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

have that article queued up, looking forward to reading it

yup. beaches have fairly constant ocean breezes and the replacement air coming off the ocean will be infection-free. but some of the hyper-crowded beaches I've seen in photos seem a lot less than ideally safe to me.

yeah risk certainly goes up with more crowding. the beaches around us in boston are pretty well-distanced, hasn't been a problem to sit 100 feet from the nearest person. going in the evening helps too

We have some non-crowded beaches locally that we've been swimming at. Social distancing hasn't been an issue at all. But over the weekend we were chased out of our regular spots by jellyfish, so we decided to try a larger local beach on the Chesapeake. We got there and it was packed to the gills with people. We rolled up there masked anyway, but we did a quick turnaround and left.

It was just like, oh shit I haven't been in a teeming mass of unmasked people in a LONG time.

i think i posted on another thread that there have been no confirmed transmissions at beaches worldwide (which is not true of parks btw). it appears to be very low risk.

it's given me the kick up the arse to do more beach trips - I've probably been more since lockdown started than last summer, excluding actual holiday. miles easier than parks etc imo.

just got tested in nyc; was told that under normal circumstances results can take up to two weeks, but if 'a rush is put on it' it might only take three days

so that's where we are, five months in, in a place that is actually trending decently

(unless you play baseball)

tbf it probably doesn't matter -- i can't really isolate any more than i've already been doing

Beaches and parks and bikepaths have been open here the whole time, and we didn't have a spike in cases until they reopened bars, then they closed the bars, I know science is hard but is this particular part of it actually that hard???

*then they closed the bars and the spike went away

It's been incredibly disappointing how many of the articles on failures in social/physical distancing have been illustrated with photos of sparsely populated beaches. Even if socializing, transmission risks at a beach is probably a small fraction of that at in a crowded bar/restaurant interiors.

Recent anecdotal (not physical) contact with anti-mask people is making me feel the U.S. is truly fucked:

The idea of being an anti-masker and also being extremely invested in your local food co-op is funny to me pic.twitter.com/gEkHwgyoHf

— CHANTS (@ChantsWI) August 3, 2020

From a bandmate:

Some fucking fat redneck loser in Walworth Country with "Obama Lies" stickers on his pickup truck tried to run us into oncoming traffic tonight, because he saw that we were from Madison. "Where's your masks??" he yelled

— Jung Millenial (@whothecanuck) August 3, 2020

Fauci going back and forth on schools reopening is annoying and unhelpful and the amount of conflicting or weird information coming out of the CDC is pissing me off

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/03/health/us-coronavirus-monday/index.html

"The default position with K-12 schools should be to reopen them, said Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
There are two big reasons schools should go back to in-person learning, Fauci said Monday. Students need the psychological and nutritional benefits of being in school, and parents may have to "dramatically modify their work schedule."
"The primary consideration should always be the safety, the health of the welfare of the children, as well as the teachers and the secondary effects for spreading (to) the parents and other family members," he said.

and yet:

"If Americans want schools to safely reopen and the economy to improve, they must get more serious about personal responsibility, health experts say.
"You have to do more than just wear masks and keep social distancing. You have to minimize your contact with as many people as possible," ACCESS Health's Haseltine said.
"It's not that complicated. But it is hard to do psychologically. It's hard to do sociologically. And it's extremely hard to do for young people."
"And if you do have to work," he said, "you have to assure that the workplace is safe and you can work safely at a distance."

you have to assure that the workplace is safe and you can work safely at a distance.

schools are workplaces. there's no way I can conceive of maintaining safe distancing in classrooms, unless students are divided into several shifts so the number in a classroom at any one time is very limited. this doesn't solve the problem of:

parents may have to "dramatically modify their work schedule."

