• Changing RCF's index page, please click on "Forums" to access the forums.

Ebola...

Do Not Sell My Personal Information
If that happens... Can you imagine?
 
UN Ebola chief raises 'nightmare' prospect that virus could mutate and become airborne if it is not quickly brought under control
  • UN warns Ebola virus currently plaguing West Africa could become airborne
  • The longer it moves between human hosts the greater possibility of mutation
  • The risk grows the longer virus is living within the human 'melting pot'
  • NGOs have said the Ebola virus is currently infecting five people every hour
  • More than 3,300 people have died from Ebola since the outbreak first began
  • Officials call for 1,000 new Sierra Leone isolation centres to contain virus
By COREY CHARLTON FOR MAILONLINE

PUBLISHED: 08:25 EST, 2 October 2014 | UPDATED: 09:48 EST, 2 October 2014

The longer the Ebola epidemic continues infecting people unabated the higher the chances it will mutate and become airborne, the UN's Ebola response chief has warned.

Anthony Banbury, the Secretary General's Special Representative, has said there is a 'nightmare' prospect the deadly disease will become airborne if it continues infecting new hosts.

His comments come as organisations battling the crisis in West Africa warn that the international community has just four weeks to stop it before it spirals 'completely out of control'.



Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...pect-virus-mutate-airborne.html#ixzz3F0IAOeMI
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

That's something you should just keep to yourself and within your field.
No need to bring more fear.
Say something when it actually happens.
 
I'm not worried. Obama will protect us.

To be honest, I'd rather Obama be president now than any of his predecessors going over the last several decades.

Don't want to make the thread political, and I'm not a fan of this President; but, realistically, all things considered, if I had to pick between Obama, Bush, Clinton, HW, a man suffering from Alzheimer's, Carter, Ford, Nixon, or Johnson -- in an epidemic scare -- I'd take Obama.
 
If that happens... Can you imagine?

All businesses would halt. All economies would collapse. Billions would die.

How about shifting half of the $22B we spend on Global Warming at this problem.

Interesting video of why the potential silver bullet ZMapp has been stalled...

http://www.bloomberg.com/video/ebol...possible-outbreak-baHez4XbTKqbiEL08rDJ2A.html



Ebola toll rises while ZMapp drug production takes its time
453576008.jpg

Liberian Foreign Affairs Minister Augustine Ngafuan (L), and a porter deliver boxes of the experimental Ebola drug ZMapp to Monrovia, Liberia, on August 13, 2014, where it was to be used to treat Liberian doctors infected with the deadly virus. Global supplies of the ZMapp ran out soon after. JOHN MOORE, GETTY IMAGES
  • The experimental serum used to treat two U.S. aid workers infected with Ebola is not going to be an option for the patient who is currently battling the virus at a hospital in Dallas. The supply of the drug known as ZMapp ran out in August, and ramping up production is not a quick or easy process. The team that makes the drug is scrambling to meet the sudden, unexpected demand that this outbreak has created.

    ZMapp was created through collaboration between Mapp Biopharmaceutical, Inc. and LeafBio in San Diego, Calif. and Defyrus Inc., another drug company in Toronto, Canada, with funding from the National Institutes of Health and the Public Health Agency of Canada. ZMapp had never been tried in patients before doses were given to Dr. Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol in August.

    "A year ago no one could really spell Ebola," Dr. Jeffrey D. Turner, president and CEO of Defyrus, told CBS News. "The challenge that many people don't appreciate is that our plans were to scale up this drug for 2015 and even then, small amounts for clinical trials. What's really happened with this outbreak is it's caught us in a position where we didn't have enough ZMapp available because no one would have bought it."




    Play VIDEO
    Ebola in America: Man hospitalized with first U.S. case

    Overall, drug research for infectious tropical viruses is severely underfunded. From both a business and scientific standpoint, developing a drug such as ZMapp is less of a priority than using money and resources to find treatments for top killers such as cancer.

