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Ebola Epidemic Numbers Vastly Under-Reported Due To "Shadow Zones", WHO Warns
The stigma surrounding Ebola poses a serious obstacle to efforts to calibrate the outbreak in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea and Nigeria. As Reuters reports, the scale of the world's worst Ebola outbreak has been concealed by families hiding infected loved ones in their homes and the existence of "shadow zones" that medics cannot enter, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). "As Ebola has no cure, some believe infected loved ones will be more comfortable dying at home," the WHO statement said, concluding rather ominously, "frankly, no one knows when this outbreak of Ebola will end."
The scale of the world's worst Ebola outbreak has been concealed by families hiding infected loved ones in their homes and the existence of "shadow zones" that medics cannot enter, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Friday.
The U.N. agency issued a statement detailing why the outbreak in West Africa had been underestimated, following criticism that it had moved too slowly to contain the killer virus, now spreading out of control.
Independent experts raised similar concerns a month ago that the contagion could be worse than reported because suspicious local inhabitants are chasing away health workers and shunning treatment.
More than 1400 deaths have been reported but the truth could be considerably worse...
Under-reporting of cases is a problem especially in Liberia and Sierra Leone. The WHO said it was now working with Medecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to produce "more realistic estimates".
...
The stigma surrounding Ebola poses a serious obstacle to efforts to calibrate the outbreak in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea and Nigeria, which has claimed far more victims than any other episode of the disease that was first discovered nearly 40 years ago in the forests of central Africa.
"As Ebola has no cure, some believe infected loved ones will be more comfortable dying at home," the WHO statement said.
"Others deny that a patient has Ebola and believe that care in an isolation ward – viewed as an incubator of the disease – will lead to infection and certain death. Most fear the stigma and social rejection that come to patients and families when a diagnosis of Ebola is confirmed."
Corpses are often buried without official notification, the WHO said, while an additional problem is the existence of numerous "shadow zones", or rural villages where there are rumours of cases and deaths that cannot be investigated because of community resistance or lack of staff and transport.
The WHO is concerned...
"So with the evolving situation, with more cases reported, including in the three hot places - Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia - the situation is not yet over," Chaib said.
Chaib, asked whether the timeline meant that the United Nations health agency expected the epidemic now raging in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone to continue into 2015, said: "Frankly, no one knows when this outbreak of Ebola will end."
* * *
And things are getting more worrisome...
In a sign of spreading international alarm, Senegal, West Africa's humanitarian hub, said it had blocked a regional U.N. aid plane from landing and was banning all further flights to and from countries affected by Ebola, potentially hampering the emergency response to the epidemic.
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West Point is a slum of Monrovia, Liberia which houses about 50,000-100,000. Several days ago a group purportedly with guns entered a health care center where about 20 Ebola patients were being treated. Most of the patients, I imagine the ones who were still mobile, fled. Then possibly bystanders entered and looted the entire medical center. “West Point residents went on a "looting spree," stealing items from the clinic that were likely infected,” said a senior police official. (Blood stained sheets, blankets and even mattresses were carried off). Ebola virus can survive several days in a dry state. Therefore it is likely that West Point will become a disaster of a sort only shown in movies. If ten people become infected by this alone, soon there will be 30, then 90, then 270, then 600, then 1800, then 5,000 and so on. Liberia is trying to “contain” (quarantine) all in West Point but they are unlikely to succeed when the panic ensues as residents start to understand, its boundaries are too porous. Consider the number of healthcare workers who have contracted the disease and/or have died. Some of these are top professionals with massive resourses, and some were not--but how is it that the top professionals using isolation and proper equipment became infected. No, this disease is far from over, in Liberia I fear that it has barely started.
To put West Point in perspective consider this: It has two public toilets, and two water taps. Private homemade toilets collapse during the rainy season. When cases emerge (if they do) as a result of this looting there will be zero care, and zero resources. I fear that this will become an epidemic in West Point with no word to describe it, the only word that comes to mind is conflagration.
It sure is odd how before they couldn't get people to go to the hospital even when they were sick. Now the healthy just go in for fun? Really? I remember this rumor. Shhhhhh....It went like this "The town of West Point is rioting because Ebola patients are being brought into their town." I get it! Fear of Ebola caused the town to riot. Afterward like goldilocks they took a nice nap in the empty clinic beds. Then they realized they loved the smell of the bedding so much they just had to take it home with them and....share it with the rest of the family!
Nobody thinks this at all strange? Ah ha ha ha we are doomed!
Thanks to all of you that are posting intelligent insights into this subject. Greatly appreciated.
The official numbers point to almost a clockwork 30 day doubling. If there are anywhere near 25k deaths by new years (assuming the ratio of offical vs unreported cases doesn't change much) you have a handful of months from that point before there is a tangible threat to yourself. On the plus side for non-Africans it does appear the cultural and environmental aspects there are conducive to transmission. As of yet I would say everyone should remain slightly weary as usual. It is not yet a real threat. For example, the average American has a about a 1% chance of dying in a car accident in their lifetime ( at current rates ). Until Ebola blows past that number there isn't much to worry about. Considering everything that is going on in the world.. and as educated as most ZHers are about that... if you aren't prepared to drop out for a year or so you are way behind. Those that are ready shouldn't worry too much.... yet, and probably won't have to unless it actually becomes an end of the world scenario which is unlikely.
