Ebola outbreak, and other potential epidemics

[PS_RalphW]

I've been predicting a population collapse in India for a while, although I was expecting famine and not for a decade or two. However, I think Indian culture is one of the most resilient on the planet. It will recover and thrive. Only people will die.

[Little John]

....I'm going to stick my head out and predict that we are now going to see an absolute minimum of 1,000,000 deaths during this outbreak, and that it highly likely that more people will die in this initial ebola pandemic than died in the flu pandemic of 1918-1920....

I think your guess is not far fetched at all. If I knew for a fact that, let's say, this country was going to be overwhelmed by it, I would take my chances and try to deliberately get infected very early on in the pandemic. That way, I would stand the best chance of medical treatment and, in turn, the best chance of survival. Assuming I survived it, I would then be immune.

[biffvernon]

If we didn't have aircraft, things would move more slowly:

https://imgur.com/QHUyH1e

Travel times from London in 1914.

[Little John]

Any chance of reducing the size of that map please Biff?

[fuzzy]

....I'm going to stick my head out and predict that we are now going to see an absolute minimum of 1,000,000 deaths during this outbreak, and that it highly likely that more people will die in this initial ebola pandemic than died in the flu pandemic of 1918-1920....

I think your guess is not far fetched at all. If I knew for a fact that, let's say, this country was going to be overwhelmed by it, I would take my chances and try to deliberately get infected very early on in the pandemic. That way, I would stand the best chance of medical treatment and, in turn, the best chance of survival. Assuming I survived it, I would then be immune.

Early infections will get the full monty, if only for PR - see:

'This morning ABC reported that Romero is conscious, breathing on her own, and that she has received another dose of serum from Sister Paciencia, added to the two doses she received yesterday from the nun. On Wednesday she received a dose from another of the nuns from Liberia who had survived the virus, and on Tuesday another two (six in total). The assistant is also taking the antiviral favipravir'

[UndercoverElephant]

....I'm going to stick my head out and predict that we are now going to see an absolute minimum of 1,000,000 deaths during this outbreak, and that it highly likely that more people will die in this initial ebola pandemic than died in the flu pandemic of 1918-1920....

I think your guess is not far fetched at all. If I knew for a fact that, let's say, this country was going to be overwhelmed by it, I would take my chances and try to deliberately get infected very early on in the pandemic. That way, I would stand the best chance of medical treatment and, in turn, the best chance of survival. Assuming I survived it, I would then be immune.

Interesting strategy.

[PS_RalphW]

However, the longer you hold it off, the better chance of a vaccine being developed. I would jump at the chance of being a vaccine Guinea pig.

[Little John]

....I'm going to stick my head out and predict that we are now going to see an absolute minimum of 1,000,000 deaths during this outbreak, and that it highly likely that more people will die in this initial ebola pandemic than died in the flu pandemic of 1918-1920....

I think your guess is not far fetched at all. If I knew for a fact that, let's say, this country was going to be overwhelmed by it, I would take my chances and try to deliberately get infected very early on in the pandemic. That way, I would stand the best chance of medical treatment and, in turn, the best chance of survival. Assuming I survived it, I would then be immune.

Interesting strategy.

My reasoning is based on what I have read about it so far. In Africa, with reasonable medical treatment, the mortality rate is around 50%. With limited medical treatment, the mortality rate is anywhere up to around 70%. In Western countries, the death rate seems to be well under 50% (albeit with a very small sample size) if caught early enough and with the full gamut of modern treatment methods thrown at it. We can be sure, however, if we were overrun with the disease, then mortality rates would quickly match those of Africa. As for sitting it out for a vaccine, that's a complete unknown.

[PS_RalphW]

The problem with developing vaccines is the mutation rate of the virus. The key is to find an element of one of the genes that is both critical to the virus and is expressed on the surface of the resulting protein. Then duplicating the sequence in benign form, eg. Splicing it into harmless virus, you can train your immune system and prime to recognise the virus and have white blood cells ready and waiting to attack it. It needs to be based on a critical sequence, so that any mutation would be fatal or seriously hinder the virus survival and reproduction.

Edit

The uk man in Macedonia appears to have died of excess alcohol, possibly of very dubious quality. My guess at a perforated ulcer my not have been far off.

