Galt's Gulch

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  • Posted by sfdi1947 10 years, 3 months ago
    This is a perpetuation of a stupid, unknowing fear based in a lack of knowledge. America, except in some areas of Florida and Louisiana does not have a supportive climate like central western Africa, read that as warm, moist and dark.
    Ebola is a fragile bug, only seconds of direct sunlight kills it.. It is spread by direct physical contact with fresh bodily fluids, blood and sexual contact.
    What the video shows is a case of stupid is as stupid does. To be at real risk the guy with the hose would have had to have had an open cut that contacted the vomitus emeritus.
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    • Posted by $ jlc 10 years, 3 months ago
      Thank you, sfdi. Here is a chart that shows how contagious ebola is in comparison to some other known diseases:
      http://www.ijreview.com/2014/10/183696-c...

      The mortality rate of ebola varies widely, from 20% to 90% but the WHO is giving it a rating of 50%. (I think it will be under 30% in the US, even before specific therapies are established.) This ebola outbreak has undergone many mutations and is less deadly than the prior occurrences.

      Still - this was not a particularly bright thing to do. If the clip had been of him cleaning it up, wearing gloves, there would be no outcry.

      Jan
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      • Posted by sfdi1947 10 years, 3 months ago
        Hi Jan, Thanks for the new info, I was using 2007 AMED statistics (UNClass) from FT Detrick, neither CDC or WHO (Which I don't trust, because they adjust counts in to many countries for political reasons. i.e. the HIV Pandemic in Thailand, Laos and Cambodia, which if unstopped will destroy the sovereignty of two of the three.) The Army Chemical Corp has more accurate numbers that are classified, but are worse by an order of magnitude in certain circumstances.
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      • Posted by khalling 10 years, 3 months ago
        what about some of the claims I have read that suggest certain strains are airborne ?
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        • Posted by $ jlc 10 years, 3 months ago
          Thank you for that question. I did a little more looking around: the CDC says not (but does not even refer to the rumor that some strains might become airborne). I found a nice write up in Scientific American, though:
          "Here is what it would take for it to become a real airborne risk: First off, a substantial amount of Ebola virus would need to start replicating in cells that reside in the throat, the bronchial tubes and possibly in the lungs. Second, the airborne method would have to be so much more efficient than the current extremely efficient means of transmission that it would overcome any genetic costs to the virus stemming from the mutation itself. Substantial natural hurdles make it unlikely that either event will occur.

          Currently, Ebola typically gains entry into the body through breaks in the skin, the watery fluid around the eye or the moist tissues of the nose or mouth. Then it infects various cells of the immune system, which it tricks into making more copies of itself. The end result: a massive attack on the blood vessels, not the respiratory system.

          Even viruses that are well adapted to attacking the respiratory system often have a hard time getting transmitted through the airways. Consider the experience so far with avian flu, which is easily transmitted through the air in birds but hasn’t yet mutated to become easily spreadable in that fashion among people."

          That was an interesting piece of research to do. Thanks again.

          Jan
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          • Posted by khalling 10 years, 3 months ago
            I read about monkeys in a lab setting and the Zaire strain. apparently the infected monkeys were were across the room from other monkeys who were deliberately infected. They said they weren't sure but they think what might have happened was cleaning the initially infected monkeys cages by spraying them down created an aerosol with the virus that the other monkeys aspirated or went into their eyes. Makes watching the video and that woman walking by kind of whoa. It is not just a matter of the guy wearing gloves to clean up infected vomit with a power washer. The power washer is probably worse in some ways. Am I off-base?
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            • Posted by $ jlc 10 years, 3 months ago
              I do not think you are off base, just low probability. If some spatter from the vomitus were to strike the eyes or lips of the woman walking by*, then she could be infected. (Apparently one of the dire things about ebola is that it only takes a small number of organisms to infect someone.) The first link I sent showed the number of other people who would likely be infected by one person. For measles, it was 18; for ebola it was 2 (approx the same as Hep C). Conventional waste treatment is sufficient to inactivate it in sewage. (It can last a long time on counters or in blood - and it seems resistant to freezing or refrigeration...pity, that.)

              I wonder if one of the differences between monkey transmission and human transmission is that monkeys groom themselves with their tongues. This would mean that if the splatter got anywhere on their coats they might be infected.

              I found your article on the Zaire strain in monkeys - and the theory you reported for that transmission. I also found a couple of mentions that ebola can be transmitted from pigs to monkeys without direct contact, but that article reported that droplets or fomites were also candidates for the cause of transmission and that airborne transmission had not been isolated.

