Aa
New threat~ Ebola Hysteria
Experts Offer Steps for Avoiding Public Hysteria, a Different Contagious Threat
As health officials scramble to explain how two nurses in Dallas became infected with Ebola, psychologists are increasingly concerned about another kind of contagion, whose symptoms range from heightened anxiety to avoidance of public places to full-blown hysteria.
So far, emergency rooms have not been overwhelmed with people afraid that they have caught the Ebola virus, and no one is hiding in the basement and hoarding food. But there is little doubt that the events of the past week have left the public increasingly worried, particularly the admission by Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, that the initial response to the first Ebola case diagnosed in the United States was inadequate.
Ebola May Pose Little Threat to U.S., but It Looms Large on TwitterAUG. 10, 2014
On Wednesday, the C.D.C. offered up the latest piece of bad news, announcing that a second infected nurse in Dallas had flown back from Cleveland a day before developing symptoms. Even before the announcement, two-thirds of the respondents to a Washington Post-ABC News poll said they were concerned about a widespread epidemic of Ebola in this country.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/16/health/ebolas-other-contagious-threat-hysteria.html?_r=0
As health officials scramble to explain how two nurses in Dallas became infected with Ebola, psychologists are increasingly concerned about another kind of contagion, whose symptoms range from heightened anxiety to avoidance of public places to full-blown hysteria.
So far, emergency rooms have not been overwhelmed with people afraid that they have caught the Ebola virus, and no one is hiding in the basement and hoarding food. But there is little doubt that the events of the past week have left the public increasingly worried, particularly the admission by Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, that the initial response to the first Ebola case diagnosed in the United States was inadequate.
Ebola May Pose Little Threat to U.S., but It Looms Large on TwitterAUG. 10, 2014
On Wednesday, the C.D.C. offered up the latest piece of bad news, announcing that a second infected nurse in Dallas had flown back from Cleveland a day before developing symptoms. Even before the announcement, two-thirds of the respondents to a Washington Post-ABC News poll said they were concerned about a widespread epidemic of Ebola in this country.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/16/health/ebolas-other-contagious-threat-hysteria.html?_r=0
Great interview with bioethicist Ezekiel Emmanuel on BBC America today that puts a lot of this into perspective.
Loading them onto planes? Logistics nightmare to get one infected person on the plane at the right time, past screeners, not to mention finding a willing 'martyr'. Unprofessional fear-mongering is right. Or Right.
Loading them onto planes? Logistics nightmare to get one infected person on the plane at the right time, past screeners, not to mention finding a willing 'martyr'. Unprofessional fear-mongering is right. Or Right.
I don't know about anyone trying to purposely infect Americans though I'm sure some wouldn't mind. I don't think a temporary travel ban from infected countries would be such a bad idea.
This was a good stock buying opportunity.."be greedy when others are fearful"
I remember all of the turmoil over aids....
Thank you Mike, I think after I read the Natural News article that you posted I got scared. I took that as the truth of what was happening. :)
I just read this article where a nurse from Britain contracted Ebola, came home, is cured and is going back to Sierra Leone.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-29456849
I just read this article where a nurse from Britain contracted Ebola, came home, is cured and is going back to Sierra Leone.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-29456849
This is fear-mongering at its worst.
Medical professionals can be idiots too.
Medical professionals can be idiots too.
But limiting travel is a waste of time and won't work....
You're so right, as soon as I get used to one sensational article another one comes out. If the hospitals could not control MRSA, or CDIF, or staff it does not give me much confidence that they can control Ebola.
The CDC screwed up with what is required to keep health workers safe. They have admitted it, that is why they are redoing their guide lines. The clothing health care workers were wearing was not adequate. Evidently their necks were not covered, they were using tape.
The nurses have been requesting training for months. They did not feel they were ready.
I think that is why the nurses have been moved to hospital better equipped to take care of them. Also the hospital in Texas has lost most of their business, there are many people worried and afraid.
I just heard that a doctor who returned here about a month ago, with Ebola, was taken to Emory Hospital has been discharged. He asked for privacy, who can blame him? He will provide an update when he is feeling better.
If someone has returned to the US with no one knowing then there are others here that we know nothing about.
Barb, I just saw the same thing, that ISIS or any enemy could have their people fly here infected with Ebola, blow themselves up in a mall or heavily congested area.
I remember when our post office in DC got a letter with Anthrax in it. The Supreme Court received a letter and it was shut down for weeks, put all employees on antibiotics.
Take Care, Dee
The CDC screwed up with what is required to keep health workers safe. They have admitted it, that is why they are redoing their guide lines. The clothing health care workers were wearing was not adequate. Evidently their necks were not covered, they were using tape.