    And as Bloomberg Businessweek recently reported, ZMapp's development was set back by two years spent waiting for funding from a Pentagon program aimed at countering biological threats.

    Turner said typically, when small biopharmaceutical companies such as his produce an experimental drug for an uncommon disease, they make just a few hundred doses at at time. Before ZMapp was pressed into service on an emergency basis to treat a handful of Ebola patients, it was still in a testing phase and was not being mass produced.

    Making more ZMapp takes a long time because the drug is made from a certain type of biologically-engineered tobacco that's currently being grown at Kentucky BioProcessing, in Owensboro, Kentucky. "It takes time for tobacco to grow; it's a certain kind of tobacco," said Turner. "It's very special, and has been carefully developed to produce authentic human proteins faithfully." He declined to estimate how much longer it would take, or how big the supply would be. Turner added that his team is currently reviewing other ways they could feasibly produce the drug at a faster rate.

    Dr. Kartik Chandran, associate professor of microbiology and immunology at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, told CBS News it would be possible to find other ways to make ZMapp, such as growing cell cultures in bio-reactor tanks, but he cautions this could backfire. "The problem is that you have to engineer the right cells, you have to do a bunch of testing," he said. "If they're starting from the beginning, that's going to take longer." He added that speeding up production for an emergency response could make errors more likely and might sacrifice decades of research.

    ZMapp is a combination of three different monoclonal antibodies that bond to the glycoproteins of the virus. "You're stapling the viral glycoprotein in three different places with these antibodies," said Chandran, who has spent a decade studying how the Ebola virus behaves on a cellular level. "The idea of using antibodies to treat infections is really old."

    Manufacturing drugs from biological sources to create an antibody cocktail has allowed for the production of blockbusters medications such as Herceptin, a drug that's become a first-line treatment for certain breast cancers. This type of treatment is also the reason why millions of HIV-positive patients are alive today.




    Play VIDEO
    CDC: Ebola outbreak could hit 1.4 million cases in Africa

    Chandran said there still much to learn about how ZMapp actually works, before it can be counted on as an effective therapy for the deadly outbreak in West Africa.

    In August, the American aid workers Brantly and Writebol each received several doses of the drug and survived. However, experts and health officials say it's impossible to know for sure whether ZMapp saved their lives, or whether both were simply statistically lucky and recovered with the help of high-level supportive care provided at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. A Spanish missionary priest who also received ZMapp this summer did not survive.

    The drug has been found to work effectively in several animal studies. In one study, published in August in the journal Nature, researchers successfully cured 18 monkeys of the Ebola virus by administering ZMapp three to five days after they were exposed to the virus and when they were exhibiting symptoms. A randomized controlled trial in people -- the only way to thoroughly test the drug -- has yet to be conducted, which is why the usefulness of ZMapp is still up for debate.

    "We need to understand exactly why ZMapp is so potent," said Chandran.

    © 2014 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.
 
Max, that $22B could come just as easily from the Defense Department; hell, we could just borrow it, we don't need to maintain a flat budget. Why take a shot at global warming though? ;)

As far as ZMapp, I think it's delayed precisely because there are folks literally waiting for this thing to turn massive, and waiting for a customer base to grow from the infected. It seems astounding to me that we would allow thousands to die rather than give them a trial drug.
 
In all seriousness, if governments and corporations become too nonchalant about this, Ebola could become to the first quarter of the 21st century what Influenza was to the first quarter of the 20th century.
 
