outbreak! (ebola, sars, coronavirus, etc)

every time this stuff gets in the news i have an anxiety attack just reading about it

do you think we're all going to die of a plague, soon?

I watched Contagion 2x in a row on a recent intercontinental flight and within 24 hours of landing I was sicker than I can ever remember being.

-Peter

that was a scary one because you know that's exactly how it's going to go down, too

my dad is of the opinion that we're all gonna drop dead from mad cow disease eventually from a lifetime of pink slime exposure

Ebola in Uganda, new flu killing East Coast seals...

Who the HECK would choose Contagion for in-flight programming???

-Peter

There is still this other side of me that wishes I'd embarked on one of my many fig tree dream careers of epidemiologist. I really get a kick form this kind of thing. Someday we will all be dead.

So how worried should we be now, anyway.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/07/25/us-heath-ebola-nigeria-idUSKBN0FU1LE20140725

Fanning flames, paranoia: http://www.sfgate.com/news/medical/article/New-fears-about-Ebola-spread-after-plane-scare-5651721.php

DAKAR, Senegal (AP) — No one knows for sure just how many people Patrick Sawyer came into contact with the day he boarded a flight in Liberia, had a stopover in Ghana, changed planes in Togo, and then arrived in Nigeria, where authorities say he died days later from Ebola, one of the deadliest diseases known to man.

Now health workers are scrambling to trace those who may have been exposed to Sawyer across West Africa, including flight attendants and fellow passengers.

Health experts say it is unlikely he could have infected others with the virus that can cause victims to bleed from the eyes, mouth and ears. Still, unsettling questions remain: How could a man whose sister recently died from Ebola manage to board a plane leaving the country? And worse: Could Ebola become the latest disease to be spread by international air travel?

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/ebola-virus-top-sierra-leone-doctor-shek-umar-dies-of-disease-9636406.html

Sierra Leone's top virologist has died in the current outbreak.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/05/health/patient-at-mount-sinai-has-ebola-like-symptoms-hospital-says.html

This is terrible, reports of hospitals shutting their doors, infected rotting corpses in the streets and ebola nurses downing tools after not getting paid measly $30 a week risk money pledged by the Sierra Leone gvt. Conditions described as "medieval" in parts where the health system has totally collapsed.

i heard a woman talking on the radio about it the other day and she was not holding back about how grim it was -- she was a reporter but i don't remember her name
she used the same analogy, like it was medieval in terms of what people believe about medicine as well as the degree to which people receive/shun medical care when they need it

Little did we know all the right wing survivalists had the right idea for the wrong reason. It's not Obama they should fear, but ebola.

I read an article about the stress of being an ebola nurse. Encased in completely enveloping PPE in a hot climate for 12 + hour shifts. Dealing with infectious, dying patients that constantly fall out of beds, spray blood and diarrhea all over the place. The people that deal with these patients ... I just have no idea where they get their courage from.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/report-armed-men-attack-liberia-ebola-clinic-freeing-patients/

holy shit

Yeah,

Plague Inc is my favorite game

http://www.npr.org/blogs/goatsandsoda/2014/08/19/341412011/shadow-and-d-12-sing-an-infectious-song-about-ebola?

dr. brantly speaking now, was just discharged from emory

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/health/tests-under-way-for-ebola-following-donegal-death-1.1904073

Shit got real. school with this guys sister

Pharmeceutical industry person tries to defend the industry re charges they have not done enough re ebola because it is in poor countries

http://www.forbes.com/sites/johnlamattina/2014/08/18/washington-post-off-base-in-critiquing-pharma-efforts-in-ebola/

the incentives for the pharmaceutical industry are what they are, unfortunately

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/08/25/ebolanomics

Irish guy didn't have Ebola. Was a false alarm.

South Africa and Senegal trying to bar some folks from countries at issue from entry

First US case in Dallas. Take that NYC & LA! We're number one!

Yikes!

I wonder how many crisis of this kind will happen before countries take the WHO seriously and decide to invest in a proper international health structure to prevent this kind of outbreak. Freaking hate to see institutions like the FMI giving up to 130 millions $ but then pressure politicians in the region to go for austerity, it's a waste of money for everyone.

ebola USED to be at the top of my list of irrational fears. presbyterian hospital is about 5 miles north of where i'm sitting right now.

welp

#patientzero

The Frontline piece on this a week or so ago was eye-opening. Hospitals that are barely more than cordoned off fields, mass graves, disinfecting the back of trucks (where patients ride, near death) by tossing in buckets of bleach, doctors and other aid workers more or less forced to visit villages free of any special suits for fear of scaring the shit out of everyone, children orphaned and alone overnight. Just heartbreaking. It's both a matter of doctors struggling to keep up with a rapidly and easily spreading illness and a population almost impossible to isolate. Bodies being dumped and left by the side of the road, families taking members out of quarantine, superstitious treatments co-mingling with modern medicine ...

