Measles is Killing More People in the DRC Than Ebola-And Faster:
Since January 2019, officials have recorded over 100,000 measles cases in the DRC, mostly in children, and nearly 2,000 have died. The figures surpass those of the latest Ebola outbreak in the country, which has tallied not quite 2,500 cases and 1,665 deaths since August 2018. The totals were noted by World Health Organization Director-General, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, in a speech today, July 15, at the United Nations Office in Geneva, Switzerland.
"Frankly, I am embarrassed to talk only about Ebola," Dr. Tedros said (he goes by his first name). He gave the speech in response to two new developments in the Ebola outbreak. That is that two Ebola responders were murdered in their home in the DRC city of Beni, and that officials on Sunday had identified the first case of Ebola in Goma, a DRC city of over one million at the border with Rwanda.
"Both of these events encapsulate the challenges we continue to face on a daily basis in DRC," he said. Tedros was referring to the scattering of disease—including Ebola and measles—as violence hampers outbreak responses and access to medical care. Since January, officials have counted 198 attacks on health responders, which left seven dead and 58 healthcare works and patients injured.
[...] So far, the Ebola outbreak has largely stayed in DRC's North Kivu and Ituri provinces, which sit on the eastern side of the country and border South Sudan, Uganda, and Rwanda. The measles outbreak, on the other hand, has spanned at least 23 of the country's 26 provinces. The health ministry declared an outbreak on June 10 and noted a 700% spike in the case count over the count in the first half of last year.
"And yet it gets little international attention," Dr. Tedro noted, adding that malaria also kills more than 50,000 people each year in the DRC.
Measles cases in developed countries are rarely fatal because of the availability of effective treatment at health care facilities. Measles is one of the most contagious diseases — just entering a room where an infected person passed through a few hours ago could lead to an infection because the disease exhibits airborne transmission. Further, people who have measles are contagious for 1-4 days before they exhibit any symptoms.
Should an outbreak take hold, it could overwhelm facilities' ability to treat all infected people. This is especially so if such an outbreak came during, say, flu season when hospitals are already under an increased load and fewer beds would be available for a concomitant measles outbreak.
And not just for your own health, either. Infants and the immune-compromized rely on herd immunity to keep them safe. As long as something like 93% of people have been vaccinated and have the vaccine "take", any instance of the disease would be hard-pressed to encounter another host to infect. At lower vaccination rates, there are enough susceptible people around that disease transmission becomes increasingly possible to the point that an epidemic could arise.
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Ebola Outbreak Declared Global Health Emergency
Submitted via IRC for Bytram
Ebola outbreak declared global health emergency
The World Health Organization has declared the Ebola crisis in the Democratic Republic of Congo a "public health emergency of international concern". The move may encourage wealthy donor countries to provide more cash.
But the WHO stopped short of saying borders should be closed, saying the risk of the disease spreading outside the region was not high.
The outbreak in DR Congo has killed more than 1,600 people. This week, the first case was detected in Goma, home to more than a million. The PHEIC emergency provision is the highest level of alarm the WHO can sound and has only been used four times previously. This includes the Ebola epidemic that devastated parts of West Africa from 2014 to 2016, and killed more than 11,000 people.
"It is time for the world to take notice," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a news conference in Geneva on Wednesday at which the emergency was declared. He said he accepted recommendations there should be no restrictions on travel or trade, and no entry screening of passengers at ports or airports outside the immediate region.
"While it does not change the reality on the ground for victims or partners engaged in the response, we hope it will bring the international attention that this crisis deserves," it said in a statement.
WHO Declares Ebola Outbreak an International Emergency
From WHO declares Ebola outbreak an international emergency
The World Health Organization on Wednesday declared the nearly year-long Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).
The outbreak was declared on August 1, 2018 and has tallied 2,512 cases and 1,676 deaths. So far, it's centered in the DRC's North Kivu and Ituri provinces, which are on the eastern side of the country bordering South Sudan, Uganda, and Rwanda.
The declaration Wednesday follows the spread of Ebola to Goma, a DRC city of nearly 2 million people at the border with Rwanda that acts as hub of regional transportation. On Sunday, health workers there confirmed the city's first case in a 47-year-old pastor who had just arrived from Butembo, a DRC city that has struggled with the outbreak since last December.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies welcomed the move.
Previously: Measles is Killing More People in the DRC than Ebola-and Faster
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @05:11PM
We need to send in US imperialism quick!! Ermagherd! We have to save them from the Moooooooooooooooslems! And make sure the right US puppet assumes power, no matter how many electoral irregularities! Send in Diebold! They'll know what to do.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @06:41PM (12 children)
False, infants are protected by maternal antibodies. And these places just need sanitation and antibiotics.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:17PM (2 children)
Whenever a news piece about infectious diseases appears, a stinking anti-vaxer little piece of shit is never far behind...
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:29PM (1 child)
stfu, you little suck up bitch.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:55PM
Why do I keep arguing with myself?! I look like such a tool when I do this...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @08:03PM (1 child)
But seemingly only in the case where the mother has natural immunity (i.e. caught measles as a child sans vacination).
It seems that part of the reason behind recent cases of repeated "boosters" is that the vaccine induced immunity fades over time, and each booster is less effective.
Thereafter the mother may not manage to pass any maternal anti-bodies, hence requiring that that infant also be vaccinated.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @08:12PM
The maternal antibodies wane faster from vaccinated mothers, which means they should move up the age of vaccination.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @09:04PM (6 children)
Antibiotics do not work against viruses. Antivirals might, although as of 2009 there weren't any that meet ideal parameters for measles [nih.gov] - not an "ideal drug" mind you, just one that meets the conditions for good deployment.