Especially for parents with multiple children in school, who might each be taught on a different shift. the whole set of guidelines given do not combine into a coherent whole.

yeah this was stupid across the board. sure classrooms and school in theory could be safe. Are they going to be? no. has fauci ever observed a child in a classroom? does he know what school funding is like? does he understand what class sizes are? apparently not.

see, I think it's all perfectly consistent with the message that many levels of government are pushing: schools are safe. the buildings are fine. busses are cool, as long as the windows are open. the systems are in place. failures and outbreaks that stem from schools being opened prematurely are actually the fault of the children and adulst who didn't execute the well-designed public policy plans safely.

my partner and i talk about this basically everyday because we're both reasonably concerned about her going back to work in a charter school and my latest default position is that, as her boss has made it clear it's unlikely she'll be called in for the first month, it seems highly likely this is going to go wrong before september in multiple places across the country and she'll almost certainly end up doing remote teaching in any case. so now we just need to make sure she holds on to the "let's give it a month" line with her boss.

Mandatory masking appears to be having a positive effect locally, which I’m sure means it will be allowed to lapse in six weeks and we can start all over again.

*grits teeth* texas

Wow.

Read this obituary for David Nagy. They (rightfully) went there. pic.twitter.com/WU2x9qL3oc

— 💙 Koko 🥁 💙 (@Kokomothegreat) August 3, 2020

I wish there were more of these.

uk has had below the average number of deaths for this time of year for a while now, they were saying on the news. i'm guessing this is because a lot of the people that would be dying around now are already dead.

BREAKING: NYC’s health commissioner resigned after clashing with Mayor de Blasio over his handling of the coronavirus outbreak.https://t.co/nHuxFzJfoX

— Cliff Levy (@cliffordlevy) August 4, 2020

Finally got a big study on nicotine replacement therapy/past smoking and Covid19.

smoking’s bad for you

Huge if true

I'm used to bristling at "They hate America!" but honestly I'm gettin there

This is the first day of school in Paulding County, Georgia. pic.twitter.com/fzdidaAABM

— 🇯🇲Black🇭🇹Aziz🇳🇬aNANsi🇹🇹 (@Freeyourmindkid) August 4, 2020

beside the point, but why are kids starting school on august 4?

In the American calendar it's April

i think some school districts wanted to move their calendars up to buy them time in the case of shutdowns, its dumb bc they should be shut down rn

I feel like my son's school will handle this better, but seeing stuff like this is pretty stressful.

one of my friends has heart issues and other regular health issues and has to go back to school. very worried for her.

a few of them had the VID already, guess we're about to find out how long-term antibodies work.

today was a really gloomy day for news and wondering what's going to be left after this is 'over'. if it's ever 'over'.

yeah, if

that thought process is such a dank rabbit hole but.....

I mean obv at some point we will be through this but this whole thing has impaired my ability to imagine life eveb a year or two from now

even

me too. i have to frequently stop myself from pondering it too much.

Economic collapse, serfdom, food riots

http://thumbnails.cbsig.net/CBS_Production_Entertainment_VMS/2013/04/06/24962627854/CBS_STAR_TREK_DS9_457_IMAGE_1368459_640x360.jpg

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-georgia-second-grader-covid-19-positive-test/

obviously the students got it before school started, but who knows how many people they spread it to.

so one day into class, you're now into a 2 week quarantine. how did that help your in person learning at all?

MARCH COMMERCIAL: during these uncertain times, we’re thinking of you and your family

AUGUST COMMERCIAL: look you might as well catch it at burger king

— Ben Rosen (@ben_rosen) August 5, 2020

refusing to require a mask (like in Georgia) is a particularly bad idea with high schoolers. it's a bad idea in general, to rely on every individual to make the obvious and correct choice to wear a mark. but it's really bad with students because they're even more susceptible to peer pressure and the perception of being cool than anyone else. if it's cool to not wear a mask, no one's going to wear a mask

I'm not sure I agree with that. If you make it a rule, and specify harsh enough consequences, students will do it. There are already dress codes - which of course are sometimes broken, but the consequences are usually mild, and the transgressions can be subjective. But nobody comes into school wearing a motorcycle helmet in class. If they do, they get told off and sent to the principal's office if they won't take it off.

Oh duh - that's what you're saying :)

The problem is that some non-trivial percentage of the kids' parents are probably mask truthers and telling their kids that they shouldn't wear them.

Well they can get with the fucking program.

these parents should be used as windshield wipers on sport utility vehicles

the old problem with democracy: relying on people to come to the obvious conclusion doesn't work