Ebola!

DiscoDriveby wrote:

Captain Trips all around -- even started in Texas.

Time to re-read The Stand graphic novel!

Is that good? Is that the book on which the film is based or visa versa?

DSGamer wrote:
DiscoDriveby wrote:

Captain Trips all around -- even started in Texas.

Time to re-read The Stand graphic novel!

Is that good? Is that the book on which the film is based or visa versa? :)

Well first there was the actual book by Stephen King, the only film I know is the TV mini-series, then this graphic series cropped up in I think 2010. I love the book, but the full version is about 1200 pages so revisiting it in graphic form is a nice option. I really like the artwork and even though it's hard to cut such a long book down to graphic form they do a good job of focusing on the major plotlines.

Edit: Ebola! Now I'm on topic again! Actually is would be cool to read The Stand for the first time now while people are imaging a crazy epidemic wiping everyone out.

PaladinTom wrote:

I'm glad the title of this post has an exclamation point to signify it's importance. :wink:

: The Musical

ClockworkHouse wrote:

My wife's cousin keeps posting articles on Facebook about how ebola is a CIA-engineered virus meant to depopulate the planet.

That's peanuts! The plans are much more sinister!! Consider that fact that the leading treatment -- or, shall we say, (air-quotes) treatment -- is called ZMapp. WHAT IS THE GOVERNMENT TRYING TO DO?!

H.P. Lovesauce wrote:
PaladinTom wrote:

I'm glad the title of this post has an exclamation point to signify it's importance. :wink:

: The Musical

Yes. This. Reminded me of this.

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/414fa4b226/the-wire-the-musical-with-michael-kenneth-williams

There are several instances of different news organizations bringing in some actual Doctor person and just badgering him or her to hell trying to convince or trick them into saying that Ebola is really dangerous. It just pisses me off so much, and the Doctors have all been really prepared for it and refuse to play the game or go off on them. Sure, staying calm and on message keeps you from letting them get an outburst the can swing as panic, but I really want the cathartic release of someone yelling at them and rebuking them for the slimy, pathetic worms that they are.

The sort of thing that happens:
Scumbag*: So I know a lot of experts are saying that there isn't anything to be afraid of, but I have to say, as a pretty normal person... I'm kinda worried about this!
Doctor: Well, it's important to keep in mind that this disease isn't very transmissible. It's not airborne, it's not carried in the water supply, or food. You can only catch it with direct contact with the bodily fluids of a person while they are showing symptoms. When compared to other, more common diseases like the flu, there are just so many more barriers to catch this disease.
Scumbag: Yeah, the experts keep saying things like that, but I hear a lot of people that are still concerned. People that think that experts are just trying to prevent a panic. What do you say to that?

What they have been saying:
Doctor: Really I think it's most important to keep in mind that there are a lot of barriers to catch this disease. Only direct contact with bodily fluids of an infected person, showing symptoms, can transmit the disease. The disease can not be transmitted in any other way.

What I so desperately want them to say:
Doctor: That's because worthless little sh*ts like you keep making remarks like that to make people second guess the threat. And if people are spreading rumors and misinformation like that then it makes it even more important for people like you, who like to claim that part of your ridiculous job is to inform your viewers, to not pass around and give idle gossip that sort of reinforcement. If you had an ounce of integrity in your body you would use this platform to pass factual information to your viewers instead of scaring and misleading them in a desperate attempt to scare one viewer into watching for one more commercial break.

*I just can't bear to use the word journalist, or anything approaching a synonym.

I was talking to a friend the other day who said we should just shut down all flights from Africa. I told him instead he should just take an extra effort to not allow sick strangers to vomit directly into his eyeballs.

I realize scaring people prior to an election is a great tradition, but, really, can't we find something better than this?

MilkmanDanimal wrote:

I was talking to a friend the other day who said we should just shut down all flights from Africa. I told him instead he should just take an extra effort to not allow sick strangers to vomit directly into his eyeballs.

I realize scaring people prior to an election is a great tradition, but, really, can't we find something better than this?

October surprise 2014: Ebola dirty bombs.

PaladinTom wrote:
MilkmanDanimal wrote:

I was talking to a friend the other day who said we should just shut down all flights from Africa. I told him instead he should just take an extra effort to not allow sick strangers to vomit directly into his eyeballs.

I realize scaring people prior to an election is a great tradition, but, really, can't we find something better than this?

October surprise 2014: Ebola dirty bombs.

EVERYTHING IS A DIRTY EBOLA BOMB BECAUSE SICK PEOPLE MIGHT HAVE LICKED IT!!!!!!!

One of the vile talking heads asked one of the Doctors "shouldn't we stop flights from these African countries like some European countries have done?"

I just did some quick googling and can not find a reference to a European country that has blocked air travel like that. Did that talking head (surprise of surprises) say something without any basis at all in reality?

I especially liked Colbert's(?) take on it, with his logical extension that we now have to wall off the entire state of Texas in order to maintain the quarantine of this deadly disease.

Yonder wrote:

One of the vile talking heads asked one of the Doctors "shouldn't we stop flights from these African countries like some European countries have done?"

I just did some quick googling and can not find a reference to a European country that has blocked air travel like that. Did that talking head (surprise of surprises) say something without any basis at all in reality?

I especially liked Colbert's(?) take on it, with his logical extension that we now have to wall off the entire state of Texas in order to maintain the quarantine of this deadly disease.

Hey, they wanted a border wall. They didn't say where to build it, though.

DSGamer wrote:
Yonder wrote:

One of the vile talking heads asked one of the Doctors "shouldn't we stop flights from these African countries like some European countries have done?"

I just did some quick googling and can not find a reference to a European country that has blocked air travel like that. Did that talking head (surprise of surprises) say something without any basis at all in reality?

I especially liked Colbert's(?) take on it, with his logical extension that we now have to wall off the entire state of Texas in order to maintain the quarantine of this deadly disease.

Hey, they wanted a border wall. They didn't say where to build it, though.

Oh god, I can't stop laughing.

MilkmanDanimal wrote:

I told him instead he should just take an extra effort to not allow sick strangers to vomit directly into his eyeballs.

Ebola is a euphemism, right?
... is this the new #GamerGate thread?

DSGamer wrote:

Hey, they wanted a border wall.

... is this the new #GamerGatedCommunity thread?

I blame the flu shot for making me think this is funny.

Found this as I was procrastinating working on my grad paper.

http://www.outbreakkit.com/

If they're advertising it, someone's buying it.

Well, it's important to keep in mind that this disease isn't very transmissible. It's not airborne, it's not carried in the water supply, or food. You can only catch it with direct contact with the bodily fluids of a person while they are showing symptoms. When compared to other, more common diseases like the flu, there are just so many more barriers to catch this disease.

Yeah, that's far and away the most important message. In the West, unless it mutates, it simply will not spread very much. Africa's having so much trouble because of multiple factors:

1. Poor healthcare infrastructure; one country of several million people had only 300 hospital beds, total, for the entire population.
2. Few medical supplies, so healthcare providers have a lot of trouble staying safe.
3. Bad hygiene habits in the poor areas; many of them don't even have running water. When you have to drag your water for maybe a mile or two, you don't want to use much of it cleaning things.
4. Very limited infrastructure and wealth for supporting people who want to self-isolate in their homes.
5. Cultures that value a lot of physical contact.
6. Burial rites that involve a very great deal of physical contact.

Most of these factors are unique to Africa; combine that with widespread disbelief that Ebola is even real, and of course it's spreading like crazy.

That won't happen in the West.

