SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
The Washington Post is reporting that the Center for Disease Control's director is warning that the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s Ebola outbreak may not be containable. The ongoing conflicts in the region might ensure that the disease becomes entrenched instead of coming under control. If it becomes endemic to the province then it will become impossible to trace contacts, stop transmission chains, and contain the outbreak. Apparently 60% to 80% of the newly-confirmed cases have no known epidemiological link to prior cases, indicating loss of control and fewer options for prevention or treatment. High level political attention is becoming needed at this point for there to be a solution.
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
CDC Director Warns that Congo’s Ebola Outbreak may not be Containable
|
Log In/Create an Account
| Top
| 41 comments
| Search Discussion
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Everything you know is wrong!
(Score: 0, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 10 2018, @10:08PM (4 children)
If they cant get any epidemiological links, perhaps its some other infection with similar symptoms like
typhoid, malaria, meningitis, or the flu? Its not like they are using accurate blood tests out in these villages (assuming an accurate test does even exist).
(Score: 4, Informative) by Spook brat on Sunday November 11 2018, @06:05AM (2 children)
From the CDC page on Ebola: [cdc.gov]
Most of the early symptoms can be easily confused with the flu and other diseases; but the open, weeping sores in late infection are a dead giveaway. It may be too late at that point, unfortunately.
The diagnosis page [cdc.gov] suggests that a critical part of diagnosis for Ebola is knowing that the patient has been exposed:
As a result, not knowing that the patient has been exposed makes it hard to justify taking blood samples and doing expensive blood work to check for ebola. This leads to a false diagnosis, patient death, and a new outbreak that must be contained, if possible.
Accurate blood tests do exist, they are effective as early as the onset of fever symptoms, and the large overlap with other similar clusters of symptoms means that it's prohibitive to use the blood test unless it can be justified with epidemiology. Which they can't do if the patient doesn't know that the warlord whose land they just bribed their way through was manning the checkpoints with ebola-positive guards. They find out that it's not meningitis/flu/malaria when the patient's skin starts liquifying, but that's not a preferred method for discovering that the original diagnosis was a false negative for ebola.
Travel the galaxy! Meet fascinating life forms... And kill them [schlockmercenary.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 11 2018, @06:41PM (1 child)
I would have used the WHO page since those definitions would apply here, but it sounds like you agree with me anyway.
(Score: 2) by Spook brat on Monday November 12 2018, @12:25PM
Knock yourself out. [who.int] I don't find the WHO website anywhere near as useful for quick reference; it's poorly organized, and when I drilled down to a diagnostics page I was met with a PDF about blood tests. Around here linking directly to PDFs is frowned upon.
Of course, I'm indulging your preference for WHO despite the fact that the nature of Ebola doesn't change depending on where in the world it occurs; I'm fairly certain that its symptoms are the same whether it's contracted in the Congo or the Carolinas. And assuming that you're not just trolling...
<img src="notSureIf.png">
Travel the galaxy! Meet fascinating life forms... And kill them [schlockmercenary.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 11 2018, @01:07PM
Not knowing everything is not the same as not knowing anything.
Reread this part again: