"Threat to break Ebola isolation in Liberia over food" Associated Press October 24, 2014
MONROVIA, Liberia — Dozens of people quarantined for Ebola monitoring in western Liberia are threatening to break out of isolation because they have no food, the West African nation’s state radio reported Thursday.
Forty-three people were put in quarantine after four people died of Ebola in Jenewonda, a town in an impoverished corner of Grand Cape Mount County near the Sierra Leone border, the Liberia Broadcasting System said.
It quoted those quarantined as saying that the United Nations World Food Program apparently has stopped providing food to people affected by Ebola in the area. But a program representative said the agency hadn’t been working there.
‘‘WFP in Liberia heard about this community being isolated only two days ago via the radio, and staff immediately began organizing a mission to bring food to the quarantined people,’’ spokesman Alexis Masciarelli stated in an e-mail to the Associated Press.
The program’s logistics unit was to deliver food to the community Thursday, he said.
There are no trucks in Grand Cape Mount County so food needs to be driven in from Monrovia, he said, adding that the UN program will verify reports with authorities and look into what is going on.
‘‘We need to keep working with government and partners to identify the communities in need as quickly as possible,’’ he said.
Liberia is the hardest hit of three West African nations being ravaged by Ebola. The latest figures published Wednesday by the UN’s World Health Organization show the country has at least 4,665 infected people and 2,705 have died there, with the numbers probably higher. Overall, it said, the disease has killed 4,877 people and infected 9,936, primarily in Liberia, Guinea, and Sierra Leone.
Meanwhile, Mali reported its first case of Ebola late Thursday, marking a major setback for West African efforts to contain the deadly virus.
Also Thursday, Rwanda reversed a decision to screen travelers from the United States and Spain, one day after announcing the measure as part of its efforts to prevent the spread of Ebola in the country.
The fear of Ebola in Guinea has kept patients and health workers, including doctors, from a hospital that is serving as a treatment center in the capital, Conakry.
Earlier this month, President Alpha Conde called on retired doctors to join the fight against Ebola.
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Looks like the end of the world, doesn't it?
"Dozens of Ebola survivors released in Sierra Leone" by Kabba Kargbo and Clarence Roy-Macaulay | Associated Press October 23, 2014
FREETOWN, Sierra Leone — Dozens of Ebola survivors have been discharged from a treatment center near Sierra Leone’s capital and told they were virus-free, as police and residents clashed in other areas of the West African country.
Assistant inspector police general Karrow Kamara said Wednesday a curfew had been imposed in the eastern diamond-rich Kono district after protests Tuesday. Police fired tear gas to disperse crowds that had gathered with sticks and machetes in support of a local leader of the governing party who wanted to stop health officials from taking blood samples from his mother. Kamara said he was traveling to the area to get more information.
At the Hastings Treatment center near Freetown on Tuesday, 45 patients were issued health certificates saying they were Ebola-free, and they proudly held them up as they were released.
Hawanatu Turay, 14, said she was happy to be feeling healthy again.
‘‘I feel good because nothing hurts me anymore, and I am feeling fine,” Turay said. “I can eat fine, my stomach hurts no more, my head aches no more and also my neck. Nothing hurts, and I have no more pains.”
She is among 130 patients who have been treated and released from the facility, which is run by Sierra Leone doctors and nurses and started operating on Sept. 19.
Such releases are glimmers of hope in an outbreak that has infected some 9,900 people and killed more than 4,800 in the hardest hit countries in West Africa — Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Guinea.
Dr. Sankoh, a lieutenant from the Sierra Leone Army, said the release of the patients is an indication that the treatment center is helping.
*********
Ebola is now believed to have killed 4,877 people globally, and the spread of the lethal virus remains ‘‘persistent and widespread’’ in West Africa, the World Health Organization said Wednesday.
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I'm sorry, but the photo looks fake to me. It's a couple of people holding pieces of paper. That's all we really know.
"Spanish nurse clear in second test for virus" by Raphael Minder | New York Times October 22, 2014
MADRID — The Spanish auxiliary nurse who was the first person known to have contracted the Ebola virus outside Africa was declared to be cleared of the disease Tuesday after a second test came back negative, said officials at the hospital where she has been treated since Oct. 7.
The nurse, María Teresa Romero Ramos, 44, was found to be infected after she treated a Spanish missionary at Hospital Carlos III in Madrid who had returned from West Africa with the disease; he died Sept. 25. Romero and officials at the hospital have suggested that she may have become infected by touching her face with a glove while removing protective gear.
Keep that carelessness in mind for later.
Spanish authorities have been criticized for their handling of Ebola. While Romero was being treated, health care workers held protests outside the hospital and elsewhere, demanding the resignation of the country’s health minister, Ana Mato.
Romero was treated with blood plasma taken from people who had survived Ebola infections, and with an experimental drug, officials said.
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Then there is the question of whether she is even real.
"World Ebola cases top 10,000, UN agency says" by Sarah DiLorenzo | Associated Press October 26, 2014
DAKAR, Senegal — More than 10,000 people have been infected with Ebola and nearly half of them have died, according to figures released Saturday by the World Health Organization, as the outbreak continues to spread.
The Ebola epidemic in West Africa is the largest recorded outbreak of the disease, with a rapidly rising death toll in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. There have also been cases in three other West African countries, Spain, and the United States.
The United Nations health agency said Saturday that the number of confirmed, probable, and suspected cases has reached 10,141. Of those cases, 4,922 people have died. Its figures show about 200 new cases since a report four days earlier.
Even those tolls are probably an underestimate, WHO has warned, as many in the hardest-hit countries have been unable or too frightened to seek medical care. A shortage of labs capable of handling potentially infected blood samples has also made it difficult to track the outbreak. For example, the latest numbers show no change in Liberia’s cases, suggesting they may be lagging behind reality.
As if reality is something one could find in the paper.
On Thursday, authorities confirmed that the disease had spread to Mali, the sixth West African country affected, and a new case was confirmed in New York, in a doctor recently returned from Guinea.
Mali had long been considered highly vulnerable to the disease, since it shares a border with Guinea.
Interestingly, Mali is full of gold and "terrorists" and the French had to occupy it.
The disease arrived there in a 2-year-old, who traveled from Guinea with her grandmother by bus and died Friday.
The toddler, who was bleeding from her nose during the journey, may have had high-risk contact with many people, the World Health Organization warned. So far, 43 people are being monitored in isolation for signs of the disease, and WHO said Saturday that authorities are continuing to look for more people at risk.
That is the first I've seen of the horrendous end effects of the dreaded disease -- if it exist at all.
To help fight Ebola, the UN humanitarian flight service airlifted about 1 ton of medical supplies to Mali late Friday. The seats of the plane were removed to make room for the cargo, which included hazard suits for health workers, surgical gloves, face shields, and buckets, according to the World Food Program, which runs the flights.
So the U.N. is getting deeper involved, huh?
The spread of Ebola to Mali has highlighted how easily the virus can jump borders, and Malian border police said that neighboring Mauritania closed its border with Mali.
The health minister of Ivory Coast, which borders Guinea and Mali, said authorities there were looking for a nurse who may have Ebola and fled from Guinea, where he was being monitored by officials. But Raymonde Goudou stressed that it was still not clear whether the man had Ebola.
There was concern also in Ghana, where some worried that a strike by health care workers could leave the country vulnerable to the disease. Ghana does not border any country with reported cases, but it is serving as the headquarters for the UN mission on Ebola.
In Liberia, the country hardest hit by the epidemic, US forces have been building desperately needed treatment centers and helping to bring in aid.
Ebola is the cover for expanding the empire.
On Saturday, Major General Darryl Williams, who was in charge of the troops assigned to the Ebola response, handed the reins to Major General Gary J. Volesky, commander of the Army’s 101st Airborne Division.
‘‘I’ve been told by a number of people that the task we face is extremely hard. Well, a fairly famous person once said hard is not impossible,’’ Volesky said.
‘‘Together, we’re going to beat it.’’
How many drone missiles you gonna use?
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"Mali rushes to track Ebola after toddler dies" by Baba Ahmed | Associated Press October 27, 2014
KAYES, Mali — Samantha Power, the US ambassador to the United Nations, is visiting the three West African countries hit hardest by the Ebola outbreak. She arrived in the Conakry, the capital of Guinea, on Sunday.
Power will visit Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone ‘‘to draw attention to the need for increased support for the international response,’’ the US mission said Sunday. She will be a rare high-profile presence on the ground in a crisis that has struggled at times to attract donations and health workers.
The United Nations has repeatedly called for a greater international response to the worst-ever outbreak of the deadly disease. The UN mission to counter Ebola is the first time the world body has set up such an effort in response to a public health crisis.
Hmmmmmmm!
Mali, which shares a land border with Guinea, has long been seen as vulnerable to Ebola because of the large number of people moving back and forth between the two countries.
Why did it wait so long to show up?
Fanta’s case has especially alarmed health authorities because she is believed to have been in a contagious state of Ebola as she traveled....
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They are in a panic over there.
Back over here:
"US expands Ebola checks; Rwanda to check Americans" by Connie Cass and Alicia A. Caldwell | Associated Press October 22, 2014
WASHINGTON — As the United States closed a gap in its screening of airline passengers arriving from three West African nations, an Ebola-free African country said it would begin checking visiting Americans for the disease.
Rwanda’s health minister said Tuesday that travelers who have been in the United States or Spain — the two countries outside of West Africa that have seen transmission during the Ebola outbreak — will be checked upon arrival and must report on their health during their stay.
No Ebola cases have been reported in Rwanda, which is in East Africa. The US Embassy in Rwanda said that country is banning visitors who have recently traveled to Guinea, Liberia, or Sierra Leone, the three countries at the heart of the outbreak, and nearby Senegal, which had a single case.
The Obama administration, under pressure from some Congress members and the public to impose a travel ban, announced stepped-up measures Tuesday meant to ensure that all travelers from the three hardest-hit countries are screened for Ebola.
Beginning Wednesday, people whose trips began in Guinea, Liberia, or Sierra Leone must fly into one of the five US airports performing fever checks for Ebola, the Homeland Security Department said.
Previously, the administration said screenings at those airports covered about 94 percent of fliers from the three countries but missed a few who landed elsewhere.
There are no direct flights from those nations into the United States; about 150 fliers per day arrive by various multileg routes.
If this is such a crisis and worth so much print, why the cavalier attitude?
Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said ‘‘we currently have in place measures to identify and screen anyone at all land, sea, and air ports of entry into the United States who we have reason to believe has been present in Liberia, Sierra Leone, or Guinea in the preceding 21 days.’’
CDC said they had measures, then had to admit, nah, weren't good enough -- from what I have read anyway.
Since screening started Oct. 11 at New York’s Kennedy airport, 562 people have been checked at the five airports, according to Homeland Security. Of those, four who arrived at Washington’s Dulles airport were taken to a local hospital. No cases of Ebola have been discovered.
The other airports are Newark’s Liberty, Chicago’s O’Hare, and Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson.
Homeland Security officials at the airports use no-touch thermometers to check for fever, which can be a symptom of Ebola infection. People who have been infected with the virus may not develop a fever and illness for up to 21 days, however.
Do they cause cancer like the body scanners?
The change falls short of demands by some elected officials and candidates for a ban on travel from the West African outbreak zone. Senator Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, described the action as an ‘‘added layer of protection against Ebola entering our country.’’