For "The West", I'd suggest that anything in the order of 10% (over normal mortality rate) will be a severe problem, especially if the death rate is reasonably uniform across all age groups.
Our downfall will be that today's modern society relies on a horde of pretty skilled, but usually "invisible" people, the loss of whom will certainly cramp our comfortable lifestyle. Add in the effects of local or more widely spread panic - induced crowd violence (deaths and significant morbidity), then consider whether our essentially "peacetime casualty numbers" health services will be able to cope, especially if their fast and efficient consumables resupply capacity has also been affected (which will certainly be the case).
Add in the fact that it does not take a lot of "extra deaths" to swamp the "disposal services" (burial, cremation, whatever), and it's no exaggeration to state that virus - laden corpses could be appearing in the streets (certainly in the back alleys), where they would be subject to the attention of vermin, who in turn could act as a further vector (we know that rats can act as a carrier - there has been an Ebola outbreak in the US in the past, caused by infected Gambian rats (sold as pets)).
This latter problem certainly has the potential to be a major infection transmission mechanism in the West Point ghetto, maybe the major transmission vector, which is why the "Cordon Sanitaire" approach there is doomed to failure.
There are likely to be more deaths from untreated malaria, cholera, dysentary, riot control shootings, and
starvation.
" "frankly, no one knows when this outbreak of Ebola will end." "
Well, maybe when there is no more need to distract you from other important matters.
You know, E-Bama has a nice ring to it, too.
We all suffer from E-bama.
ebola's not a problem, set up a perimeter 55 gr @ 3000fps out to 500 yds. problem solved.
Do NOT eat bush meat.
Or use a dental dam?
Do not, and I repeat, do not participate in water sports with a person you might think is infected with Ebola.
MSM distraction/fear propaganda.
"local inhabitants are chasing away health workers and shunning treatment."
The victim remains at home where they are not contaminating "health care workers" who also are dying of the disease because there's little way in Africa for them NOT to be infected. So that's a plus, right...not assisting infection?
And since there's "no treatment" anyway, what's bad about separating the sick at home away from others? Yes, the family may die but if they too remain at home they won't infect others.
Let's not pretend that people who go to health centers in AF are being cured. That's the worst thing we can do and it looks to me like that's what WHO is doing. It's a charade. I'm not criticizing but it is what it is.
"And things are getting more worrisome...
If I try to bring a couple fruits into the country its like I am a criminal. The 'helpers' went to Afrika knowing the risk but of course assumed THEY would not get infected becasue THEY know about hygene and so forth. Well, obvisouly THEY didn't know THAT much. And now we let them back in instead of first treating them somewhere remote at a military base or something?
The government is infiltrated with brain dead puppets.
Second suspected case in Canada (first was negative):
Montreal patient being tested for Ebola virus after returning from West Africa
Also found interesting the last sentence in the story:
Transmission of Ebola from person to person is largely through direct contact with blood and body fluids.
So in the cases it is not through direct contact with blood and body fluids, how is it transmitted?
I would kinda like to know what "direct contact with blood and body fluids" actually means.
They go on about traditional African funerals, where mourners touch the body, being a primary conduit for Ebola, but how does that work? So you touch the ebola body, you get ebola-riddled fluid on your fingers say ... what then has to happen for you to get infected with ebola? It doesn't just seep through your skin, does it? Surely, you then have to touch your mouth, rub your eyes or get the fluid near a cut or scratch so the virus can get into your body?
But then that suggests the virus can live on your skin for a certain amount of time before you accidentally infect yourself. So surely anything you touch while you have ebola on your fingertips is then contaminated with live ebola, and someone else can pick it up and infect themselves too?
Am I getting this totally wrong?
The reason I am interested in this is that I could never understand how drug-addicts sharing needles passed the HIV virus so successfully. When you think about a modern syringe -- the process, the plunger etc -- where was the significant transfer of blood? You would be looking at microscopic traces on the outside of the needle and, if that were the case, then we surely would be kinda screwed. So I eventually asked my mum (a medical administrator) and she told me what the problem really was: that addicts, in an attempt to get at the heroin left in the needle after they had injected, would pull out the plunger withdrawing their own blood into the needle and case to then reinject a mix of their own blood and the remaining heroin -- thus leaving an amount of their own blood in the needle. It was this blood in the needle that the next addict then injected into their veins, and that was how the virus was passing so successfully.
The devil's always in the details.
Regarding needle practices:
I caught you knockin' at my cellar door
I love you, baby, can I have some more?
Ooh, ooh, the damage done
I hit the city and I lost my band
I watched the needle take another man
Gone, gone, the damage done
I sing the song because I love the man
I know that some of you don't understand
Milk blood to keep from running out
I've seen the needle and the damage done
A little part of it in everyone
But every junkie's like a settin' sun
Neil Young
If you would like to listen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fi2XCsPKlY8
Sunday Morning
If I hock a big lugey at you, is that airborne? What if I hock a baby lugey? I think this is about micro lugeys, they spray, you pray. Or they sprays and it will stays until your hand lays right in it.
I am a know nothing common sense guessing kind of gal.
Maybe build an ice wall around the infected area..
sorry.. wrong thread.
Might actually be more affective for Ebola than Fukushima...
It's all good. Nothing to worry about.
When gold is above $2000, then I'll worry...byt not much.