<p>If our gov stepped in and dealt with it swiftly, there would be a lot less panic. I wasn’t planning to get worried until I saw how easily things could have gotten out of hand. The vomit from the patient was left in the parking lot for four days. It’s pretty certain Ebola is now in the animal system. The woman who was in the closest contact with the patient broke the quarantine and got out of the apt necessiating a guard to be placed. That itself is probably ok. But if they have so much trouble controlling with one infection, what can we expect in an outbreak? I am still not exactly worried but I’d be paying far more attention if anyone throws up now. </p>
<p>Consolation, before we go down that road, at the risk of sounding callous, I’d like to know if she was totally unaware of the risk her fiance posed to the community. Although they are retracting the story now, the guy helped carry an Ebola patient. Did she not know that? The half brother knew.</p>
<p>And how about the EMT crew and the nurse and the doctor who treated him during his first visit? Are they also quarantined? If so, how are their lives affected? In the morning, they went to work. It was supposed to be just another day. Would the nurse and the doctor lose their licenses? Sure they made a mistake. They shouldn’t have but it could have been avoided if the patient pin-pointed having contacted an Ebola victim instead of saying as little as possible. Is it possible the patient was playing both sides; alerting that he is from Liberia to get the necessary medical attention but not that he was in direct contact with an Ebola victim to avoid getting caught lying to Liberian gov?</p>
<p>I have not read the entire thread, but unfortunately thirty plus years ago when I worked in an emergency department of a large training hospital, one of the doctors would look to see if the person had insurance or not. If they did not, he would keep moving their paperwork to the bottom of the patient stack in hopes that they would get tired of waiting and leave. He was the only one out of many to do that fortunately.</p>
<p>About that insurance thing, on occasion, I was asked what kind of insurance we had. I never paid much attention why they were asking. On one occasion tho, the doc told us that we should choose a costlier and safer way to do the procedure since we have xxx insurance. Clearly, the info was in the chart. I don’t khow how that works in ER but I don’t agree that medical professionals are totally unaware of what insurance patients carry.</p>
<p>To come up with my own sob story, the nurse and the doctor didn’t know they were in direct contact with an Ebola patient for two days. For those two days, they went home hugged their kids, went their rounds with other sick patients. What have they done to deserve the scare?</p>
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<p>I do not even think swift was / is necessary, as that is where really bad decisions can be made. What is missing is consistency in what is being said to the public and what the public is seeing being done. The rhetoric and the visuals are out of sync leading to the cause of concern. </p>
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<p>And this is a distinction that some refuse to accept. </p>
<p>There are monumental qualitative differences between studious and careful preventative measures and indiscriminate worry and panic. People who want the former are being reflexively labeled as having and creating the latter. When continuous false arguments are created, it is wise for the populous not to trust such proclamations.</p>
<p>I’ve been thinking about what this all must feel like for Louise. She has gone from planning a wedding to having her fiance at death’s door from a modern-day plague, and worrying that she and/or her relatives may soon be in the same situation. She’s lost her home, at least temporarily. And she has probably lost her job, too. In any case, she probably has no income coming in now. </p>
<p>I’m very impressed by that “judge” in TX - he’s apparently the highest level elected official in Dallas. I remember him being on TV talking about the immigration/refugee crisis. He seems like such a kind and good man, and a natural leader.</p>
<p>One of the American Ebola survivors, Dr. Sacra, is back in the hospital with respiratory illness & conjunctivitis.