Meanwhile, the World Health Organization is pressing the search for a vaccine and hopes to test two experimental versions as early as January on 20,000 front-line health care workers and others in the hot zone — a bigger rollout than envisioned just a few months ago.
A-HA! I will be getting to the vaccines and shots below.
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A health care worker in protective gear was sprayed with disinfectant in Liberia Tuesday (Abbas Dulleh/Associated Press).
Notice anything odd in the background?
"US to track everyone coming from Ebola nations" by Mike Stobbe | Associated Press October 23, 2014
ATLANTA — All travelers who come into the United States from three Ebola-stricken West African nations will now be monitored for three weeks, the latest step by federal officials to keep the disease from spreading into the country.
It's already here, and if they wanted to stop it they would be banning flights.
Beginning Monday, anyone traveling from Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone will have to report in with health officials daily and take their temperature twice a day.
The measure applies not only to visitors from those countries but also returning American aid workers, federal health employees, and journalists. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced the new step Wednesday.
You would think that would get them to start investigating and telling the truth, but no.
CDC director Tom Frieden said monitoring will provide an extra level of safety, on top of the temperature checks and screening that passengers already undergo before they leave West Africa and again when they arrive in the United States.
‘‘We have to keep our guard up,’’ Frieden told reporters on a conference call.
But don't worry.
The Obama administration has resisted increasing pressure to turn away any visitors from the three countries at the center of the Ebola outbreak, especially after a Liberian visitor to Dallas came down with the disease just days after he arrived, then died.
Instead, officials began screening at five US airports and Tuesday they said all travelers from West Africa would be funneled to those airports.
The monitoring program will start in six states — New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, New Jersey, and Georgia — the destination for the bulk of the travelers from the outbreak region. It will later extend to other states.
Passengers will be required to provide contact information for themselves as well as a friend. They will be instructed to check for a fever twice a day and report their temperature and any symptoms to health officials daily. Frieden said states will determine how to do that, whether in person, by phone, or Skype.
If a traveler does not report in, state or local public health officials can track them down to ensure daily monitoring. How far they can go is up to those officials, CDC officials said.
They will also receive so-called CARE kits — an acronym for Check and Report Ebola. The kits include thermometer and instructions on what to do if symptoms occur. Also included is a card to present to health-care providers if they seek care.
CDC already has told its employees and other health professionals working in the outbreak zone to monitor their temperature for 21 days upon return, so Wednesday’s announcement adds another step to their ongoing fever watch. It can take several days to develop Ebola symptoms.
Earlier this year, about 150 travelers per day were from the three countries. But it appears there are far fewer now — there are no direct flights, and flights to the region have been curtailed. New York’s Kennedy airport — which handles the most traffic from the outbreak zone — has averaged 34 a day since screening began Oct. 11.
The other airports are Washington’s Dulles, Newark’s Liberty, Chicago’s O’Hare, and Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson. While a few of the people screened thus far have been taken to hospitals, none had Ebola.
According to an Associated Press-GfK poll released Wednesday, Americans are worried about Ebola spreading here, and many say the government has not done enough to prevent that. The poll found a surprising 9 out of 10 people backed the tightening of screening procedures.
You can't get any more unanimous than that, and the ten percents are the ones benefiting or from the government.
Some would go even further: Three-quarters think it’s definitely or probably necessary to prevent everyone traveling from places affected by Ebola from entering the United States.
On Wednesday, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said the president has followed advice from scientists that a travel ban could do more harm than good. Health officials fear travelers would just find alternate routes and enter the country unidentified, sparking harder-to-trace outbreaks.
They are not taking this seriously, but here is something you should:
Obama Calls for Pause In Offensive Bioweapons Research
WTF?
Earnest sidestepped a question about whether the new monitoring measure is a way to avoid a travel ban.
Many health specialists agree a travel ban is a bad idea. But one faulted the CDC for being slow to begin the daily monitoring.
I don't like seeing "but" when it comes to diseases and health.
Monitoring can’t stop Ebola from coming in, ‘‘but we’ll have a better chance’’ to identify and isolate cases, said Dr. Richard Wenzel, a Virginia Commonwealth University scientist.
Such tracking measures might have made a difference for Thomas Eric Duncan, the Liberian who became the first person diagnosed with Ebola in the United States, Wenzel said.
Duncan was not sick and passed the screening when he left Liberia, and did not develop symptoms until days after his arrival in Dallas. He died Oct. 8.
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Staff Sergeant Dwight Thomas sprayed a bleach mixture on a
protective suit worn by another service member in an anti-Ebola
training session at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla. (Nick Tomecek/Northwest Florida Daily News via associated press)
I put it up because it caught my eye.
Why aren't the Army guys in suits, why isn't her face covered, and can I really believe what I see in my ma$$ media?
R.I. man may leave Ebola facility soon
R.I. man declared free of Ebola
R.I. man who survived Ebola grateful for recovery
Just another actor?
"Nebraska’s biocontainment unit opened in 2005 with $1 million in federal and state money. It was a response to the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and the SARS outbreak in 2003. In Omaha, home to a hospital that has now successfully treated two Ebola patients, residents were confident in the ability to keep the virus under control. “We have a hospital that can treat it, but I don’t have that confidence in hospitals nationwide,” Chris Adams, 23, said. At a coffee shop down the road, some said they were proud of the care the hospital has provided. But fears of Ebola remained in Nebraska’s biggest city, as those concerns grew nationwide, according to a national survey released Tuesday by the Pew Research Center."
“There’s a lot of pride with a tinge of worry.”
