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Ebola cases pass 2k as crisis escalates

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Re: Ebola cases pass 2k as crisis escalates

#61

Post by marcosdumay »

ctrl-j wrote: post #23
goldenchrome wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really sounds like you're reading too much news. News is fear mongering most of the time. Try taking a short break, you might be surprised how much better you feel!

Feeling better and taking care of yourself is, of course, really important. However, measles outbreaks and hate-crimes aren't going to stop because one does not pay attention to the news.

Measles outbreaks and hate crimes are very rare events that mostly shouldn't be in one's mind (with obvious exceptions if you are working on some related field).

Re: Ebola cases pass 2k as crisis escalates

#62

Post by roboys »

low_roar1 wrote: post #50
edubs25 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Ebola should actually be easier to contain in any civilized country such as the US. Quarantine measures and disposing of infected bodies properly would limit the pandemic. I would be careful of the use of the word 'civilized' in this context. You're implying DRC and/or other African countries are uncivilized. Which is just not true.

> I would be careful of the use of the word 'civilized' in this context. You're implying DRC and/or other African countries are uncivilized. Which is just not true. No, I stand by what I said and by the following definitions of the word "civilized", and never talked about "other African countries": > easy to manage or control; well organized or ordered: > having an advanced or humane culture, society, etc. Given the…

Seems the "advanced cultures" tend to send their so called "civilized" companies into these regions and they historically have acted very uncivilized (in many cases worse than the local bush-people with no formal education).

Wouldn't be suprising if ebola is being spread in Congo for the same reasons that HIV was spread by the apartheid South African government.

Natural resources make our so called "civilized" do some almost subhuman things (remember many of the beneficiaries are US companies/shareholders).

Re: Ebola cases pass 2k as crisis escalates

#63

Post by landryraccoon »

jerf wrote: post #25
lostlogin wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I honestly think we need to prevent people from this area of the world from coming to the US... ...this is simply unacceptable from a global standpoint. I’m guessing you’re in the US? What about the rest of us?

This is a knife that cuts through political issues. If your society has become so political that it can't even imagine the thought of restricting travel to prevent global pandemic, well, if nothing else consider that after the pandemic rages through a country it is fairly likely that said country's survivors are going to take a very dim view of open borders for a long time. If nothing else, consider that this is the…

> Epidemics are not political matters.

Why then are you entirely focused on a political solution to a non-political matter? Closing borders is a political solution.

I disagree because your situation disrespects the progress that technical solutions have made over thousands of years of human progress. As medicine, hygiene and diagnostic tests improve, the probability of the dramatic epidemic event you propose falls closer to zero.

We detect and quarantine individuals who are at high risk of being infected, without shutting down borders worldwide. We use better hygiene and sanitation to reduce the transmission of disease. We can educate the public when a disease is a risk and people can take measures to reduce the likelihood of transmission. Researchers can find cures and effective treatments to reduce the threat even if the disease spreads.

For all your talk of reality and rationality, you don't mention any actual technical solutions in your grandstanding that this isn't about politics, instead contradicting yourself by basically focusing on a single political solution.

Re: Ebola cases pass 2k as crisis escalates

#64

Post by roboys »

natalyarostova wrote: post #58
edubs25 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Ebola should actually be easier to contain in any civilized country such as the US. Quarantine measures and disposing of infected bodies properly would limit the pandemic. I would be careful of the use of the word 'civilized' in this context. You're implying DRC and/or other African countries are uncivilized. Which is just not true.

What is the politically appropriate word instead of civilized to enumerate the difference between taking a public health first approach vs. killing first responders on conspiracy?

I would call them suspicious instead of uncivilized.

Europeans have tested harmful drugs on Africans without their knowledge for more than 2 centuries (including injecting live cancer cells and spreading HIV in very recent cases).

I don't think we can blame them for avoiding this treatment like the plague.

Re: Ebola cases pass 2k as crisis escalates

#65

Post by jerf »

landryraccoon wrote: post #63
jerf wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a knife that cuts through political issues. If your society has become so political that it can't even imagine the thought of restricting travel to prevent global pandemic, well, if nothing else consider that after the pandemic rages through a country it is fairly likely that said country's survivors are going to take a very dim view of open borders for a long time. If nothing else, consider that this is the…

> Epidemics are not political matters. Why then are you entirely focused on a political solution to a non-political matter? Closing borders is a political solution. I disagree because your situation disrespects the progress that technical solutions have made over thousands of years of human progress. As medicine, hygiene and diagnostic tests improve, the probability of the dramatic epidemic event you propose falls cl…

The solutions you refer to don't exist, or can not be meaningfully deployed. I cite as evidence the article itself. Ebola isn't even all that contagious, really, and if those solutions were the solution to the problem, this article wouldn't have had to be written. Not everywhere is a first-world country. Most places aren't first-world country. Heck, even in the first world countries not everywhere is necessary "first-world country" status.