<a href=“http://bigstory.ap.org/article/3db4c7be6e3f4a23bca128a0ccc85bd8/hospital-monitoring-doctor-cleared-ebola-virus”>http://bigstory.ap.org/article/3db4c7be6e3f4a23bca128a0ccc85bd8/hospital-monitoring-doctor-cleared-ebola-virus</a></p>
<p>This reminds me of an article I read that says we are not counting as Ebola fatalities people in West Africa who survive but die soon after from a different disease because their bodies have been so weakened by Ebola.</p>
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<p>Does not sound or risk being callous at all. The lives of fellow American citizens (European citizens as well) are not just pawns in this man’s life to be risked at his pleasure and upon his decision to risk. </p>
<p>What is callous is knowingly lying that you have been exposed to a deadly disease and traveling to another country where you know there is a serious risk you could infect and kill citizens that country. Now that is what I call callous and wanton disregard for others. </p>
<p>There is a reason he most likely will be charged in Texas with a crime and why his home country already labeled him a criminal. And, to be sure, it is not because he was such a nice guy and exhibited behavior, which promoted the humane welfare of others. In fact, his actions exhibited just the opposite concern for the welfare of others.</p>
<p>“I’ve been thinking about what this all must feel like for Louise. She has gone from planning a wedding to having her fiance at death’s door from a modern-day plague, and worrying that she and/or her relatives may soon be in the same situation. She’s lost her home, at least temporarily. And she has probably lost her job, too. In any case, she probably has no income coming in now.”</p>
<p>I can’t believe anyone believes this wedding nonsense. Even the pastor said he just found about about the wedding afterwards. As far as losing her home, the apartment manager says they were being evicted on Oct 1st which goes a long way toward explaining the bizarre plea for a new home. His home country knows a lot more about him than we do and his co-workers are not telling stories that put him is positive light at all. And, they are much more believable than the unlikely version of events people are piecing together here.</p>
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<p>The fact that they went home and hugged their kids that day is irrelevant. They most likely did not come into contact with the patient’s body fluids based on an interaction with the patient that day. The nurse’s interactions probably were limited to taking blood pressure and temperature. The patient was not vomiting. </p>
<p>They are not contagious if they are not symptomatic. I’m sure they are monitoring themselves religiously. If I were the nurse involved, I might go overboard on my precautions and send the kids to live with grandparents or friends while I self quarantined. If they are educated and not prone to histrionics, they know that their chances of infection are not high.</p>
<p>According to the supervisor of the EMTs, they were suspicious of a communicable disease as soon as they got a verbal report about the patient before they entered the environment and used PPE while assessing him and transporting him.</p>
<p>He WAS symptomatic when he went to ER the first time . . . that’s why he went</p>
<p>^^^I’m talking about the nurse and the doctor. They don’t have to agonize that they went home and “hugged their children” that day or saw other patients.</p>
<p>The whole contagious only when symptomatic is pretty vague, isn’t it? Does it mean as soon as you get a headache, or when you get a fever, or when you get the runs, or when you start throwing up, or when your eyes turn red. It would be nice to know.</p>
<p>Taking the temperature involves a body fluid, saliva. If the way it transmits is you touch infected body fluid and touch your nose, mouth, eyes, you can get infected. What if I touch the infected body fluid and shake someone else’s hand soon after? If that person touches his/her mouth right after shaking my hand, what would stop him/her from getting infected although that person didn’t touch any body fluid? If Duncan sneezed into his hand during his first visit to ER and unconsciously wiped it around his wrist and the doc took the pulse? Do docs wear latex while taking the pulse?</p>
<p>^^^they have studied blood and body fluid samples of exposed people. You have to shed virus in order to infect others. When the very first symptoms start to appear, there is still very little virus detectable, thus very little shedding. As it gains steam, then look out.</p>
<p>It’s not as vague as people seem to want to believe. </p>
<p>So hopefully he was barely infectious when he first went to the ER.
Btw I saw yesterday that the hospital says he is now in critical condition.</p>
<p>^^It has been several days since he first experienced the symptoms. This is not unexpected. </p>
<p>Worth repeating from the New Yorker article linked earlier (text in bold is my emphasis):</p>
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<p>As to isolation:</p>
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<p><a href=“The Ebola Epidemic Is Stoppable | The New Yorker”>The Ebola Epidemic Is Stoppable | The New Yorker;