The nurses have been requesting training for months. They did not feel they were ready.
I think that is why the nurses have been moved to hospital better equipped to take care of them. Also the hospital in Texas has lost most of their business, there are many people worried and afraid.
I just heard that a doctor who returned here about a month ago, with Ebola, was taken to Emory Hospital has been discharged. He asked for privacy, who can blame him? He will provide an update when he is feeling better.
If someone has returned to the US with no one knowing then there are others here that we know nothing about.
Barb, I just saw the same thing, that ISIS or any enemy could have their people fly here infected with Ebola, blow themselves up in a mall or heavily congested area.
I remember when our post office in DC got a letter with Anthrax in it. The Supreme Court received a letter and it was shut down for weeks, put all employees on antibiotics.
Take Care, Dee
I had a medical professional mention, today, that it would make sense for IS to try to get ebola into the U.S - great way to kill off a good share of the population. This person thinks they will be sending over as many as they can get on planes - now there's panic material for you...
DMD.........disease of mass destruction!!!!!!!!!
Teeheehee
Teeheehee
Actually, I was listening to cnn a while ago and they said the WHO has said, it would make more sense to use a 42 day quarantine, and they said the virus has shown signs of mutation in humans with each one showing a sign the virus may be mutating. Whatever that means.
The hysteria is growing faster than the virus they say and then right about the time things are looking better, they say something like this.....
The hysteria is growing faster than the virus they say and then right about the time things are looking better, they say something like this.....
There some people here locally losing their minds over the hysteria.
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/ebola-virus-outbreak/ebola-america-has-fever-broken-n229916
"It’s been 21 days and none of the people in closest contact with Thomas Eric Duncan in the days before he was hospitalized has gotten sick. That includes his fiancée Louise Troh and her children, who were in a small Dallas apartment with an increasingly ill Duncan for days, and forcibly kept inside for days afterward.
No one else has carried Ebola into the country yet, and since Wednesday, no more nurses or other health care workers who took care of Duncan have been infected.
What has been seen is what the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other experts predicted would happen — that someone might carry Ebola into the United States, and that they might even infect a few other people. What CDC has always promised is that it would stop there.
“I for one, am quite encouraged by the fact that 21 days have elapsed and Thomas Duncan’s family have not become ill,” said Jennifer Nuzzo, a senior associate at the University of Pittsburgh Medical School’s Center for Health Security. “It’s further evidence of what public health specialists have been saying: that this virus is not easily transmitted.”
'Extraordinary Contact' and Extraordinary Measures
Nurses Amber Vinson and Nina Pham had “extraordinary contact” with Duncan and, as in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, they were at the highest risk. People who lived with Duncan, rode in vehicles with him and spoke with him did not catch Ebola.
“It’s starting to show us the science we talked about at the very beginning is working,” said Dallas mayor Mike Rawlings.
Yet schools have closed, teachers and students who might have been in contact with someone who was in contact with a patient have been asked to stay home. Public schools in Moore, Oklahoma, have said they will ask students and an administrator to stay home because they were on a cruise ship with an uninfected — and now cleared — lab worker who handled Duncan’s blood. Doctors say the chance that any of those students could be infected is zero.
Members of Congress continue to demand travel bans even though every expert who knows about such measures has said they not only don’t work, but they could make matters worse. People who have merely traveled to Liberia are asked to stay away from speaking engagements.
Vigilance Where It's Needed
The past three weeks have illustrated just how difficult it is to be vigilant about an infectious disease without swerving into overkill. If Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital had been thinking Ebola, Duncan would have been isolated and treated on Sept. 25 and wouldn’t have been so ill when he did start getting treatment.
It’s impossible to say that he may have lived, but experience shows that prompt treatment does raise the survival rate. And now the CDC is planning to issue new, clearer guidelines about what gear nurses and other health care workers should wear to protect themselves.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if the new guidelines today were more streamlined,” Nuzzo said.
And while the CDC’s been lambasted for not having been more forceful with hospitals, former Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt points out that local officials and even individual hospitals were also supposed to have been on the ball. “States and local governments, not just in Dallas, not just in Nebraska, not just in Bethesda, have got to be prepared for this," Leavitt said on MSNBC’s Daily Rundown.
“As it spreads across Africa the likelihood of it returning to the United States is high and we need to be ready for that.”
A Beer Can In Snake's Clothing?
More than 9,000 people have been infected in West Africa and while half have been confirmed to have died, the World Health Organization says the numbers are certainly higher. The epidemic is not even close to being under control and aid organizations say the help they’ve been screaming for is slow to arrive.