[madibe]

According to 'an expert' this morning on BBC Radio 4, there will be approximately 10,000 more infections before it is brought under control.



Since we are on the exponential, that will be day after tomorrow then.

[madibe]

Brazilian health officials quarantine a Guinean man feared to have Ebola after he checked in at a clinic with a fever following his arrival from Africa last month.

Source:

http://videos.oneindia.in/watch/101973/ ... ebola.html

[fifthcolumn]

You lot are the most paranoid and pessimistic bunch so it's pretty good to come on here to see what you think.

While I'm not ruling anything out (for example UE's horror story of 50 million dead (like as in the Spanish flu epidemic) and that cases could get out of control and start spreading in the first world countries, so far there are some data points.

1. The countries surrounding the hot zone aren't importing any cases that we know of
2. Sporadic cases are coming in to first world countries from citizens or visa holders (which are extremely limited)
3. I suspect there are very few new visas being issued
4. People in Gabon have up to 30% of the population in Ebola areas with natural immunity. Perhaps some of those in the three most affected country also have natural immunity
5. The RO of Ebola is low: 1.4-2.0 people infected per ebola patient. From july to september it appeared to be 1.4 in liberia. I haven't checked any of the other countries.
6. Although the actively incubating caseload is likely underestimated in the hotzone, the deaths are likely a lot closer since the bodies are getting buried.
7. The numbers appear (to me) to be up to 120,000 infected between the three countries if it doesn't slow down (by january)
8. Watching the Dallas thing was interesting. In spite of the many and almost comical screw ups, there doesn't appear (so far) to be any secondary cases. We're not out of the woods till about the 18-20th October so it's too early to be sure.
9. The Spanish nurse who caught it, was infected exactly the same way the other health care workers who were flown out were infected: accidentally touched themselves with infected PPE
10. Although it *bloody well is* airborne (i.e. it can be coughed, spit or vomited on to you), there doesn't appear to have been anyone infected that way in Dallas despite the guy vomiting all over the place and despite the unprotected Mexicans power washing the vomit off the street with no protection.
11. GSK, Health Canada and a few others are ramping up production of vaccine as we speak.
12. Said vaccines are being tested on the ground by health workers in Mali, which borders the hot zone
13. Troops are on the ground in the hot zone attempting to build hospitals


So.... let's wait and see what happens before panicking.

That said, I'm not saying don't add to your SHTF stockpile in case things do go sideways because after all, things have gone bloody sideways in the hotzone and the difference between us and them is simply the number of hospitals/health care workers per 100,000. If enough cases expand from index cases here then even though we have 100 times more health care workers we willl be overwhelmed too. It will just take a few extra doublings.
e.g. 2 4 8 16 32 64 128 etc...

[vtsnowedin]

You lot are the most paranoid and pessimistic bunch so it's pretty good to come on here to see what you think.

While I'm not ruling anything out (for example UE's horror story of 50 million dead (like as in the Spanish flu epidemic) and that cases could get out of control and start spreading in the first world countries, so far there are some data points.

1. The countries surrounding the hot zone aren't importing any cases that we know of
2. Sporadic cases are coming in to first world countries from citizens or visa holders (which are extremely limited)
3. I suspect there are very few new visas being issued
4. People in Gabon have up to 30% of the population in Ebola areas with natural immunity. Perhaps some of those in the three most affected country also have natural immunity
5. The RO of Ebola is low: 1.4-2.0 people infected per ebola patient. From july to september it appeared to be 1.4 in liberia. I haven't checked any of the other countries.
6. Although the actively incubating caseload is likely underestimated in the hotzone, the deaths are likely a lot closer since the bodies are getting buried.
7. The numbers appear (to me) to be up to 120,000 infected between the three countries if it doesn't slow down (by january)
8. Watching the Dallas thing was interesting. In spite of the many and almost comical screw ups, there doesn't appear (so far) to be any secondary cases. We're not out of the woods till about the 18-20th October so it's too early to be sure.
9. The Spanish nurse who caught it, was infected exactly the same way the other health care workers who were flown out were infected: accidentally touched themselves with infected PPE
10. Although it *bloody well is* airborne (i.e. it can be coughed, spit or vomited on to you), there doesn't appear to have been anyone infected that way in Dallas despite the guy vomiting all over the place and despite the unprotected Mexicans power washing the vomit off the street with no protection.
11. GSK, Health Canada and a few others are ramping up production of vaccine as we speak.
12. Said vaccines are being tested on the ground by health workers in Mali, which borders the hot zone
13. Troops are on the ground in the hot zone attempting to build hospitals


So.... let's wait and see what happens before panicking.