              Jan
              *This is one of the reasons you are told never to even open a can of food that is swollen: the tiny bit of botulism that flicks off the gas-laden lid as you open it and lands on your lips can be enough to kill you when you lick your lips reflexively. Isn't biology wonderful...!
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    • Posted by LibertasAutLetum 10 years, 3 months ago
      Ah yes. Thank you for the enlightenment. In other words, unless you work in a mushroom farm and surrounded by African natives you are never at risk of contracting it. Good to know.
      Im just gonna kick back in my e-z chair with a beer and watch the show for the next six months or so. If you're right you get to say "I told you so". If you're wrong, then what?
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    • Posted by barwick11 10 years, 3 months ago
      Only a few seconds of direct sunlight *where there is significant amount of UV radiation* will kill it.

      Most parts of North America (and the rest of the world) suffer from a lack of intense UV in the fall, winter, and early spring.

      Not saying the rest of what you said is bad or wrong (or right), just making that point.
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      • Posted by sfdi1947 10 years, 3 months ago
        You are right, but unless the exposure takes place indoors any temperature below 50 F vastly reduces its ability to attach to other organisms at the cellular level, it goes dormant at 0 C and is still vulnerable to UV which does not have to have high frequencies to kill it, it just takes a few seconds longer, assuming it is not a hardened, weaponized bug (USARIIM)
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  • Posted by Temlakos 10 years, 3 months ago
    Carelessness of a phenomenal order, or:

    Someone is staging the scene. One way or the other.
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    • Posted by sfdi1947 10 years, 3 months ago
      I don't think even the most dedicated political operator in the world would start a epidemic using a bug with an African morbidity of 80 percent.
      I must point out that the phrase "African Morbidity" is not intended as a politically incorrect remark, but to differentiate between the quality of hospitals and climatic conditions.
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      • Posted by Temlakos 10 years, 3 months ago
        Suppose we're not dealing with a dedicated political operator?

        Suppose instead we're dealing with a megalomaniac or ideologue bent on mass murder?

        That's not to say Ebola need be as effective as this real-life Floyd Ferris might suppose, nor as effective as was portrayed in motion-picture projects like "Outbreak." It is to say someone is playing, or trying to play, some nasty, deadly games.
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        • Posted by sfdi1947 10 years, 3 months ago
          Certain scientific skills are required, the likely transgressor you describe would just catch it themselves.
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          • Posted by Temlakos 10 years, 3 months ago
            Not if he's the President and refuses to ban incoming flights from the affected region in Africa, and otherwise interferes with good containment protocols.

            I have to recommend certain preventative measures that landed on my console.

            Try this link:

            http://www.conservativenewsandviews.com/...
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            • Posted by sfdi1947 10 years, 3 months ago
              Well aside from the fact that Obama doesn't have a clue, the article you've posted is interesting, but offers no real solution. Ebola and six other hemorrhagic fevers all have a very variable initial presentation, between 3 and 21 days with outliers going to thirty days, only Marburg has a short term presentation of less than 7 days (According to the Army Medical Scientists at Ft. Detrick, Published in Chem. Corps' FM's.).
              The reason you have a Pandemic in Africa is because of the lack of good, qualified hospital and medical facilities, and the inability of the people to get to them.
              If a 'Lock Down' embargo becomes necessary, which it probably will not, our environment in the US. is hostile to the viral germ, the Secretary of Homeland Security will recommend one and the president will impose it, but it is unlikely to be necessary.
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  • Posted by hattrup 10 years, 3 months ago
    Malaria and the Flu kill so many more people per year in the world (and the US) than Ebola has that it is just staggering.
    Wash your hands and correctly use DDT....
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  • Posted by $ jlc 10 years, 3 months ago
    One of the things that is not being mentioned is that this ebola outbreak is a GREAT way of testing our bioterrorist/deathplague response system. We have an organism that is very scary and which is therefore being treated as if it were more hazardous than it really is and we are seeing if our hospitals and public health systems can cope with 'ebola'. This may actually save us all when a really bad deathplague (natural or artificial) breaks out and dances its dance of Kali around the world.

    Jan
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  • Posted by scinch 10 years, 3 months ago
    Hmmm....Texas wanted secession didn't they? Maybe its time to sever the knot and let em go...and close the new international border along the Texas state lines....

    OK...before you get yer panties in a wad...that was just an attempt at some dry humor...
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    • Posted by $ Susanne 10 years, 3 months ago
      After INS, USBP, and CDCR letting ebola into their state, I wouldn't be surprised if Texas would, given the opportunity, secede and close their borders.
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