Secondly, as I sort of alluded to in my mention of quarantine, it's not about "borders". National borders are a relatively convenient cutting point in our world, but anything can be quarantined; a house, a state, Manhattan, a particular valley, a cross-country region, an airport, a hospital, whatever it takes. It's not about politics. It's not about any of the characteristics of the people on either side of the quarantine boundary beyond "are they contagious or not". It's about whether you can take the necessary steps to stop the spread of a pandemic or not.

I'll say it again, if you're sitting there standing on your rights and technology when something comes tearing through, then if nothing else you're going to filter out of the population all the people who are willing to trust technology and insist on free travel regardless, both because of changing attitudes and because of who ends up trusting in the assurances that everything's fine and doesn't take adequate steps themselves. If you value the believe in free travel, and you want a society to have an effective belief in free travel, then you must paradoxically be willing to handle cases like this very carefully, because if you stand on a 100% dogmatic "I don't care what diseases they have, free travel is literally more important than everyone's lives" stance you will create a society that does not value free travel at all once a highly-preventable epidemic sweeps through.

Re: Ebola cases pass 2k as crisis escalates

#66

Post by phkahler »

i_am_nomad wrote: post #38

To those of you worried about a global outbreak: USAMRIID is closing in on a highly effective (near 100%) treatment for Ebola. So far it is 100% successful in macaques, which is a good animal model for the disease in humans. The project lead spoke to my research group - his talk about Ebola, and some of the cultural and geographic challenges in fighting it, was fascinating.

There are vaccines being tested on people in DRC right now. Is there any data coming back on those? I dont care much about macaques.

Re: Ebola cases pass 2k as crisis escalates

#67

Post by unknowable »

HarryHirsch wrote: post #43
jeffdavis wrote: post #10

Do these ebola outbreaks give the virus substantially more opportunity to evolve? Or is that not a significant risk?

They do: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5580494/ But the jury is still out on what evolutionary processes are ongoing. Is the virus adapting to its new host and consequently evolving more slowly, or is it quickly developing increased transmissibility? It's not quite clear.

I'd argue that there's no way to know such a thing in the moment, and the reason for that is because you're observing a living thing learn and discover facts about the best way to survive.

It's an open ended scenario. The organism could learn a robust survival method that helps it survive more efficiently, without making it more lethal. It could learn nothing at all. It could learn to be less lethal but more transmissible. It could learn to spread to other organisms, or whatever opportunity proves advantageous.

It's possible we could notice pathways that represent doomsday hazards long before it would be possible for an organism to naturally evolve into a new version of itself. With that, we might focus on adaptations that never appear, yet cannot be ignored. Like watching for a robber that never robs us.

It's probably only worth worrying about robberies when it looks like we have a robber on our hands. And right now, we're observing an awfully effective robber in action, right now.

Re: Ebola cases pass 2k as crisis escalates

#68

Post by phkahler »

HarryHirsch wrote: post #43
jeffdavis wrote: post #10

Do these ebola outbreaks give the virus substantially more opportunity to evolve? Or is that not a significant risk?

They do: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5580494/ But the jury is still out on what evolutionary processes are ongoing. Is the virus adapting to its new host and consequently evolving more slowly, or is it quickly developing increased transmissibility? It's not quite clear.

The best evolutionary path from virus point of view is to reduce lethality so the host can spread it longer. I thought I read that HIV did something similar and used to be more deadly - even without modern treatment.

Problem with Ebola is that its transmission among humans is via the same thing that kills humans.

Re: Ebola cases pass 2k as crisis escalates

#69

Post by IllogicalLogic »

prepend wrote: post #20
sixQuarks wrote: post #8

The internet was supposed to create an educated society with information at your fingertips, instead we got fake news and echo chambers spreading extreme thinking We have huge groups of actively ignorant people supporting the growth of climate change, anti-vaccination, and a host of other dangerous actions. Now those fighting Ebola outbreaks are getting attacked. I hope I’m wrong, but it looks like rationality is fas…

The people fighting Ebola responders are not actively ignorant. They are just militia and chaotic. This is more to do with being unlucky where the outbreak occurred in a country without order in that part, than fake news affecting anything.

There are poor people living on top of trillions of dollars worth of natural resources.

A powerful entity conducting a controlled bio-attack to clear opposition to future mining operations is entirely plausable.

Re: Ebola cases pass 2k as crisis escalates

#70

Post by [deleted] »

georgehayduke wrote: post #19

I am amazed at the bravery of the medical staff, health professionals and volunteers who are trying to contain Ebola in the DRC. Not only are they potentially exposed to the deadly disease, they have to content with violent attacks from the population they're trying to help. It sounds incredibly complex - a mix of political mistrust, lack of education and difficult terrain making containment difficult. While spreadin…

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