Mama Mia]

Uh, you guys have it all wrong. Ebola is being brought into the U.S of A on a daily basis by thousand of Central American children who are also carrying drugs and/or guns. These evil 8 year olds are sent thousands of miles on an incredibly dangerous journey by their worthless parents, solely for shits and giggles, and the opportunity to get rich off us tax payers! And spread a multitude of deadly diseases, including Ebola. I know this because the crazy interwebz told me so! :roll:

Really, there are people online insisting that the Central American refugee children are bringing in Ebola.

[PennySycamore]

Uh, you guys have it all wrong. Ebola is being brought into the U.S of A on a daily basis by thousand of Central American children who are also carrying drugs and/or guns. These evil 8 year olds are sent thousands of miles on an incredibly dangerous journey by their worthless parents, solely for shits and giggles, and the opportunity to get rich off us tax payers! And spread a multitude of deadly diseases, including Ebola. I know this because the crazy interwebz told me so! :roll:

Really, there are people online insisting that the Central American refugee children are bringing in Ebola.

It's those people who spread shit like this about the refugee children that scare the ever-lovin' hell out of me!

[16strong]

ATLien checking in...nobody here is particularly thrilled about this. However, I had a feeling that Atlanta would see the first cases of ebola outside of Africa simply because Hartsfield-Jackson is a major hub for world air traffic. I didn't guess that the authorities themselves would actually bring the ebola-infected to the U.S. by plane. While I don't think there's much to worry about, I'm also not jumping for joy.

[chaotic life]

It spreads like Heptatitis B, which is nearly identical to HIV *except* that the virus is far hardier and can live on surfaces for days after exposure, if not properly decontaminated. HIV is a very fragile virus in that it cannot live for more than a few minutes outside a living, human host. Ebola can live for a week, and I believe Heptatits B can live for five days. Incubation period of ebola is 2-21 days, but you are contagious when you are showing symptoms. It is not spread through casual contact. The biggest reasons that it is hard to contain in Africa is because of poor contact precautions and isolatino precautions, a mistrust by many of these populations towards governments which can extend to healthcare workers, and cultural practices of touching the corpse thereby spreading the virus after death.

There's a picture going around of the ground outside a Liberian hospital where the big, rubber gloves like we use for washing dishes are staked in the yard to dry after washing them. That is the level of decontamination procedures available in these three nations. That is not how it would EVER be handled in the US.

[August]

It scares me too but only illogically. Logically, they know what they're dealing with. Ebola is containable- containment has stopped all the other outbreaks. The reason it's not working in this one is that people are moving and escaping the containment zones and because until now, unaffected (developed) nations weren't helping inthe effort. So, logically, you shouldn't be worried at all about these two patients. You should worry about the guy on the plane who's just come out of the area and is either in the early stages or doesn't yet realize he's sick...

No, the other oytbreaks ceased naturally because the disease is so deadly and symptoms show so quickly. This outbreak is continuing because it's significantly less deadly (only 60% compared to 90% normally). That means it's much harder to contain.

Developed nations have been helping since the beginning.

Yes, it's only one flight away, which is why they're takingthe temperature of every person trying to board a plane in the region.

If you're notterrified of them doing this, it's because you don't know enough about the disease and the history of mistakes in high containment labs.

[Rachel333]

No, a person is not contagious unless they are showing symptoms (see question 4):

http://www.who.int/csr/disease/ebola/faq-ebola/en/

EDIT: It can also be transmitted after a man has recovered from the virus through semen (though not through other fluids, it seems) for a long time (up to seven weeks!).

Ah, okay, so the worry isn't necessarily that people could spread it without knowing it, but that they could carry it elsewhere and then get sick and start to spread it.

This article was interesting, it explains why ebola in the US isn't as terrifying as it sounds.

http://www.vox.com/2014/7/30/5948995/wh ... in-america

[Mama Mia]

Yeah, since my dad just got over an infectious pneumonia he acquired through the hospital, where he was for cancer treatment, I am a little worried about contagion precautions in the U.S. too. Not for this case, it's so high profile, and with such top of the line, experienced experts that I'm sure there won't be a spread from this one patient. It's if other people are sick and show up at the ER, will there be enough precautions before the staff realizes it isn't just the flu and it's spread through the whole hospital.

[DGayle]

Yeah, since my dad just got over an infectious pneumonia he acquired through the hospital, where he was for cancer treatment, I am a little worried about contagion precautions in the U.S. too. Not for this case, it's so high profile, and with such top of the line, experienced experts that I'm sure there won't be a spread from this one patient. It's if other people are sick and show up at the ER, will there be enough precautions before the staff realizes it isn't just the flu and it's spread through the whole hospital.