Here: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/ebola-outbreak/

The saddest bit may be at the end, where grave diggers, one by one, list all their families members who have succumbed.

I'm just a few miles further away, art. Drive by it almost every day as I head up to Richardson.

Your risk of dying from ebola (total confirmed 2014 ebola deaths: a few thousand worldwide) is still lower than your risk of dying due to complications related to seasonal influenza (on average, 5800-7500 a year in the US). Get a flu shot. Don't get too preoccupied by ebola.

wanna c&p that on every damn facebook post I see for the next week

be my guest

i have total confidence in the medical system to properly handle any other arising cases. that said, i am still illogically terrified

Sick Burn I saw on FB:

Don't worry about Ebola spreading in Dallas. The Cowboys have shown us that people in Dallas can't catch anything.

Ebola spreads by physical contact with bodily secretions and fluids. That makes it easier to contain in a place like the USA or Europe, where there are lots of medical facilities and a patient's recent contacts can be quickly discovered and tracked down.

Even so, if ebola strongly establishes itself in Africa, with a reservoir of infected people who keep the virus continuously viable and circulating, then not only will massive numbers of africans die, but ebola will keep leaping to other parts of the world, including the USA and Europe. It can be compared to sparks thrown out from a wildfire, which land on tinder and start other fires away from the main fire. You can put out many of these small satellite fires, but it is hard to extinguish all of them, and the more new places that start burning the harder the firestorm is to keep contained.

That's a good analogy. I really wish international focus between the Ebola outbreak and ISIL was better divided.

run for the hills imo

*not the hills of West Africa, tho*

http://i.imgur.com/LHm72Rq.png

ugh goddamned parody accounts :(

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/02/world/africa/ebola-spreading-in-west-africa.html

this is a very difficult article to read

apparently the problem is not money but organization and time

Oh jeez:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/02/texas-ebola_n_5919522.html

at what point is it ok for me to start panicking?

supposed to go to the state fair this weekend and have resolved not to touch any surfaces and to bathe myself in hand sanitizer after it is all over.

the panic is hilarious. Especially from folks who drive on the streets of Dallas. You should be much more afraid of north Texas drivers than ebola.

until there is an effective vaccine I consider ebola as a threat, but in the USA it is a long term threat, which gives the researchers plenty of time to develop that vaccine.

truly despicable imo for rand paul, a physician, to be saying things like this to score political points

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/sen-rand-paul-sounds-ebola-alarm/

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/02/world/africa/ebola-spreading-in-west-africa.html

this is a very difficult article to read

apparently the problem is not money but organization and time

― I dunno. (amateurist), Wednesday, October 1, 2014 7:27 PM (Yesterday

disorganization and lack of preparedness (not to mention distrust of medical authorities, belief in traditional healing, etc) are consequences of poverty, though. this was from a few weeks ago but i think it's a good primer

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp1409494

First, Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia are resource-poor countries already coping with major health challenges, such as malaria and other endemic diseases, some of which may be confused with EVD. Next, their borders are porous, and movement between countries is constant. Health care infrastructure is inadequate, and health workers and essential supplies including personal protective equipment are scarce. Traditional practices, such as bathing of corpses before burial, have facilitated transmission. The epidemic has spread to cities, which complicates tracing of contacts. Finally, decades of conflict have left the populations distrustful of governing officials and authority figures such as health professionals. Add to these problems a rapidly spreading virus with a high mortality rate, and the scope of the challenge becomes clear

some analysts are calling it a vwv\M/W\mwv-shaped recovery

others simply say that there's no point in trying, because that would be bad for someone's political campaign, and would be stressful for public leaders

\m/._. \m/

YMMV

lol?

*treated with placebo
*of COVID-19 https://t.co/jYZFAEHWnE

— Amy Schellenbaum (@acsbaum) October 21, 2020

kind of what drives me nuts about some fellow COVID trial participants I know who are bragging about how they're gonna go back to livin' it up after they get stuck. a) you don't know if you're getting the vax or the placebo and b) you have no idea what level of protection you will get, if any, if you do get the vax.

(not that this volunteer did anything wrong, that's tragic - just illustrates why I get mad at irresponsible panelists).

Thank you for your service, Neanderthal

so FL numbers I am watching nervously as they haven't crept back up significantly yet but if they do, I fear a return to the horrific summer totals we endured earlier with little to no closures by Desantis (other than like...bars only, which he did last time)

kind of what drives me nuts about some fellow COVID trial participants I know who are bragging about how they're gonna go back to livin' it up after they get stuck. a) you don't know if you're getting the vax or the placebo and b) you have no idea what level of protection you will get, if any, if you do get the vax

if the vaccine reaches the minimum threshold for effectiveness the FDA is going to require for approval (50%) and there's two treatments in the trial, there's a 75% chance they have no immunity!

(same calculation tells you why a vaccine isn't going to change things quickly: it's effective ~half the time, and only about half of americans are going to get it, so it's going to take us from ~5% population immunity to ... 30%? a big jump that will save lives, but nowhere near the levels required for herd immunity.)

yeah I think I read the article that stated that, as well as this one: https://news.northeastern.edu/2020/10/19/a-covid-19-vaccine-wont-mean-a-swift-end-for-wearing-masks-or-social-distancing/

my hope has been dwindling as a result

Boston-area COVID (as-measured-by-poop-sampling) numbers just went exponential: pic.twitter.com/D4Gpvlar1g

— Itamar Turner-Trauring (@itamarst) October 21, 2020

*throws "(Welcome Home) Sanitarium" on repeat*

I'm so glad I got my medical marijuana card, y'all. I'm going to be spending a lot of time this winter getting high as giraffe balls and writing weird poetry

I mean, given these numbers, that's what I see in my future

I'm so glad I got my medical marijuana card, y'all. I'm going to be spending a lot of time this winter getting high as giraffe balls and writing weird poetry

― healthy cocaine off perfect butts (the table is the table), Thursday, October 22, 2020 5:10 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

"ppl who have figured out how to live" thread

So much we don't know..

The Czech death rate at the moment is really astonishing - twice as high per capita as basically anywhere else in Europe. Not yet ofc at the double-figure levels in the worst-affected countries in March/April. pic.twitter.com/2Od55bBpAg

— Mike Bird (@Birdyword) October 23, 2020

they had this really smug video back in April about how low their rates were because of mandatory mask wearing

It's a mystery though. Does it mean that masks don't work? I'd say it needs more reporting but every now and then you get the sense everyone is fumbling around in the dark.

The government stopped enforcing the rules ahead of the election.

Lol it's just horrible but hope it worked out for them.

The UK data from yesterday looks very concerning, unless there's a quirk in the way it's being reported. New cases up about 10% on this time last week but hospitalisations up nearly 50%.

In France too the data is bad. 40000+ new cases yesterday. So far hospitalisations remain relatively low but there's been a point of inflection upward there too. Many new départements were put under curfew starting Saturday, and more are expected to be added next week. There's also talk of extending our curfew in Paris to 7pm, rather than 9pm as it is now. So far that's just rumor though.

Hospitalisations tend to lag cases by a couple of weeks at least so I'd expect that curve to go up even further. Probably also a result of the virus crossing over from younger, and more socially active people, into more vulnerable groups as well.

I no longer have any idea where this ends.

I'd say it needs more reporting but every now and then you get the sense everyone is fumbling around in the dark

The scary scenario is that a lot of this might be down to sheer luck. Super-spreader events have a really disproportionate impact on progression, and there was a Tufecki article recently positing that they might explain the dramatic differences between areas in Italy, for example. It could be that sheer bad luck meant some bad outbreaks blew past the first-line Czech protections and they didn't have a second-line ready and now it's out of control.

I'm no expert but my sense is that masks help, especially when combined with social distancing and particularly partial lockdowns (no indoor bars, restaurants, or schools). See what NY and Italy did. The second you open up, no amount of mask wearing alone is going to stem the tide (though please wear masks).

New cases up about 10% on this time last week but hospitalisations up nearly 50%.

I think this means testing is levelling out but no-ome told the virus.

The virus is much more widespread and firmly entrenched in all populations around the globe today than it was in April. In the USA, for example, the interior of the continent had not yet seen any major outbreaks and populations were mostly virus-free. Now 99% of the USA population is probably living, working and breathing within a couple of miles of someone who is currently infectious.