Also see: Sacra's Saga
He's sick again, and there should be concern:
"New York City doctor tests positive for Ebola" by Marc Santora | The New York Times October 23, 2014
NEW YORK — A doctor in New York City who recently returned from treating Ebola patients in Guinea tested positive for the Ebola virus Thursday, becoming the city’s first diagnosed case.
The mayor said Thursday there’s no reason for residents to be alarmed by the doctor’s Ebola diagnosis. He said all city officials followed ‘‘clear and strong’’ protocols in their handling and treatment of Craig Spencer, a member of Doctors Without Borders. ‘‘We want to state at the outset that New Yorkers have no reason to be alarmed,’’ de Blasio said. ‘‘New Yorkers who have not been exposed are not at all at risk.’’
That's reason enough to be alarmed.
Spencer was rushed to Bellevue Hospital Center on Thursday and placed in isolation while health care workers spread out across the city to trace anyone he might have come into contact with in recent days. A further test will be conducted by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to confirm the initial test.
While officials have said they expected isolated cases of the disease to arrive in New York eventually, and had been preparing for this moment for months, the first case highlighted the challenges surrounding containment of the virus, especially in a crowded metropolis.
But don't get alarmed.
Even as the authorities worked to confirm that Spencer was infected with Ebola, it emerged that he traveled from Manhattan to Brooklyn on the subway Wednesday night, when he went to a bowling alley and then took an Uber car home.
At least you can get a shot in the taxi.
Spencer had traveled on the subway’s A, L, and 1 lines, said Mary Bassett, New York City’s health commissioner, and also bowled at The Gutter bowling alley in Brooklyn’s Williamsburg neighborhood.
The next morning, he reported having a temperature of 103 degrees, raising questions about his health while he was out in public.
Bassett said Spencer’s fiancee and two friends had been quarantined, and his Harlem apartment was cordoned off. Spencer also handed over his metro card so authorities can monitor where he traveled.
Oh, jeez, he was up in Harlem?
Health officials say the chances of the average New Yorker contracting Ebola, which is spread through direct contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person, are slim. Someone can’t be infected just by being near someone who is sick with Ebola. Someone isn’t contagious unless he is sick.
So they tell us.
Bassett said the probability was ‘‘close to nil’’ that Spencer’s subway ride would pose a risk. Still, the bowling alley was closed as a precaution.
President Barack Obama had been briefed on the situation in New York, the White House said.
Spencer’s travel history and the timing of the onset of his symptoms led health officials to dispatch “disease detectives immediately began to actively trace all of the patient’s contacts to identify anyone who may be at potential risk,” according to a statement released by the department.
It was unclear if the city was trying to find people who might have come into contact with Spencer on the subway. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority directed all questions to the health department, which did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the issue.
At Spencer’s apartment in Harlem, his home was sealed off and workers distributed informational fliers about the disease. It was not clear if anyone was being quarantined.
Health authorities declined to say how many people in total might have come into contact with Spencer while he was symptomatic.
Mayor Bill de Blasio, speaking at a news conference Thursday evening before the diagnosis, said Spencer has given health workers a detailed accounting of his activities over the last few days.
“Our understanding is that very few people were in direct contact with him,” de Blasio said.
Spencer had been working with Doctors Without Borders in Guinea, treating Ebola patients, before returning to New York City on Oct. 14, according to a city official.
He told the authorities that he did not believe the protective gear he wore while working with Ebola patients had been breached but had been monitoring his own health.
Doctors Without Borders, in a statement, said it provides guidelines for its staff on their return from Ebola assignments, but did not elaborate on those protocols.
“The individual engaged in regular health monitoring and reported this development immediately,” the group said in a statement.
Spencer began to feel sluggish Tuesday but did not develop a fever until Thursday morning, he told the authorities. At 11 a.m., the doctor found that he had a temperature and alerted the staff of Doctors Without Borders, according to the official.
The staff of Doctors Without Borders called the city’s health department, which in turn called the Fire Department.
Emergency medical workers, wearing full personal protective gear, rushed to Spencer’s apartment. He was transported to Bellevue and arrived shortly after 1 p.m.
He was placed in a special isolation unit and is being seen by the pre-designated medical critical care team. They are in personal protective equipment with undergarment air ventilation systems.
Bellevue doctors have prepared for an Ebola patient with numerous drills and tests using “test patients” as well as treatment of suspected cases that turned out to be false alarms.
A health care worker at the hospital said that Spencer seemed very sick and it was unclear to the medical staff why he had not gone to the hospital earlier, since his fever was high, at 103.
Spencer is a fellow of international emergency medicine at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center, and an instructor in clinical medicine at Columbia University.
“He is a committed and responsible physician who always puts his patients first,” the hospital said in a statement. “He has not been to work at our hospital and has not seen any patients at our hospital since his return from overseas.”
Even before the diagnosis, the CDC dispatched a team of experts to assist in the case.
More than 30 people have gone to city hospitals and raised suspicions of Ebola, but in all those cases, health workers were able to rule it out without a blood test.
Stay away from the hospitals.
While the city stepped up its laboratory capacity so it can get test results within four to six hours, because of the precautions that need to be taken when drawing blood and treating a person possibly sick with Ebola, it took until late in the evening to confirm the diagnosis.
But doctors said that even before the results came in, it seemed likely that he was infected. Symptoms usually occur within eight to 10 days of infection and Spencer was home nine days when he reported feeling ill.
Ebola is transmitted through bodily fluids and secretions, including blood, mucus, feces and vomit.
Because of its high mortality rate — Ebola kills more than half of the people it infects — the disease spreads fear along with infection.
Who is spreading fear?
The authorities have been on high alert ever since Thomas Eric Duncan traveled to the United States in September from Liberia, and was later given a diagnosis of Ebola.
Duncan died at a Dallas hospital this month.