About 1.7 million people a year get hospital-acquired infections, and about 100,000 die. So I'm not so confident that ebola can't possibly break loose. All it will take is ONE person making ONE TINY MISTAKE, and we've got a big, big problem.

[Arete]

People are comparing apples to oranges when they are extrapolating a US Ebola outbreak to nosocomial acquired infections in the US. First of all, an Ebola patient will be in a room that has its own, independent air system. The laundry, the medical waste, EVERYTHING touching that patient will be destroyed in a seperate autoclave that is dedicated to that suite with the seperate air system from the rest of the building it is in. They will be pulling in nursing staff who are trained in level3 microbial containment, as well as cleaners who train and specialize for these tasks with the CDC. These are not the same people cleaning toilets for 7 dollars an hour in a hospital. The cleaners, the medical staff, anyone who will enter that room will have to gown aspetically. This is not the bs gowning in a NICU. You have to certify to gown this way, be able to put on a gown without touching the outside, cover every last area of your skin including your face, double glove, googles, space boots, the works. You are going through multiple air locks that are negative pressure to the outside, meaning air and particles stay IN the room with the patient. As you are leaving, you "take off" all your gowning in reverse, once again touching the outside of the gown only to grab the zipper with your double gloved hand, then go into the inner cuff of the outer gloves to remove them, then remove other pieces in sequence in the proper order and air locks.

I don't care what anyone saw in which movie. Sterile containment is grossly misrepresented in those movies. Hospitals have procedures to limit the spread of micro organisms, but it isn't anything like the sterile containment that will be dedicated to this case. It is highly specialized, technically difficult, and grossly expensive, which is why it is reserved for something with a 90% kill rate with no known drug cure.

Stop panicking and don't spread panic. Worry about the cases that could be around the world in 24 hour jet travel that are not being controlled in a CDC facility.

I truly am sorry for being snippy, but I have an EXCELLENT memory of the beginning of the AIDS outbreak. It is a big, fat, fucking lie to think only Republicans and Ronald Reagan said, "hey, it's too dangerous". Sophisticated, non God fearing liberals were proposing rounding up AIDS patients and forcing them into camp environments, because it was so deadly, there were no drugs, and people were that scared.

[chaotic life]

Areto Jo, so much of the fear I have heard is verbatim the things that were said and mentalities that were maintained about HIV, which had a 100% fatality rate when it first showed up, and typically within 2-5 years, just not as fast as ebola.

I honestly have very little concern about transporting these missionaries back to US hospitals, with known ebola infections. I am far more concerned that there has been a confirmed case of ebola in Nigeria (Liberian man traveled there and then died) and the risk of an unknown infected individual transporting the virus into the country and then walking into a random ER.

[Toothfairy]

I was reading comments about this. Americans are so damn rude and would gladly turn their back on one of their own.

[Arete]

I was reading comments about this. Americans are so damn rude and would gladly turn their back on one of their own.

It is human nature to fear a disease of this magnitude of seriousness. Where we are failing is in educating the public, not in manners. Instead of running news stories and actually showing the public the precautions and technology, the REDUNDANT precautions and technology involved in this kind of patient isolation, our press outlets are actually feeding the hysteria. The science and technology editors and reporters should be hanging their heads in shame over choosing sensationalism over education. People actually think what they see in movies, movies FFS, is an accurate portrayal of containment protocols.

Here is the unvarnished truth. A US Ebola outbreak will happen if a traveler from a hot zone hops a jet while asymptomatic, comes to the US, becomes symptomatic, and other people come into contact with the patient's body fluids. It will spread until it is recognized for what it is and area hospitals and healthcare go on red alert. It isn't going to happen from patients on specially equipped transports going into CDC supervised containment protocols.

Some people may think letting a few American citizens die in Africa is fine moral calculus, but it isn't. It is impossible in the jet age to keep any country's borders hermetically sealed. Sick people will get in. The only way to fight a disease, slow it down, or even cure it, is to treat the sick in controlled conditions and gather data. That is what the First World is good at and has resources for. It will save American lives, it will save African lives, European lives, Australian lives. But it takes time and logical heads need to prevail.

[alba]

No, the other oytbreaks ceased naturally because the disease is so deadly and symptoms show so quickly. This outbreak is continuing because it's significantly less deadly (only 60% compared to 90% normally). That means it's much harder to contain.

Developed nations have been helping since the beginning.

Yes, it's only one flight away, which is why they're takingthe temperature of every person trying to board a plane in the region.

If you're notterrified of them doing this, it's because you don't know enough about the disease and the history of mistakes in high containment labs.

Do you have a source asserting this outbreak is less deadly? According to the BBC:

MSF says this outbreak comes from the deadliest and most aggressive strain of the virus, which kills more than 90% of patients.

bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-26835233