Ebola outbreak, and other potential epidemics

[Standuble]

Don't know about "lies", but I am curious as to how this "20,000" figure that's continually being bandied about was arrived at.

I would have thought that they actually have no clue (especially how the virus has supposedly mutated several hundred times) and are quoting the figure becomes it sounds more impressive than 10,000 (which we are well on our way to already) and less far fetched than 30,000.

Please note that (from what I've read on the articles) 20,000 isn't quoted as the final figure but just one of several potential final figures to draw one's attention. I don't think they know how to bring it under control or what the final numbers would be. It could very well reach 100,000 or perhaps even a million before it is brought under control.

[adam2]

Death toll now approaching 2000, a substantial increase.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-29055041

Looks out of control IMHO

[PS_RalphW]

The separate outbreak in the Congo is also expanding rapidly.

[UndercoverElephant]

Looks out of control IMHO

Looks like nobody is denying that it is currently out of control. The big question is what it will take to get it under control, or how it might blow itself out. And looks like nobody knows the answer to those questions either.

[snow hope]

The cat is out of the bag and nobody can now stop it.

http://who.int/mediacentre/news/ebola/3 ... r-2014/en/

Things about to get very bad in Nigeria - the pandemic has started.....

[vtsnowedin]

Looks out of control IMHO

Looks like nobody is denying that it is currently out of control. The big question is what it will take to get it under control, or how it might blow itself out. And looks like nobody knows the answer to those questions either.

I don't know if we have any effective means to control it.In fact I think not. That leaves "blowing itself out" which involves people staying away from each other enough to avoid transmission which probably won't happen until three quarters of the local population is already infected and likely to die.

[UndercoverElephant]

The cat is out of the bag and nobody can now stop it.

http://who.int/mediacentre/news/ebola/3 ... r-2014/en/

Things about to get very bad in Nigeria - the pandemic has started.....

That looks potentially very nasty, and the authorities are clearly very worried indeed.

[adam2]

2,105 lives now lost according to world health organisation.
Suggestions of a possible treatment using the blood of those who have recovered from the infection.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-29084254

[adam2]

Another report here
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-29060239
The most doom laden report I have seen so far in MSM.

[vtsnowedin]

Another report here
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-29060239
The most doom laden report I have seen so far in MSM.

Yes quite grim indeed. There is no reason not to expect it to spread to all of Africa and with varied efforts and abilities for control there could easily be a twenty percent infection rate and a death rate of ten percent of the entire African population of one point one billion.
Guess I'll just scratch off the African safari hunt off my bucket list.

[UndercoverElephant]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/s ... a-outbreak

A four-day nationwide lockdown announced by the Sierra Leone government in a bid to contain the biggest ever outbreak of Ebola could instead exacerbate the spread of the disease, aid agencies have warned.

From 18 to 21 September people across the west African nation will not be allowed to leave their homes, a senior official in the president's office said on Friday.

But Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) raised concern about the drastic step, warning that it could lead people to try to conceal infections from the authorities.

A spokeswoman said: "It has been our experience that lockdowns and quarantines do not help control Ebola as they end up driving people underground and jeopardising the trust between people and health providers. This leads to the concealment of potential cases and ends up spreading the disease further."

[clv101]

It's worth remembering that 600,000+ people die of malaria each year (90% in Africa). Maybe Ebola has the potential to be worse but it's not there yet.

[vtsnowedin]

It's worth remembering that 600,000+ people die of malaria each year (90% in Africa). Maybe Ebola has the potential to be worse but it's not there yet.

Watch that number go up as the hospitals fill up with ebola patients and the people cant sort out victims of malaria from new cases of ebola. Dead is dead, but will they chalk up a death from malaria as really caused by the ebola panic?

[Little John]

It's worth remembering that 600,000+ people die of malaria each year (90% in Africa). Maybe Ebola has the potential to be worse but it's not there yet.

Watch that number go up as the hospitals fill up with ebola patients and the people cant sort out victims of malaria from new cases of ebola. Dead is dead, but will they chalk up a death from malaria as really caused by the ebola panic?

That should be statistically separable simply by summing all deaths that occur from ebola, malaria or "either"and then subtracting the expected malaria deaths from the total. What's left will be Ebola. So, for example, if the expected deaths from malaria per annum is 600k and the death total from ebola, malaria and "uncertain", when added together, comes to, say, 1.5 million, then the probable number of deaths from ebola would stand at 900k.

There would be some complications to the above calculation, of course, due to people dying from things they would otherwise not because of overstretched healthcare systems due to the ebola outbreak. However, these could be conceivably included in the ebola death total since they would still be a result of the outbreak no less than someone who died of it directly.

[UndercoverElephant]

It's worth remembering that 600,000+ people die of malaria each year (90% in Africa). Maybe Ebola has the potential to be worse but it's not there yet.

Watch that number go up as the hospitals fill up with ebola patients and the people cant sort out victims of malaria from new cases of ebola. Dead is dead, but will they chalk up a death from malaria as really caused by the ebola panic?

That should be statistically separable simply by summing all deaths that occur from ebola, malaria or "either"and then subtracting the expected malaria deaths from the total. What's left will be Ebola. So, for example, if the expected deaths from malaria per annum is 600k and the death total from ebola, malaria and "uncertain", when added together, comes to, say, 1.5 million, then the probable number of deaths from ebola would stand at 900k.

There would be some complications to the above calculation, of course, due to people dying from things they would otherwise not because of overstretched healthcare systems due to the ebola outbreak. However, these could be conceivably included in the ebola death total since they would still be a result of the outbreak no less than someone who died of it directly.

It becomes an academic exercise at that point though. The BBC article posted by adam2 basically sums it up: it looks like we're rapidly heading towards (if we aren't there already) the point where this thing is uncontainable. We've been talking about "epidemic" or "pandemic", but what we're actually looking at now is a newly endemic human pathogen in the "undeveloped" parts of the world.