Much as we'd prefer not to admit it, we're still in the stage where all that can be done is to flatten the curve and wait for new tools to arrive. The best way to flatten the curve is to do what we all knew to do in early April: limit social contacts as much as humanly possible, wash your hands, wear a mask, create a 'safe' bubble in your living space and be aware of whatever enters it from the outside. And with the virus so widespread, it is even more important now than it was in April.

Aimless, we agree!

Plus governments need to develop robust test and tra- oh.

I was jarred reading aimless's post because I think it has been months since I heard anyone use the phrase 'flatten the curve'. It's fucked up how, in the uk at least, the conversation has changed so much even tho the situation and our understanding of it really haven't (not to anything like the same degree anyway). Like the need for a second lockdown in the winter to pinch off cases in time for flu season was a given IN MARCH, and yet it feels so much like everyone is arguing from some earlier prelapsarian point before we knew anything about anything. All this pissing around with tier 2.5 local lockdown when our tracing system has imploded just reinforces something someone said a while ago: we've just given up here. It's dispiriting.

It really is.
I was expecting a more coherent and consistent testing system by now, back in the Spring.
This was initially spreading because we don't know who has it - it's now spreading partly because even if you think there might be a possibility of you having it there aren't many incentives in place to do the right thing if this inconveniences/impoverishes you.

Cases per million people in the Midwest have surpassed both the early peak in the Northeast and the summer surge in the South. pic.twitter.com/MiHF4GBu9o

— The COVID Tracking Project (@COVID19Tracking) October 24, 2020

Ohio has a set a daily record for new cases everyday this week.

Holy shit that's some very frightening stuff.

Epidemiology twitter is starting to make noise that if an infection gets wildly uncontrolled then vaccines aren't much use, which is a frightening scenario.

MEADOWS: We're not going to control the pandemic

TAPPER: Why not?

M: Because it's a contagious virus

T: Why not make efforts to contain it?

M: What we need to do is make sure we have the proper mitigation factors to make sure people don't die pic.twitter.com/0DYgk4rB3T

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 25, 2020

Ghouls.

If it was a bacterial infection, we'd be all over this shit like 99 clowns in a tiny car

Epidemiology twitter is starting to make noise that if an infection gets wildly uncontrolled then vaccines aren't much use, which is a frightening scenario.

where community spread is high and vaccination efficacy is low

If it is true that the FDA plans certify any vaccine where trials show it is more than 50% effective, then that could be exactly where we end up.

It is exactly where we’re going to end up.

At warp speed.

based on politics/distrust of science/jenny mccarthy, ~40% of the USA will probably not take any vaccine which will lead to a grim dystopia straight out of the late middle ages.

this seems good:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/20/magazine/covid-natural-experiments.html

Cool article!

✈️NEW flight report on corona transmission on flights:

13 people appear to have been infected on a 7-hr flight to Ireland this summer, leading to 59 cases as passengers visited friends & family. The plane was at 17% capacity & required masks.https://t.co/7XrxTz5DRe pic.twitter.com/GhyHV1nGWR

— Amy Maxmen (@amymaxmen) October 26, 2020

that's freaky because the conventional wisdom = teh HEPA filters would filter the air which would probably protect those far away from infected cases, and usually those in the immediate rows around the infected were at higher risk, particularly if someone sneezed or wasn't wearing a mask, but there's a great degree of separation between the cases in the seats.

wonder if transmission was due to people unmasking to drink/eat for long periods of time, or from visiting the lavatory (either from fomites or coming in contact with someone leaving lavatory, etc).

serves as a reminder that air travel has risk too. I will admit to having taken a flight this year (I wore KN95 masks while I flew) but I wouldn't take a flight longer than 2 hours. probably won't do it at all ongoing tbh.

Every airplane seat already has those drop-down masks. Could we just make them mandatory for the whole flight, every flight?

It may, of course, not be on the plane where transmission occurred.

A lot of standing in line at security, to board, immigration etc. The whole airport experience seems a recipe for transmission.

This study has been doing the rounds, seems to confirm that risk of airborne transmission from seated passengers is pretty unlikely, but it doesn’t account for the rest of the flying experience.

https://www.ustranscom.mil/cmd/docs/TRANSCOM%20Report%20Final.pdf

In other news, shops, bars and restaurants will open in Melbourne tomorrow for the first time in nearly 3 months.