Ebola Outbreak Now Third Largest Recorded and "Spreading Rapidly" • Hacker News Board

Re: Ebola Outbreak Now Third Largest Recorded and "Spreading Rapidly"

#21

Post by SecretDreams » Sat, May 23, 2026, 5:23 PM UTC

arjie wrote: post #11

> the US has “abdicated its longstanding role as a leader in global health and humanitarian response.” It’s interesting to note that in the end, there was no one else coming: we were it. A large amount of disease containment and control was just fronted by the United States. As the US declines, it’s not that a new leader will come in. It’s not that the Chinese century will have their massive industrial engine put to…

> Sobering, really, that despite all the ascendance of new powers (who do not yet share the norms) and the noble aims of the old (who are too weak), one year after the US left no one has filled the gap.

One year isn't a lot of time to fill a gap that was previously filled by decades of hard work.

Maybe if the US had had a transition plan, other competent and capable countries could have better filled the gap.

Re: Ebola Outbreak Now Third Largest Recorded and "Spreading Rapidly"

#22

Post by SecretDreams » Sat, May 23, 2026, 5:24 PM UTC

christkv wrote: post #7

You are only infectious during illness and it requires contact with fluids. It's exasperated by local funeral rituals where people interact with the dead body and get infected.

So your claim is this won't be an issue for the rest of the world? What are the underlying implications from your statement?

Re: Ebola Outbreak Now Third Largest Recorded and "Spreading Rapidly"

#23

Post by illusive4080 » Sat, May 23, 2026, 5:24 PM UTC

christkv wrote: post #7

You are only infectious during illness and it requires contact with fluids. It's exasperated by local funeral rituals where people interact with the dead body and get infected.

0% chance this spreads rapidly in the first world.

Re: Ebola Outbreak Now Third Largest Recorded and "Spreading Rapidly"

#24

Post by gchamonlive » Sat, May 23, 2026, 5:24 PM UTC

arjie wrote: post #11

> the US has “abdicated its longstanding role as a leader in global health and humanitarian response.” It’s interesting to note that in the end, there was no one else coming: we were it. A large amount of disease containment and control was just fronted by the United States. As the US declines, it’s not that a new leader will come in. It’s not that the Chinese century will have their massive industrial engine put to…

Yet it isn't fair to people that rely on such assistance to drop it without a plan to substitute the assistance provider. It was all done overnight. One day you had outposts serving people in need, the other they had their doors closed.

So don't act like the world should be thankful for all the US has done when it pulls the plug in such a way that is maybe more devastating than having done nothing, because at least nothing would have left the spot for someone else to have risen to the occasion. Maybe this time though without using people's basic needs to create a political tool to be used opportunitistically.

Re: Ebola Outbreak Now Third Largest Recorded and "Spreading Rapidly"

#25

Post by SecretDreams » Sat, May 23, 2026, 5:25 PM UTC

BJones12 wrote: post #16

hedora wrote: post #12

Like Trump 1.0’s handling of COVID, this outbreak is going to spread further and faster than it would have if the US continued to pay for international health initiatives. Those initiatives inevitably cost far less than the economic impact of outbreaks (the US is currently diverting international travelers), but the best deal maker in the history of the universe says they’re a “bad deal”, so the rest of the planet ge…

> if the US continued to pay for international health initiatives There are ~197 countries in the world, you should also criticize the other 196 for also not wanting to pay for the exact same thing.

Maybe there could have been direct solicitation for funds from other countries before suddenly and dramatically pulling the plug on decades of hard work?

Re: Ebola Outbreak Now Third Largest Recorded and "Spreading Rapidly"

#26

Post by axus » Sat, May 23, 2026, 5:27 PM UTC

ineedasername wrote: post #13

aleister_777 wrote: post #5

[flagged]

A scan of headlines doesn't show any "scream of apocalypse", not across multiple news aggregators, incognito mode, etc. Out of dozens I noticed maybe one or two that might have seemed a bit much. Other than that, I think it bears considering that any specific level of fear may be a factor in the safeguard that have been put in place to mitigate outbreaks. Without some level of fear, not much would be done. I don't kn…

I don't usually do this but...

You were right 6 years ago about a strong response needed for COVID: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22315024

Re: Ebola Outbreak Now Third Largest Recorded and "Spreading Rapidly"

#27

Post by aorloff » Sat, May 23, 2026, 5:29 PM UTC

arjie wrote: post #11

> the US has “abdicated its longstanding role as a leader in global health and humanitarian response.” It’s interesting to note that in the end, there was no one else coming: we were it. A large amount of disease containment and control was just fronted by the United States. As the US declines, it’s not that a new leader will come in. It’s not that the Chinese century will have their massive industrial engine put to…

You are discounting the notion that other powers have something to gain by letting the US own this fuckup a bit more before reacting

Re: Ebola Outbreak Now Third Largest Recorded and "Spreading Rapidly"

#28

Post by christkv » Sat, May 23, 2026, 5:34 PM UTC

SecretDreams wrote: post #22

christkv wrote: post #7

You are only infectious during illness and it requires contact with fluids. It's exasperated by local funeral rituals where people interact with the dead body and get infected.

So your claim is this won't be an issue for the rest of the world? What are the underlying implications from your statement?

That it does not spread that easily and that its current spread is more a combination of factors in the specific area. War, hunger, refugees, culture and lack of education. It’s to say it’s hard for it to land and expand. Once you have symptoms the patient is also very quickly immobilized reducing the spread further.

Re: Ebola Outbreak Now Third Largest Recorded and "Spreading Rapidly"

#29

Post by mentalgear » Sat, May 23, 2026, 5:38 PM UTC

SilverElfin wrote: post #3

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #2

This unfortunately won’t be news again until, and I think this is now an until versus if, we find evidence the disease is spreading uncontrollably outside the DRC.

I think that’s going to be true if any disease whose previous outbreaks were only in a “third world” place. The rest of the world easily ignores it. If it was contained but in let’s say - some European country - I bet it would be in the news 24/7 still.

Exemplified by the ridiculous Hanta-Virus news/social media coverage for weeks - even though the risks were much lower and contained - but it happened on a CRUISE ship which the news people thought might resonate with the western vacation crowd.

Re: Ebola Outbreak Now Third Largest Recorded and "Spreading Rapidly"

#30

Post by ceejayoz » Sat, May 23, 2026, 5:42 PM UTC

jmpman wrote: post #19

Grok is very defensive of Elon's role in the current Ebola outbreak. However if you push on Elon impacting Ebola monitoring, it will eventually admit that Elon's DOGE cancelled "some" Ebola prevention efforts very briefly, but in reality many Ebola related contracts and programs were not fully restored. "Surveillance capacity in eastern DRC weakened, contributing to the current Bundibugyo Ebola strain circulating und…

A while back "oops, we accidentally canceled ebola monitoring" was a White House press conference laugh line made by Musk, in fact.

https://x.com/factpostnews/status/2056461616162431323