Oh, and what happens to the maternal antibodies when the infant stops breastfeeding?
So much for the "intelligent" objector.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @09:56PM (5 children)
The main complication of measles is bacterial pneumonia. Measles itself is not dangerous, only the complications.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @10:44PM (4 children)
Good. You're aware that obtaining a viral disease puts the body at risk for other comorbidities as your immune system is thus compromised. Therefore not acquiring the disease at all is a good thing. Which is why vaccination.
Funny that, you avoid getting the parent disease there is no need for further medications and no cormorbidities of the disease you didn't get. No further expense, either, freeing up that ED bed for someone else.
Thanks for playing.
And PS: You're aware that bacterial pneumonia is only responsible for about 60% of deaths as a result of measles?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @11:08PM (3 children)
I am aware of much more than you... I can tell you are an idiot who learns from wikipedia.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 17 2019, @07:00AM
Better that than an idiot that can't learn from wikipedia.
And I still look like a tool for arguing with myself.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday July 17 2019, @08:55AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 17 2019, @05:31PM
Parent AC here.
Wrong again, my knowledge and experience comes from a quite stronger source. I can tell my credentials are far better than yours by what you've been saying.
Three strikes. You're out. Buh-bye.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:57PM (9 children)
Ebola does show a 67% mortality rate versus measles' 2% mortality rate.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday July 16 2019, @08:37PM (8 children)
That is an IMPORTANT distinction. God and the devil are arguing about you, and you are given the choice of catching one of ten different diseases. First has 100% mortality rate, working down to measles, which only has a 2% mortality rate. My answer would be, "Everyone wants to go to heaven, but I don't want to go right now, Lord. I'll take those measles, please!"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @09:05PM (4 children)
Not sure if you're being sarcastic or don't recognize the false equivalency.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday July 16 2019, @10:27PM (3 children)
Explain this "false equivalency" please. Disease A has a high mortality rate, disease B has a much lower mortality rate. Which would you rather have?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @10:35PM (2 children)
It's not an either-or. It can be "neither", you know. But apologies, you're right that it's not false equivalence. It's false dichotomy.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday July 16 2019, @11:00PM (1 child)
OK, neither. So, you are hypothesizing a world without disease? We're going to stamp out measles, malaria, ebola, AIDS, cancers, all of it? All within the next six months, or the next six generations? Sorry, ain't happening. We aren't even close to wiping out cancer.
You can make valid arguments that measles should be pretty much eliminated by now. If there were a world-wide drive against it, like there has been against polio, maybe it would be as rare as polio is today. But, humans are human, and they mostly refuse to cooperate on a world wide basis, so we are where we are today.
If you are going to fear disease (I think we all do, some more, some less) then you might reserve your energies for those disease that are most lethal. Hemorhaggic fevers are real bitches. All of them seem to have fatality rates well over 50%. Measles? Sorry, I just can't get on board with doomsday visions of measles killing off the human race.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 17 2019, @05:47PM
It can be both, too. All I'm saying is you're trying to make black and white choices in a place where they don't apply.
Mealses and Ebola have vaccines. There is a vaccine for the strains of HPV which are linked to certain cancers. AIDS has had ones in trial, not sure where they're at with that, but it isn't in general use (although PrEP and PEP are). Malaria and other cancers do not have vaccines.
Measles WAS eliminated in the United States, in 2000. There were no continuous transmissions of the disease for 12 months and the vaccination rate seemed enough for herd immunity for the cases still occurring overseas. We can thank ourselves, in part, for the current outbreak. Maybe we can get back to a point of elimination again.
Polio, in case you hadn't noticed, is now only natively occurring in three countries. World-wide cooperation has been proven to work in this regard. We might well live to see the disease completely wiped out in our lifetimes.
Here's the acid test for whether to promote vaccination: Is the rate of severe and serious complications from the disease greater or less than the rate of serious and severe complications from the vaccination? The economics of vaccine cost is important (it's one reason Polio still isn't quite there yet - oral vaccine is still cheaper than inactivated injection). However, the economics of vaccinations change when new decisions are undertaken to expand coverage. But it doesn't take "killing off the human race" to be concerned about a disease that is preventable. And the 110,000 that died in 2017 [google.com] from measles didn't deserve that, and could have been part of the 21.1 million who haven't died from the disease because vaccination (same source).
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @09:09PM (2 children)
Haha. I always find it interesting how many so-called "believer" are scared to death of dying, while so many non-believers actually welcome it when the symptoms of an incurable illness (or its treatments, like chemo) become too much to bear.
For a bunch of people convinced they're part of their invisible-friend's privileged group and are going to heaven, they sure are desperate to avoid it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @10:36PM (1 child)
Yeah. Haven't met a lot of dying people, have you.... It's pretty scary no matter your faith beliefs.
But you're more than welcome to die, we won't miss you.
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Wednesday July 17 2019, @08:52AM
It's usually the religious nutjobs who are most against assisted suicide, and suicide in general.
(in the U.S. those same jobs are all up for killing people though, through war and the death penalty, despite "Thou shall not kill")
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Wednesday July 17 2019, @04:36AM (2 children)
511 words in TFS, and not one mention of what "DRC" means.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 17 2019, @07:03AM
Democratic Republic Congo.
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Wednesday July 17 2019, @08:50AM
Why would there be? If it said "USA" or "UK" would you expect it to be expanded?
Top result in ddg is the country.