Several days after his death, a nurse who helped care for Duncan learned she had Ebola. Two nurses who treated Duncan fell ill but have since recovered.
That single case led to hundreds of people being quarantined or being asked to remain isolated from the general public.
The missteps by both local and federal authorities in handling the nation’s first Ebola case raised questions about the ability of health care workers to safely treat those with the disease.
In the New York City region, hospitals and emergency workers have been preparing for the appearance of the virus for months.
Dr. Irwin Redlener, the director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University and a special adviser to de Blasio, said that the risk to the general public was minimal, but depended on a city moving swiftly.
“New York has mobilized not only a world class health department, but has full engagement of many other agencies that need to be on the response team,” he said.
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Also see: Workers try to trace NYC doctor’s contacts
Related:
"Spencer’s illness led lawmakers on Capitol Hill, scientists and ordinary New Yorkers to wonder why he was out on the town after his return from West Africa — and why stronger steps weren’t being taken to quarantine medical workers. Health officials said he followed U.S. and international protocols in checking his temperature every day and watching for symptoms, and put no one at risk. But...."
What did I say about that word?
"Nurse under quarantine in N.J. criticizes Ebola quarantine order" by Anemona Hartocollis and Emma G. Fitzsimmons | New York Times October 26, 2014
NEW YORK — A nurse who is being quarantined at a New Jersey hospital after working with Ebola patients in Sierra Leone criticized her treatment Saturday as an overreaction after an initial test found that she did not have the virus.
“I am scared about how health care workers will be treated at airports when they declare that they have been fighting Ebola in West Africa,” the nurse, Kaci Hickox, wrote in an essay on the website of The Dallas Morning News, in collaboration with a friend who works for the paper.
“I am scared that, like me, they will arrive and see a frenzy of disorganization, fear, and most frightening, quarantine,” Hickox said.
She described having been held in isolation for about seven hours at Newark Liberty International Airport on Friday, left alone for long stretches, and given only a granola bar when she said she was hungry.
Hickox, 33, was placed in quarantine under a new policy announced Friday by the governors of New York and New Jersey. Under the new rule, all people entering the country through Newark and Kennedy airports are being quarantined for 21 days if they had direct contact with Ebola patients in Guinea, Liberia, or Sierra Leone, even if they show no symptoms of infection.
On Friday night, New Jersey health officials said the nurse had developed a fever after landing, but on Saturday, they said her blood had tested negative for Ebola. Additional tests will be conducted to confirm the finding.
Hickox disputed that she had had a fever. She wrote that at the airport, a forehead scanner showed her temperature to be 101, but that came after four hours during which she had not been allowed to leave.
“My cheeks were flushed, I was upset at being held with no explanation,” she wrote. “The female officer looked smug. ‘You have a fever now,’ she said.”
That's AmeriKan authority these days.
She was eventually escorted by eight police cars to the hospital and taken to a tent outside the building. An oral thermometer showed her temperature to be 98, she wrote. A forehead scan taken around the same time read 101, she wrote, suggesting that it was not a reliable instrument to determine fever.
She wrote that the doctor felt her neck and rechecked the temperature. “‘There’s no way you have a fever,’ he said. ‘Your face is just flushed.’ ”
Her complaints served as a broadside against the new quarantine policy, which goes beyond recommendations from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The new policy has raised concerns among some health experts and doctors that it will discourage people from going to West Africa to try to contain Ebola at its source.
The World Health Organization reported Saturday that there are more than 10,000 suspected or confirmed cases in the three hardest-hit countries.
The CDC calls for self-monitoring for travelers who have had contact with Ebola patients, but not isolation, because a patient is not believed to be contagious until symptoms appear. CDC officials said that states had the right to go beyond its recommendations.
On Saturday, in a sign of growing concern about the virus, Governor Pat Quinn of Illinois, the home of another major travel hub, O’Hare International Airport in Chicago, instituted a quarantine program similar to the one in place in New York and New Jersey.
Because state authorities realize they will have hell to pay if the Feds fall down on the job. It also acts as a test for the slow extension of tyranny.
New Jersey officials did not immediately respond Saturday to the nurse’s complaints about her treatment and about the policy. The CDC, which is involved with the monitoring of travelers at the airport, did not immediately answer questions about how she was handled.
The governors of New York and New Jersey issued their order on Friday, the day after Dr. Craig Spencer, a New York City resident who had worked in Guinea, tested positive for Ebola.
New Jersey health officials did not say how long Hickox was to be kept at University Hospital in Newark.
A hospital spokeswoman, Stacie Newton, said the nurse was in an extended treatment area, “in a building that’s part of the hospital.”
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They got the guy delivering mail with gloves and a mask, but don't worry?
"N.Y. loosens policy for Ebola quarantines; Confinement for health workers would be at home" by Marc Santora and Michael D. Shear | New York Times October 27, 2014
NEW YORK — Governor Andrew M. Cuomo on Sunday night outlined New York state’s mandatory quarantine policy for health care workers returning from West African nations with Ebola outbreaks, bringing the state closer into line with federal protocols and marking a significant break with the way the policy has been carried out in New Jersey.
Pressure was brought to bear.
The announcement came after the Obama administration pressed New York to rescind its order, issued only two days ago in a joint press conference with New Jersey’s governor, Chris Christie. New Jersey officials, who stood by their decision Sunday, have yet to explain many details of their quarantine policy. The state has come under scathing criticism for the treatment of a nurse returning from Sierra Leone, who was forced into quarantine in a hastily erected tent at a New Jersey hospital even though she had not displayed any signs of illness and tested negative for Ebola.
Earlier Sunday, both governors backed their decisions, saying the current federal guidelines did not go far enough.
Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York said the treatment of the nurse, Kaci Hickox, had been shameful and vowed that New York City would do all it could to honor the work of the health care workers here and those who go to help fight the epidemic in West Africa.
