<p>“And the kidnapping situation is probably not one where the child’s life is in immediate danger. In all of those situations the State Department will work to to find a solution, but you can’t equate that with an epidemic or a coup situation. Sheesh. Some people just LOVE to hate our government so much that they can’t even praise a humanitarian gesture”</p>
<p>A kidnapping situation may not put a child’s life in immediate danger?</p>
<p>I guess if I LOVED to hate the government so much, I wouldn’t have spent seven years in the military, and served in a war zone, with difficult sacrifices for my family.</p>
<p>Perhaps I’m merely not naïve enough to think that the government is going to rescue me, no matter the situation, the cost, while putting others at risk just because I’m an American. They might, if public pressure or a particular group advocates hard enough for my rescue. We stand a better chance than most, because of our US citizenship, but if you really think someone is always going to come in and save you, just because you’re an American…well, I hope you don’t travel out of the country very much. You have to use your own common sense and not put yourself at risk.</p>
<p>Those thunderstorms were just weird. It was hailing nearby, thunder and lightening. We never get that. What’s going on? We were wondering, what is that noise, are the Blue Angels doing an extra practice?</p>
<p>We were nearby to where the lightning hit in Fremont.
It was very loud, but they didnt look like storm clouds.
Unfortunately the storm moved into the Methow Valley & they had gusts of almost 60mph, as well as new lightning strikes today.
D assures me shes ready if they have to evacuate, but they are already housing other families, who lost their homes earlier.</p>
<p>She has it much easier obviously than most of the people in the valley.
It will make a good story one day, but for now its tough
It makes me feel a lot better that they have an evacuation route.</p>
<p>Are you talking about the plane that brought the Ebola patient back to the US yesterday? It is specially equipped with an isolation unit on the plane. The pilots were in no danger. But that is why they brought only one and are going back for the second person, because it isn’t built for two people. You might want to read a bit more and find out the facts before assuming this guy was just sitting in the back seat of a 4 person Cessna or something.</p>
<p>The aircraft that transported the patient was a Gulfstream III. You must not be very familiar with aviation if you think anyone could think there would be a possibility of transporting someone from Africa to the US on a tiny bugsmasher. I flew a private jet a little smaller than the Gulfstream III for a number of years. Even in a modified plastic isolation tent, the pilots aren’t that far from the patient. It is not a large aircraft, and most people, especially if they are not wearing protective gear themselves, would have some concern. Like how strong is a collapsible clear tent? What if something penetrated the tent? That’s a lot of time in the air. I’d be curious to talk to the pilots in private, as what they would say in public would be whatever the company line is. Were they sealed in the cockpit? Where did they go to the bathroom, is their facility inside of the cockpit, or outside? How did they walk around? They must have needed to, that is such a long flight. How many pilots were onboard, what were their concerns? Were they worried that a country would not give them landing clearance if they knew the Ebola patient was onboard? Did they feel pressured to continue and not get minor malfunctions fixed, to accomplish the mission (actually, that’s a given). Pressure to complete a flight is a danger right there, but that happens all of the time.</p>
<p>Well, Flossy, if only the govt would tell us that hospital induced staph infections will never hurt us, I’d feel better about getting an operation. I keep hoping.</p>
<p>But what I really am worried about is if someone sick gets onto an airplane, and then walks around a crowded terminal. Or goes into a hospital, with everyone thinking it’s the flu. A bad situation could be on a cruise boat, with a cruise employee. So many people in such a small space.</p>
<p>This article has a picture of the containment unit. Which isn’t just custom made for this situation, it isn’t the first time someone has had to have air transport with an infectious disease. Obviously I knew they weren’t flying a Cessna, but it was unclear what you were thinking, since you haven’t had many facts at your disposal on Ebola since the start of this conversation.</p>
<p>Here is what the head of the CDC said about this: “I hope that our understandable fear of the unfamiliar does not trump our compassion when ill Americans return to the U.S. for care”. But fear of the unfamiliar seems to be rampant in the minds of some people these days…</p>
<p>Really, you people. Embrace the unknown, seek out the unfamiliar. Wrap your arms around Ebola, and while you’re at it, get familiar with the bird flu and anthrax too. You never know when the CDC is going to accidentally expose you to something, but that’s all so trivial anyways.</p>
<p>Stop being so ignorant and fearful, and start acting a little more sophisticated around here. Jeez!</p>
<p>We do have hospital in the US that are equipped to handle serious infectious diseases. Emory is one of them. Just because you are unfamiliar does not mean it is not being handled safely.</p>
<p>Do you understand how many deadly, exceptionally rare viruses are handled in isolation units every year? The only reason this is a “big” deal is because A- it’s the first and B- the media got wind of it. </p>
<p>People, believe it or not, REAL people not “the CDC” spend their entire lives/careers working in infectious disease and how to contain it. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, romani, two medical professionals (who probably assured their families they would be fine), managed to contract the disease. Two professionals who should have known exactly how to protect themselves, one of whom was a hygienist, whose job was decontaminating the treatment area. No doubt their organizations were certain that their superior training and procedures would protect them.</p>
<p>The reason this is a big deal is because there is no cure. And it is incredibly deadly. You think of how afraid people were of the bird flu, which is far easier to catch, but much easier to recover from. No cure and extremely high death rate= massive fear.</p>
<p>And I agree, there is very little threat from Ebola where people are taking the maximum precautions. The threat is from people flying in, going on cruises, crowded places, and not realizing what they have until they’ve infected others.</p>
<p>Well, the news media didn’t exactly “get wind of it”. The State Dept. announced it in a briefing and Emory held a news conference. The aid organization released details of the transfer. And, being first is pretty much the definition of newsworthy. Also interesting is that this Emory isolation unit has only been used a couple of times tops. </p>
<p>The two medical professionals were exposed not because they were too macho or negligent. They were exposed because they were working in the fields together with the locals. Apparently, as one story said, a local health care worker developed the disease and still showed up at the hospital for work and got into the areas beyond the quarantine perimeter where sick people were not supposed to be. </p>
<p>^^And that kind of thing, Bunsen, is what I think, the serious threat could be. Not at a place where everyone is expecting it, but where they aren’t. People won’t know what disease they have if they’re in the US until they are very sick. They won’t be expecting it, they will think they have something benign. If this could happen at a place where people are actually dealing with Ebola all the time, thinking about it every second, imagine what could happen in a place where it’s the last thing on people’s minds.</p>
<p>@busdriver11, no one has said that there isn’t a risk from people who don’t know they are infected. I think you are now trying to distract the discussion from your earlier position that these people should not have been brought back or aren’t being properly kept in isolation. </p>
<p>One of the most interesting things I read today about this is that we have had cases of Marburg and Lassa fever here in the US (5 total from what I read). They are also hemorrhagic viral diseases typically picked up in Africa, and are also sometimes fatal, although not as high a fatality percentage as Eboa. I just Googled, and one of the cases was in my home state this year. The news media did not pick it up – but that seems like bigger news to me that this instance of transporting the patients back using the best isolation procedures we have. Every time I read about Marburg I think that if I ever travel to Africa, I am NOT going into a cave. Something in caves seem to be the host, but it is not clear what that is yet…</p>