Oh, and I forgot:

7. Many hospitals are closing out of fear of Ebola; the doctors and nurses are staying home.

Two concerning things from my perspective -

1 If the method of infection is so well understood (and the bar actually set "vomit into your eyeballs" high), I don't see why so many healthcare professionals are ending up sick. I feel a little silly saying that because, of course they're going to be more exposed to sick people, but if the bar is actually "taking bodily fluids inside yourself", it still seems avoidable.

2 What happened in Dallas was a huge clusterf*ck, and actually scary when you look at it in the context of some other more virulent disease. It's literally 24/7 Ebola on every TV station and they let the guy go home.

NormanTheIntern wrote:

Two concerning things from my perspective -

1 If the method of infection is so well understood (and the bar actually set "vomit into your eyeballs" high), I don't see why so many healthcare professionals are ending up sick. I feel a little silly saying that because, of course they're going to be more exposed to sick people, but if the bar is actually "taking bodily fluids inside yourself", it still seems avoidable.

2 What happened in Dallas was a huge clusterf*ck, and actually scary when you look at it in the context of some other more virulent disease. It's literally 24/7 Ebola on every TV station and they let the guy go home.

I'm not panicked about Ebola, and am not letting anyone vomit in my eyeballs regardless, but I agree with both of these points.

NormanTheIntern wrote:

1 If the method of infection is so well understood (and the bar actually set "vomit into your eyeballs" high), I don't see why so many healthcare professionals are ending up sick. I feel a little silly saying that because, of course they're going to be more exposed to sick people, but if the bar is actually "taking bodily fluids inside yourself", it still seems avoidable.

I'm not aware that the number of health care workers getting sick is anywhere near what their risk levels would produce in unprotected individuals. I believe they are much less than 1% of those who have been affected (I think about one in 500-1000 victims have been health care workers), yet they are in the highest risk exposure category.

The virus can survive for somewhere between 2 hours and 2 days outside the body, and the number of particles needed to infect is between one and ten. The number in a drop of body fluid from an end-stage patient can be over 500,000 per drop. So you have to picture health care workers as being very seriously exposed; the smallest mistake can be fatal. They are actually doing quite well.

2 What happened in Dallas was a huge clusterf*ck, and actually scary when you look at it in the context of some other more virulent disease. It's literally 24/7 Ebola on every TV station and they let the guy go home.

The guy was asymptomatic, and he lied about his exposure. There's not really a protective scheme that could change that, short of complete quarantine, which is impractical at this point (and probably unnecessary). (Although I think I heard some company is working on a quick test, which presumably could be useful.)

Robear he went to the hospital puking with a high fever, told them he came from a country with ebola. They gave him a z pack and put him back into circulation. I think you're talking about the airport screening, which is a different issue.

NormanTheIntern wrote:

Two concerning things from my perspective -

1 If the method of infection is so well understood (and the bar actually set "vomit into your eyeballs" high), I don't see why so many healthcare professionals are ending up sick. I feel a little silly saying that because, of course they're going to be more exposed to sick people, but if the bar is actually "taking bodily fluids inside yourself", it still seems avoidable.

2 What happened in Dallas was a huge clusterf*ck, and actually scary when you look at it in the context of some other more virulent disease. It's literally 24/7 Ebola on every TV station and they let the guy go home.

1. The reason it's so transmissible to doctors and nurses in Africa is because in most of those areas they are running through all of their cleaning supplies. So even if they have fresh running water (not at all certain) they don't have the Bleach etc etc to actually clean themselves and their area well. That leads to the handful of people that have gotten sick getting sick. (It hasn't really been that many, right? It seems like every time some US or European researcher gets sick it hits the news as they are flown back to their home country for treatment, and I think it's only happened around a dozen times.

2. I think you're overstating the severity a bit. The fact that he was in that region of Africa means that yes, he should have been held for observation, but even after going to Africa showing up with fever, nausea, and weakness most likely means that you have the flu. Treating everyone for the worst possible thing their symptoms could be is something that gets out of hand pretty quickly. But yeah, it is quite stupid given that he had been in the area.