“The problem here is, this hero, coming back from the front having done the right things, was treated with disrespect,” de Blasio said.
“We have to think how we treat the people who are doing this noble work,” he said. “We owe her better than that.”
She can get behind all the veterans who have been f***ed by the VA.
Under the revised guidelines, New York state would allow all returning health care workers who have had contact with Ebola patients but have no symptoms of illness to return to their homes, where they would be confined; their health would be monitored for 21 days.
They would be transported by private vehicle, arranged by the New York state Department of Health or the local health department. While under confinement, there would be at least two unannounced visits by local officials, in coordination with state health officials, each day to check the individual’s condition as well as ensure that the individual is complying with the state order.
Tyranny coming to your font door under cover of Ebola.
The New York state or local health department would, if needed, coordinate care services such as food and medicine.
If a person arrives from one of the affected areas with no symptoms and had no direct contact with anyone infected with the Ebola virus, there would be no home confinement. Health officials would monitor these individuals twice a day for temperature and other symptoms until the 21-day incubation period is over.
Despite having no symptoms, Hickox has been kept under quarantine at a hospital in New Jersey, where she has been confined to a tent equipped with a portable toilet and no shower.
Hickox, who has called her treatment “inhumane,” planned to mount a legal challenge to the quarantine order.
Ever since Cuomo, a Democrat, and Christie, a Republican, announced the quarantine plan Friday evening, top Obama administration officials have been seeking to modify the order. But Christie said at a fund-raiser in Florida that he had “gotten absolutely no contact” from the White House.
Two more states — Illinois and Florida — announced they were instituting similar policies, as some members of the public expressed outrage that Dr. Craig Spencer, the infected patient in New York City, had used the subway and gone bowling just before developing symptoms.
Spencer received a diagnosis of Ebola on Thursday, having contracted the virus while working in Guinea for Doctors Without Borders. He is being treated at Bellevue Hospital Center, where he is in serious but stable condition.
“The patient looks better than yesterday,” Dr. Ramanathan Raju, the president of the city’s Health and Hospitals Corp., said Sunday.
In an interview with CNN on Sunday, Hickox said officials still have not told her what they plan to do next or why they are isolating her since she poses no public health risk as long as she is asymptomatic.
She assailed Christie for saying that she was sick, when it was clear that she did not have a fever and had tested negative for Ebola.
“The first thing I would say to Governor Christie is that I wish he would be more careful about his statements about my medical condition,” she said from inside the medical tent where she has been quarantined since Friday night. “If he knew anything about Ebola, he would know that asymptomatic people are not infectious.”
“I also want to be treated with compassion and humanity, and I don’t feel I’ve been treated that way in the past three days,” she said in the interview. “I think this is an extreme that is really unacceptable. I feel like my basic human rights have been violated.”
Now you know how the rest of the world feels under AmeriKan rule.
Hickox has retained a civil rights lawyer, Norman Siegel, to challenge the quarantine order and get her out of isolation. In an interview on Sunday, he said the order “raised substantial civil liberties issues” and said he is preparing to challenge it on her behalf.
--more--"
Also see:
Ebola relief volunteer recounts a world upended
UMass Medical School to lead Ebola team in Liberia
Fidelity charitable customers directed $3.8 million to Ebola aid
The right aid in Ebola crisis
Knowledge of Ebola is the weapon to fight it
Ebola causing spike in demand for protective gear
Cha-ching!
"Possible vaccine for Ebola went years untested on humans" by Denise Grady | New York Times October 24, 2014
GALVESTON, Texas — Only now is it undergoing the most basic safety tests in humans — with nearly 5,000 people dead from Ebola and an epidemic raging out of control in West Africa.
Its development stalled in part because Ebola is rare and until now outbreaks had infected only a few hundred people at a time. But experts also acknowledge that the lack of follow-up on such a promising candidate reflects a broader failure to produce medicines and vaccines for diseases that afflict poor countries. Most drug companies have resisted spending the enormous sums needed to develop products useful mostly to countries with little ability to pay.
Now, as the growing epidemic devastates West Africa and is seen as a potential threat to other regions as well, governments and aid groups have begun to open their wallets.
A flurry of research to test drugs and vaccines is underway.
OMG, this IS ANOTHER $wine flu $windle!!!
**********
A federal official said in an interview Thursday that two large studies involving thousands of patients were planned to begin soon in West Africa and were expected to be described in detail Friday by the World Health Organization.
Ever see "The Constant Gardner?"
With no vaccines or proven drugs available, the stepped-up efforts are a desperate measure to stop a disease that has defied traditional means of containing it.
“There’s never been a big market for Ebola vaccines,” said Thomas W. Geisbert, an Ebola expert at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston and one of the developers of the vaccine that worked so well in monkeys.
“So big pharma, who are they going to sell it to?” Geisbert added: “It takes a crisis sometimes to get people talking. ‘OK. We’ve got to do something here.’”
And now you are seeing why I am finding this another hoax. Who i$ benefiting again?
Dr. James E. Crowe Jr., director of a vaccine research center at Vanderbilt University, said that academic researchers who develop a prototype drug or vaccine that works in animals often encounter a “biotech valley of death” in which no drug company will help them cross the finish line.
The Ebola vaccine on which Geisbert collaborated is made from another virus, vesicular stomatitis virus, which causes a mouth disease in cattle but rarely infects people. It had already been used successfully in making other vaccines.
The researchers altered VSV by removing one of its genes, rendering the virus harmless, and inserting a gene from Ebola. The transplanted gene forces VSV to sprout Ebola proteins on its surface. The proteins cannot cause illness, but they provoke an immune response that in monkeys, considered a good surrogate for humans, fought off the disease.
