Anyone worried about Ebola?

I live about 45 minutes from Dallas, where ANOTHER patient--a nurse that contracted it from a patient who died --is being treated. I live close to Fort Worth, where Dr. Brantley, one of the survivors, is from (or at least where he was living). As you can imagine, Ebola is the top story on the news every night, and we learn more about the nurse who has been infected every day. The poor nurse, who is currently being treated, had a haz-mat team come to her apartment, remove every single possession that she owned, and send them away to be destroyed. They even took her dog away, and have not decided what to do with it. It is possible that the dog could be euthanized. Most people around here do not seem to be that concerned about getting Ebola, and I haven't really been either up until now. I am starting to get just a little worried though. I use hand sanitizer when handling things like shopping carts and door handles. Maybe I'm paranoid, but it seems like people look at me with worry whenever I cough, lol.

This morning on the local radio show, one of the DJs that had to drive past Texas Presbyterian on his way to have surgery at another nearby hospital confessed that he moved over to the far left lane when he saw the hospital on the right.

I doubt that we will ever have an outbreak like they have in Africa, but is kind of scary when it starts happening in your own backyard!

This will probably start happening more frequently as these viruses mutate to strains we have never seen before. They still don't know how Ebola spreads so it is wise to be cautious at this point.

I really wasn't too concerned about it until I seen something about bush meat being smuggled into this country.  The meat I am sure is being sold within African immigrant communities.  If it gets started within an immigrant community outside of a hospital setting then things could get really bad.  Some immigrants don't get health care either because they mistrust western medicine or they are afraid of being deported because they are undocumented.  Lay people outside of a hospital setting have no hope of containing the virus.

I don't know if they have found patient zero in this recent African outbreak, it will be more difficult because of the size of the outbreak.  The smaller outbreaks in the past have all traced back to patient zero who had eaten bush meat.  Apes carry the virus without developing symptoms.

What exactly is bush meat?

Monkey.

Primates seem to be the cause of every awful disease.

They are so close to us genetically so diseases are contagious between humans and primates.  The same is true the other way.  The people who take care of orphaned baby primates wear masks and sometimes scrubs to lessen the likely hood of a virus passing from humans to ape.  People that go up to get close to the mountain gorillas are only allowed one hour close to them for the same reason.  Viruses like the common cold could kill apes because they don't have the immunity to it that we have.

According to this article www.cnn.com/2014/08/11/health/ebola-patient-zero/  the WHO think the 'natural host' of the virus is fruit bats.  They traced the infection back to a 2-year old in Guinea. He may be the "patient zero"

 

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I'm going to put my tinfoil hat on a moment and say this is awful close to Oryx and Crake for my liking...

Seriously, though, you're far, far more likely to catch and even pass away from influenza than you ever are to contract Ebola.

Had an unconfirmed case just today at Yale university hospital.

I'm definitely concerned for other people, but not specifically for myself  nor those close to me. The way it's spread is through direct contact of bodily fluids, if I recall correctly. Even if you're in a region where a patient has been found (and isolated), unless you're dealing with them as a caretaker or going around public places licking surfaces and asking people to sneeze on your face, it's not likely you're at a great risk. It's definitely cause for concern, but not quite cause for panic in North America. What's happening in Texas, however, is worrying because it was a mistake that shouldn't have happened in a society that is honestly already in panic mode. I think it scares me more that a mistake like that did happen, but hopefully it means greater diligence in dealing with future cases.

I am petrified.  I live 10 minutes from where the latest nurse stayed in Ohio.  According to the news, over three days she went to ONE place.  No one knows if it is only spread by bodily fluids.  What if she went to Wal-Mart and sneezed on the handle of a cart?

I am also worried. I too live close to where she was in Ohio, and everyone around here is freaking out. I heard it can only be spread by bodily fluids, but then I heard that it is mutated to become airbourne...

zoneout said:

This will probably start happening more frequently as these viruses mutate to strains we have never seen before. They still don't know how Ebola spreads so it is wise to be cautious at this point.

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I agree, especially about the possibility of the virus mutating.  I do think Ebola has the potential to become widespread.  Ebola used to burn itself out because it would sweep quickly through a small village.  Of course now we are part of a large, global village.    

The Hot Zone is a fascinating book on the subject of viral hemorrhagic fevers, for anyone who is interested.   It's an older book, but I've read it several times and it provides a lot of information.

Aren't there also forms of dengue fever and yellow fever that are hemorrhagic?  I remember reading that the first outbreak of Ebola in humans in 1976 was first thought to be yellow fever.

I was a front line health care provider-ER over 20 years and I am not afraid. We saw people w/o any sort of protection before they had a diagnosis.

We have had more deaths this year from the run of the mill flu and only ONE from Ebola. Stop listening to the news. Their job is to sell advertising space which they do by pulling in viewers often using deceptive practices by pretending things are worse than they are.

Panicking at this stage is not helpful

Let the scientists do their work.

No, I'm not worried.  There are plenty of other things out there that can kill you, why worry about one more?

They have 16 people in Ohio quarantined, I am assuming they are people who were in contact with the nurse that came down with it after being in Ohio.  They are doing the quarantining thing which actually isn't done very often anymore.  They are also giving health workers in Ohio training on the full hazmat gear.  I guess the main thing is how to remove it after exposure.

Shower first I guess

I think they are up to about 130 people quarantined here in Texas, but it ends in a day or two for 48 of them.

It is getting a little ridiculous. They canceled a game at my nephew's high school tonight so that they could shut down the school and clean it--all because a parent of one of the kids was on the same flight as the nurse that traveled from here to Ohio and back. They are even making the kid stay home from school for two weeks.