UN Ebola chief raises 'nightmare' prospect that virus could mutate and become airborne if it is not quickly brought under control
  • UN warns Ebola virus currently plaguing West Africa could become airborne
  • The longer it moves between human hosts the greater possibility of mutation
  • The risk grows the longer virus is living within the human 'melting pot'
  • NGOs have said the Ebola virus is currently infecting five people every hour
  • More than 3,300 people have died from Ebola since the outbreak first began
  • Officials call for 1,000 new Sierra Leone isolation centres to contain virus
By COREY CHARLTON FOR MAILONLINE

PUBLISHED: 08:25 EST, 2 October 2014 | UPDATED: 09:48 EST, 2 October 2014

The longer the Ebola epidemic continues infecting people unabated the higher the chances it will mutate and become airborne, the UN's Ebola response chief has warned.

Anthony Banbury, the Secretary General's Special Representative, has said there is a 'nightmare' prospect the deadly disease will become airborne if it continues infecting new hosts.

His comments come as organisations battling the crisis in West Africa warn that the international community has just four weeks to stop it before it spirals 'completely out of control'.



Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...pect-virus-mutate-airborne.html#ixzz3F0IAOeMI
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook


This is what I was wondering since it's getting close to the cold flu season here in the states.

If it could possibly mutate after coming in contact with the different strains of influenza that go around or more specifically the H1N1 strain of influenza since it seems to mutate the most often.
 
Question for everyone (I haven't kept up with this thread much in the last week or so), but how would you feel about restricting travel to and from Africa, or at the very least these infected areas?

The sound of this thing mutating into an airborne virus is absolutely terrifying. Not out of bounds to say that thousands, if not millions of people would potentially be infected.
 
I gotta be honest...

I get a little excited about apocalyptic scenariors. And Max will lie, but deep down that's why he's all over this.

If there's an apocalypse, I have X's e-mail address.
 
Question for everyone (I haven't kept up with this thread much in the last week or so), but how would you feel about restricting travel to and from Africa, or at the very least these infected areas?

The sound of this thing mutating into an airborne virus is absolutely terrifying. Not out of bounds to say that thousands, if not millions of people would potentially be infected.

I wouldn't permit any non-citizens to enter the country who have been in one of the affected nations within the last 21 days. Perhaps some very limited exceptions, but no tourist, student, etc.. visas. And by "infected countries" I mean those that have had more than a handful of cases, so that would mean Liberia, Guinea, and Sierra Leone, for now.

There are thousands of people in those nations who already have visas to enter the U.S., so we ought to be taking steps to undo that immediately.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/200000-from-ebola-countries-have-visas-to-enter-u.s./article/2553386
 
Last edited:
The guy is lying in a Dallas hospital bed dying from Ebola and Liberia announces they want to prosecute him...

Liberia to Prosecute Man Who Brought Ebola to US

DALLAS — Oct 2, 2014, 1:40 PM ET
By DAVID WARREN Associated Press

WireAP_c221526f12a74a3497421a932ea3b675_16x9_992.jpg

New Details on the 1st US Ebola Patient
NEXT VIDEOOutside The Apartment Of 1st Person Diagnosed With Ebola In US

AUTO START: ON | OFF



AP_logo_update_20130709.gif



Liberia plans to prosecute the airline passenger who brought Ebola into the U.S., alleging that he lied on an airport questionnaire about not having any contact with an infected person, authorities said Thursday.

Thomas Eric Duncan filled out a series of questions about his health and activities before leaving on his journey to Dallas. On a Sept. 19 form obtained by The Associated Press, he answered no to all of them.

Among other questions, the form asked whether Duncan had cared for an Ebola patient or touched the body of anyone who had died in an area affected by Ebola.

"We expect people to do the honorable thing," said Binyah Kesselly, chairman of the board of directors of the Liberia Airport Authority in Monrovia. The agency obtained permission from the Ministry of Justice to pursue the matter.

Neighbors in the Liberian capital believe Duncan become infected when he helped bundle a sick pregnant neighbor into a taxi a few weeks ago and set off with her to find treatment.

In Texas, health officials have reached out to about 80 people who may have had direct contact with the man who brought Ebola into the U.S. or someone close to him, a public-health spokeswoman said Thursday.