The vaccine was actually produced, in Winnipeg by the Public Health Agency of Canada. The Canadian government patented it, and 800 to 1,000 vials of the vaccine were produced. In 2010, it licensed the vaccine, known as VSV-EBOV, to NewLink Genetics, in Ames, Iowa.
The Canadian government donated the existing vials to the World Health Organization, and safety tests of the vaccine in healthy volunteers have already begun.
NewLink’s product is one of two leading vaccines being tested. The other, which uses a cold virus that infects chimpanzees, was developed by researchers at the National Institutes of Health and Glaxo-SmithKline.
********
Several other vaccine candidates, not as far along, are also in the pipeline and may be ready for safety testing next year. Once any drugs or treatments pass the safety tests they will be available for use in larger numbers of people, and health officials are grappling with whether they should be tested for efficacy in the traditional way, in which some people at risk are given placebos instead of the active drug.
Governments and the military became interested in making vaccines against Ebola and a related virus, Marburg, during the 1990s after a Soviet defector said the Russians had found a way to weaponize Marburg and load it into warheads. Concerns intensified in 2001 after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and anthrax mailings.
Yeah, that false flag anthrax attack makes the point (as the media accuses Russia!), and we know about the bioweapons warfare programs so excu$e the $kepticism.
The government money led to major advances in the laboratory, Geisbert said, but was insufficient to cover the huge costs of human trials.
Nor could the small companies that were involved in the early studies in animals afford to pay for human trials. No finished product came to market.
Geisbert moved on, working on treatments for Ebola and another version of the VSV vaccine. For the vaccine work, his main collaborator has been Dr. Heinz Feldmann, chief of virology at the Rocky Mountain Laboratories in Hamilton, Mont., part of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
--more--"
So which US military lab created Ebola?
"Drugmakers bet on Ebola vaccines, treatments" by Matthew Perrone and Danica Kirka | Associated Press October 27, 2014
Do I really need to type it?
Drugmakers are racing to develop vaccines and drugs to address the worst outbreak of Ebola in history. It’s unclear who will pay for their products, but companies are betting that governments and aid groups will foot the bill.
It IS the $wine flu $windle redux!
There are no proven drugs or vaccines for Ebola, in large part because it is so rare that up until now it has been hard to attract research funding. And the West African nations hardest hit by the outbreak are unlikely to be able to afford new Ebola vaccines and drugs.
But governments and corporations are shifting millions of dollars to fight Ebola in response to the outbreak that has infected nearly 10,000 and killed over 4,800. Experts say drugmakers are wagering international groups and wealthier governments like the United States will buy Ebola vaccines and drugs in mass quantities to stockpile them for future use once they’re deemed safe.
Now you know why I'm doubting all this. Every five years it's the $ame $tory.
‘‘The political bet is that the US and World Health Organization have been so embarrassed and burned by this event that they will be willing to change the way they do business,’’ said professor Lawrence Gostin of the Georgetown University Law School, who studies global health issues.
What, not enough tax loot being dumped into the trough?
Drugmakers have benefited from stockpiling before. During the bird flu pandemic of 2009, Western governments spent billions to stock up on drugs and vaccines that mostly went unused. Shelf-life varies by product, but can be as little as a year.
Related: A $7 Billion Dollar Shot in the Arm
Owwww!
Still, it’s unclear who will pay for the vaccines in development, even after a WHO meeting on Thursday that included government officials, drugmakers, and philanthropic groups.
I'm pretty clear on who will, taxpayers.
‘‘Something concrete needs to be developed soon,’’ said Dr. Manica Balasegaram of Doctors Without Borders, who attended the meeting. ‘‘This needs to done in tandem for us to prepare for when these vaccines are deployed in the larger scale beyond clinical trials.’’
Even with the uncertainty, drug companies are rushing to begin testing in patients.
Johnson & Johnson said last week it would test a vaccine combination that could protect against a strain ‘‘highly similar’’ to the virus that triggered this Ebola outbreak.
The New Brunswick, N.J., company is spending up to $200 million to speed up production of the vaccine, which it licensed in part from a Danish company last month. If safety tests are successful, the company hopes to begin large clinical trials in May 2015.
The two leading Ebola vaccines in the pipeline have largely been funded by government efforts, but their testing is being completed by a combination of corporate and public financing.
Government is public financing.
Human trials of a vaccine co-developed by the US National Institutes of Health and GlaxoSmithKline are being funded by the company, its charitable trust, and funds from the US and UK governments.
It's another $taged and $cripted $windle, folks.
It is being tested for safety in the United States, United Kingdom, and Mali.
And Mali just got their first case!
GSK said it might be able to make about 1 million doses of its vaccine per month by the end of 2015, assuming that some logistical and regulatory hurdles can be overcome.
A small US drugmaker, NewLink Genetics, holds the license on the second front-runner vaccine, developed by the Public Health Agency of Canada and sent to Walter Reed Army Institute of Research in Maryland for testing on volunteers, with preliminary safety results expected by December.
Dr. Marie-Paule Kieny from the UN health agency told reporters last week that millions of doses could be available in 2015 in West Africa if early tests proved the two leading experimental vaccines are safe and provoke enough of an immune response to protect people.
When are the mandatory vaccinations?
--more--"
Related:
"In Brussels on Friday, the European Union and its 28 member nations managed to create a $1.26 billion fund to fight the Ebola outbreak. Britain’s contribution of $329 million was the largest among the EU nations."
And only believe in global pharmaceuticals, folks:
"Companies seek to benefit from Ebola" by Jessica Meyers | Globe Staff October 25, 2014
These are the bad companies, and I'm glad the Globe is looking out for us.