That said, I'm not saying don't add to your SHTF stockpile in case things do go sideways because after all, things have gone bloody sideways in the hotzone and the difference between us and them is simply the number of hospitals/health care workers per 100,000. If enough cases expand from index cases here then even though we have 100 times more health care workers we willl be overwhelmed too. It will just take a few extra doublings.
e.g. 2 4 8 16 32 64 128 etc...

I think your numbers 6 and 7 are off the mark. Areas where it is the hottest have all officialdom either busy with the living or absent. No one is taking accurate counts or filling out reports. So using Lab confirmed cases is a serious under count and anything projected from official figures may be off by factors of two to four. You number seven may be low by a factor of ten by the end of January. Check back in twenty and then forty days and see a much clearer picture of where we are today viewed in hindsight.

[fifthcolumn]

You lot are the most paranoid and pessimistic bunch so it's pretty good to come on here to see what you think.

While I'm not ruling anything out (for example UE's horror story of 50 million dead (like as in the Spanish flu epidemic) and that cases could get out of control and start spreading in the first world countries, so far there are some data points.

1. The countries surrounding the hot zone aren't importing any cases that we know of
2. Sporadic cases are coming in to first world countries from citizens or visa holders (which are extremely limited)
3. I suspect there are very few new visas being issued
4. People in Gabon have up to 30% of the population in Ebola areas with natural immunity. Perhaps some of those in the three most affected country also have natural immunity
5. The RO of Ebola is low: 1.4-2.0 people infected per ebola patient. From july to september it appeared to be 1.4 in liberia. I haven't checked any of the other countries.
6. Although the actively incubating caseload is likely underestimated in the hotzone, the deaths are likely a lot closer since the bodies are getting buried.
7. The numbers appear (to me) to be up to 120,000 infected between the three countries if it doesn't slow down (by january)
8. Watching the Dallas thing was interesting. In spite of the many and almost comical screw ups, there doesn't appear (so far) to be any secondary cases. We're not out of the woods till about the 18-20th October so it's too early to be sure.
9. The Spanish nurse who caught it, was infected exactly the same way the other health care workers who were flown out were infected: accidentally touched themselves with infected PPE
10. Although it *bloody well is* airborne (i.e. it can be coughed, spit or vomited on to you), there doesn't appear to have been anyone infected that way in Dallas despite the guy vomiting all over the place and despite the unprotected Mexicans power washing the vomit off the street with no protection.
11. GSK, Health Canada and a few others are ramping up production of vaccine as we speak.
12. Said vaccines are being tested on the ground by health workers in Mali, which borders the hot zone
13. Troops are on the ground in the hot zone attempting to build hospitals


So.... let's wait and see what happens before panicking.

That said, I'm not saying don't add to your SHTF stockpile in case things do go sideways because after all, things have gone bloody sideways in the hotzone and the difference between us and them is simply the number of hospitals/health care workers per 100,000. If enough cases expand from index cases here then even though we have 100 times more health care workers we willl be overwhelmed too. It will just take a few extra doublings.
e.g. 2 4 8 16 32 64 128 etc...

I think your numbers 6 and 7 are off the mark. Areas where it is the hottest have all officialdom either busy with the living or absent. No one is taking accurate counts or filling out reports. So using Lab confirmed cases is a serious under count and anything projected from official figures may be off by factors of two to four. You number seven may be low by a factor of ten by the end of January. Check back in twenty and then forty days and see a much clearer picture of where we are today viewed in hindsight.

Nope. The deaths are reported by those who are burying the bodies.
And it's not even possible for a jump of 8 times. That would mean the virus is six weeks ahead of the number of deaths. Which it isn't.

But as you say, let's check back and we'll see.

[fuzzy]

Vaccine trials in Africa:

http://globalbiodefense.com/2014/10/10/ ... st-africa/