None of the people is showing symptoms, but health authorities have educated them about Ebola and told them to notify medical workers if they begin to feel ill.

The group will be monitored to see if anyone seeks medical care during the three weeks immediately following the time of contact, said Erikka Neroes, of the Dallas County Health and Human Services agency.

Ebola symptoms can include fever, muscle pain, vomiting and bleeding, and can appear as long as 21 days after exposure to the virus. The disease is not contagious until symptoms begin. It spreads only by close contact with an infected person's bodily fluids.

The 80 people include 12 to 18 who came in direct contact with the infected man, as well as others known to have had contact with them, she said.

"This is a big spider web" of people involved, Neroes said.

The initial group includes three members of the ambulance crew that took Duncan to the hospital, plus a handful of schoolchildren.

Health officials are focusing on containment to try to stem the possibility of the Ebola virus spreading beyond Duncan, who arrived in Dallas on Sept. 20 to visit relatives and fell ill a few days later.

His sister, Mai Wureh, identified Duncan as the infected man in an interview with The Associated Press.

A Dallas emergency room sent Duncan home last week, even though he told a nurse that he had been in disease-ravaged West Africa. The decision by Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital to release Duncan could have put others at risk of exposure to Ebola before the man went back to the ER a couple of days later when his condition worsened.

The patient explained to a nurse last Thursday that he was visiting the U.S. from Africa, but that information was not widely shared, said Dr. Mark Lester, who works for the hospital's parent company.

Hospital epidemiologist Dr. Edward Goodman said the patient had a fever and abdominal pain during his first ER visit, not the riskier symptoms of vomiting and diarrhea. Duncan was diagnosed with a low-risk infection and sent home, Lester said.

The hospital is reviewing how the situation would have been handled if all staff had been aware of the man's circumstances.

But the diagnosis, and the hospital's slip-up, highlighted the wider threat of Ebola, even far from Africa.

"The scrutiny just needs to be higher now," said Dr. Rade Vukmir, a spokesman for the American College of Emergency Physicians.

Duncan has been kept in isolation at the hospital since Sunday. He was listed Thursday in serious but stable condition.

Duncan's neighborhood, a collection of tin-roofed homes, has been ravaged by Ebola. So many people have fallen ill that neighbors are too frightened to comfort a 9-year-old girl who lost her mother to the disease.

The 19-year-old pregnant woman was convulsing and complaining of stomach pain, and everyone thought her problems were related to her pregnancy, in its seventh month. No ambulance would come for her, and the group that put her in a taxi never did find a hospital. She died, and in the following weeks, all the neighbors who helped have gotten sick or died, neighbors said.

Ebola is believed to have sickened more than 7,100 people in West Africa and killed more than 3,300, according to the World Health Organization. Liberia is one of the three countries hit hardest in the epidemic, along with Sierra Leone and Guinea.
 
I'm shocked that someone who wanted to get the hell out of Liberia would omit information that would keep him from being allowed to leave.
 
I'm shocked that someone who wanted to get the hell out of Liberia would omit information that would keep him from being allowed to leave.

Unreal... A questionnaire? A questionnaire used to help prevent the spread of what could become a global pandemic? Are they fucking stupid?
 
Unreal... A questionnaire? A questionnaire used to help prevent the spread of what could become a global pandemic? Are they fucking stupid?

Well, if you consider the incubation period between infection and being symptomatic, there really isn't screening that would truly be effective. That would seemingly lead to a quarantine being the most logical way to limit transmission, but I suspect the idea of a national quarantine makes bureaucrats and State Department types a bit uneasy. So, they go with the uncontroversial protocol that doesn't work versus the controversial one that does.

At least, that's how I see it.
 
  • Like
Reactions: KB

Rubber Rim Job Podcast Video

Episode 3-13: "Backup Bash Brothers"

Rubber Rim Job Podcast Spotify

Episode 3:11: "Clipping Bucks."
Top