WASHINGTON — One company championed a cure for Ebola through a silver-based antibacterial agent. Another recommended cinnamon bark oils to ward off the virus. A third suggested its oregano treatments.
As fears of the disease escalate, American companies are touting all manner of Ebola-related products — including dietary supplements, protective suits, and virus-themed toys.
The Food and Drug Administration wrote scathing letters last month to three companies whose websites or consultants claimed products could help eradicate Ebola. The FDA has not approved any treatment for the virus.
During illness outbreaks, fraudulent products “all too often appear on the market,” said Jennifer Rodriguez, an FDA spokeswoman.
Yeah, often with FDA approval before they have to be recalled.
Officials are working with the Federal Trade Commission, which helps police companies that swindle or mislead consumers.
Unless they are banks or some other well-connected corporate concern and agenda-pu$hing intere$t!
“Our concern is that if public anxiety increases over Ebola here, we will see a lot more marketing,” said Richard Cleland, assistant director in the FTC’s division of advertising practices. “We’re trying to get in front of that curve.”
Some marketers say they offer legitimate products, such as protective gear. But the more questionable cases fit into familiar categories: products that promise a cure, charities that sprout up with unclear origins, and e-mails that mention the virus and request personal information.
I'm reading something questionable every morning.
Regulators faced similar situations in years past with avian flu, an anthrax scare, and the respiratory disease known as SARS. But heavy media coverage of Ebola, and criticism that the Obama administration has mishandled the situation, only helps fuel uncertainties.
Well, whose fault is that!?!
A recent survey by the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan Washington think tank, found concerns about exposure to the virus had risen to 41 percent from 32 percent in early October.
Enter marketers....
And vaccine makers.
--more--"
Also see:
Amid Ebola worry, nomination for surgeon general languishes
This is not the zombie apocalypse
Ebola is the crisis du jour
Now I feel better.
Dallas clears 43 of Ebola, easing concerns" by Manny Fernandez, Frances Robles, and Donald G. McNeil Jr. | New York Times
"The people closest to Ebola victim Thomas Eric Duncan are trying to resume their lives now that they have come out of a 21-day incubation period without developing symptoms of the disease. Youngor Jallah beamed with pride as she sent her children off to school for the first time in three weeks, with clearance from the Dallas County health department tucked into their backpacks. A letter dated Oct. 19 and signed by Dallas County's chief epidemiologist, Wendy Chung, authorized Jallah and her partner, Aaron Yah, to return to work and their children to go back to school "without any restrictions." A control order isolating Duncan's fiancee, Louise Troh, and others who had shared a home with him was lifted Monday, and Troh spent the early afternoon looking for a new place to live with funds collected by the city of Dallas, her church and an anonymous donor. Still, health officials said they were breathing a little easier."
Related:
With Ebola looming, a visit to the no-mistake zone
Hospitals vary on Ebola rules for staff
NEXT DAY UPDATES:
Hazmat workers labor to make officials’ reassurances real
Not getting it done for me, sorry. I'm far from reassured by anything I find from government and ma$$ media.
Amid questions, N.J. officials lift quarantine, release nurse
The Feds must have exerted enormous pre$$ure bordering on extortion to gain those reversals as Ebola heads for Maine.
"US gives safety steps on Ebola; Restrictions omit strict quarantines" by Felice J. Freyer, Carolyn Y. Johnson and Jessica Meyers | Globe Staff October 28, 2014
Dr. Thomas Frieden, the CDC director, said the new federal guidelines “add a strong level of protection and a strong level of reassurance.”
“I wish we could get to zero risk in the US. But we will only get to zero risk by stopping it at its source,” Frieden said....
Yet there is no travel ban and Ebola is already here anyway.
The updated guidelines underscore tension between some states and the federal government over appropriate requirements for workers returning from Ebola-plagued regions.
***********
Public health specialists criticized the quarantines imposed by the three states.
“The highest priority if we want to protect Americans is to contain the epidemics in the three West African countries and prevent it from spreading,” said Dr. Barry Bloom, former dean of the Harvard School of Public Health.
Dr. Georges C. Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, said quarantine powers should be used thoughtfully and judiciously.
“By creating an overreaction, they’re doing more to create uncertainty and fear than is necessary that I believe will make their jobs more difficult down the line,” Benjamin said.
Tell it to the war propagandists and this government!
George Annas, chairman of the Department of Health Law, Bioethics & Human Rights at Boston University’s School of Public Health, said the governors were not responding to public fear but to their own: “They were nervous that if something happened they wouldn’t be seen as doing everything possible. . . . The public is remarkably calm, and always is.”
It's called lie overload from yo-yoing fear at us.
I have to tell you, I'm exhausted. I'm more likely to die of some health malady, but I've got all these other things to fear (thankfully a prescription pharmaceutical should take care of that) if the paper I read every day has something to say about it.
Draconian requirements such as quarantines can drive sick people into hiding, which is “the worst thing that can happen,” Annas said.
The new CDC guidelines establish four categories of risk....
Like anyone has confidence in the CDC these days.
--more--"
Also see:
"Continuing her trip to West Africa on Monday, Samantha Power, the American ambassador to the United Nations, said the United States will help fight Ebola over ‘‘the long haul.’’Power described a ‘‘heartbreaking change’’ in Guinea: No one hugs or even touches, for fear of catching the disease.
Meaning the occupation by troops will be until the end of empire, and if they are afraid to do all that over here why are officials telling us subways and buses are safe?
Ebola is forcing such changes of behavior throughout the region. Accra, the capital of Ghana, has become the main staging area and headquarters for the UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response, or UNMEER, the UN’s first-ever emergency health mission. Fear of the disease and its stigma is also making life difficult for foreign health care workers who are returning home after a tour treating Ebola patients, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said Monday."
No vaccine re$earch to report today?