Malor wrote:
Well, it's important to keep in mind that this disease isn't very transmissible. It's not airborne, it's not carried in the water supply, or food. You can only catch it with direct contact with the bodily fluids of a person while they are showing symptoms. When compared to other, more common diseases like the flu, there are just so many more barriers to catch this disease.

Yeah, that's far and away the most important message.

Not entirely. By itself the difficult transmission is great, but not enough to make the disease a slam dunk. It's the combination of "very hard to transmit" and "only contagious while symptomatic" that ensures that Ebola will never spread widely in the US or other developed countries.

In the US, 10 million people will get the flu, 1 million will need to be hospitalized because of it, and around 10,000 will die from it. Car crashes will kill about 3x the number the flu will. But we're worried about Ebola, which has killed 0 Americans at my last count.

Media sucks. Fear works.

If the method of infection is so well understood (and the bar actually set "vomit into your eyeballs" high), I don't see why so many healthcare professionals are ending up sick.

A lot of it is because of lack of supplies. They just don't have what they need. Rubber gloves? Here, we use them once, and throw them away. In many places in Africa, they wash those and hang them up to dry, because they don't have enough. They don't throw them away until they have holes in them -- visible holes.

And, as Robear points out, if they miss just ONE virus, someone can die.

edit: you can't read the whole article unless you subscribe, but the headline mostly sums it up:

Ebola Virus: For Want of Gloves, Doctors Die

ClockworkHouse wrote:

My wife's cousin keeps posting articles on Facebook about how ebola is a CIA-engineered virus meant to depopulate the planet.

Tell them they should read Biohazard by Dr. Ken Aibek. He used to run the Soviet bioweapons program where was literally trying to create a chimera virus that combined smallpox, influenza, and a little dash of the plague.

Malor wrote:
If the method of infection is so well understood (and the bar actually set "vomit into your eyeballs" high), I don't see why so many healthcare professionals are ending up sick.

A lot of it is because of lack of supplies. They just don't have what they need. Rubber gloves? Here, we use them once, and throw them away. In many places in Africa, they wash those and hang them up to dry, because they don't have enough. They don't throw them away until they have holes in them -- visible holes.

And, as Robear points out, if they miss just ONE virus, someone can die.

edit: you can't read the whole article unless you subscribe, but the headline mostly sums it up:

Ebola Virus: For Want of Gloves, Doctors Die

Seems reasonable - the latest out ex-Africa case is a Spanish healthcare worker, though.

NormanTheIntern wrote:

Seems reasonable - the latest out ex-Africa case is a Spanish healthcare worker, though.

Reasonably obvious explanation: Being from a richer country doesn't confer upon a medical worker the ability to create disposable gloves out of nowhere.

When there's a shortage, there's a shortage for everybody, including visitors.

Seems reasonable - the latest out ex-Africa case is a Spanish healthcare worker, though.

Expanding on Hypatian's comment, I doubt very much that the Spanish worker would have been willing to work in more safety than his or her African colleagues. If I were there, I would make damn sure that everyone was taking the same risk.... in fact, I'd probably be willing to be somewhat riskier than the Africans, because I'd know that I'd get airlifted to First World medical facilities if I got sick, when they probably wouldn't. Their highest-ranking doctors weren't given medevacs (and later died), when even grunts from the First World were.

ClockworkHouse wrote:

My wife's cousin keeps posting articles on Facebook about how ebola is a CIA-engineered virus meant to depopulate the planet.

Interspersed with articles about how the government is too incompetent to do anything right?

You guys should listen to the No Agenda Podcast. They are also discussing the ebola thing and many other things wrong with this planet.
They make fun of sh*t, but often hit the nail on the head as well. Awesome audio clips about ebola too.

ps no agenda podcast is an awesome podcast in general. Just don't get thrown off by things that are normal to the crowd that has listened for a while already.
It will make sense in the end

Prederick wrote:

Oy.

Called it.