As long as the epidemic rages, people are likely to carry the virus elsewhere. That doesn’t mean the system has failed, Nuzzo says. “People are on high alert. So finding a case here and there in a hospital is not a case of the system failing but of the system working,” she said.
It may also mean more school closures.
“It’s unfortunate but understandable because people are acting on their emotions,” she said. “If shutting down a school to clean it means people will feel safer going the next day, then it is worth doing.”
Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins has a folksy way of explaining such reactions.
"I've seen and heard of horses spooked by a snake and go running and that's probably a really good idea if you’re a horse,” he told a news conference Monday.
“I’ve seen and heard of horses spooked by a beer can. And beer cans don't usually attack horses often. So there's not much reason for running from a beer can. This is more of a beer can at this point than a snake.”
However, calls for travels bans will also pick up. And if another case appears, it may be more difficult to say no to such calls, says Dr. Peter Hotez, an infectious diseases expert at the Baylor College of Medicine.
“That is something we have to actively fight against,” Nuzzo said. “It may make people feel better but it won’t make them any safer.”
"It’s been 21 days and none of the people in closest contact with Thomas Eric Duncan in the days before he was hospitalized has gotten sick. That includes his fiancée Louise Troh and her children, who were in a small Dallas apartment with an increasingly ill Duncan for days, and forcibly kept inside for days afterward.
No one else has carried Ebola into the country yet, and since Wednesday, no more nurses or other health care workers who took care of Duncan have been infected.
What has been seen is what the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other experts predicted would happen — that someone might carry Ebola into the United States, and that they might even infect a few other people. What CDC has always promised is that it would stop there.
“I for one, am quite encouraged by the fact that 21 days have elapsed and Thomas Duncan’s family have not become ill,” said Jennifer Nuzzo, a senior associate at the University of Pittsburgh Medical School’s Center for Health Security. “It’s further evidence of what public health specialists have been saying: that this virus is not easily transmitted.”
'Extraordinary Contact' and Extraordinary Measures
Nurses Amber Vinson and Nina Pham had “extraordinary contact” with Duncan and, as in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, they were at the highest risk. People who lived with Duncan, rode in vehicles with him and spoke with him did not catch Ebola.
“It’s starting to show us the science we talked about at the very beginning is working,” said Dallas mayor Mike Rawlings.
Yet schools have closed, teachers and students who might have been in contact with someone who was in contact with a patient have been asked to stay home. Public schools in Moore, Oklahoma, have said they will ask students and an administrator to stay home because they were on a cruise ship with an uninfected — and now cleared — lab worker who handled Duncan’s blood. Doctors say the chance that any of those students could be infected is zero.
Members of Congress continue to demand travel bans even though every expert who knows about such measures has said they not only don’t work, but they could make matters worse. People who have merely traveled to Liberia are asked to stay away from speaking engagements.
Vigilance Where It's Needed
The past three weeks have illustrated just how difficult it is to be vigilant about an infectious disease without swerving into overkill. If Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital had been thinking Ebola, Duncan would have been isolated and treated on Sept. 25 and wouldn’t have been so ill when he did start getting treatment.
It’s impossible to say that he may have lived, but experience shows that prompt treatment does raise the survival rate. And now the CDC is planning to issue new, clearer guidelines about what gear nurses and other health care workers should wear to protect themselves.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if the new guidelines today were more streamlined,” Nuzzo said.
And while the CDC’s been lambasted for not having been more forceful with hospitals, former Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt points out that local officials and even individual hospitals were also supposed to have been on the ball. “States and local governments, not just in Dallas, not just in Nebraska, not just in Bethesda, have got to be prepared for this," Leavitt said on MSNBC’s Daily Rundown.
“As it spreads across Africa the likelihood of it returning to the United States is high and we need to be ready for that.”
A Beer Can In Snake's Clothing?
More than 9,000 people have been infected in West Africa and while half have been confirmed to have died, the World Health Organization says the numbers are certainly higher. The epidemic is not even close to being under control and aid organizations say the help they’ve been screaming for is slow to arrive.
As long as the epidemic rages, people are likely to carry the virus elsewhere. That doesn’t mean the system has failed, Nuzzo says. “People are on high alert. So finding a case here and there in a hospital is not a case of the system failing but of the system working,” she said.
It may also mean more school closures.
“It’s unfortunate but understandable because people are acting on their emotions,” she said. “If shutting down a school to clean it means people will feel safer going the next day, then it is worth doing.”
Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins has a folksy way of explaining such reactions.
"I've seen and heard of horses spooked by a snake and go running and that's probably a really good idea if you’re a horse,” he told a news conference Monday.
“I’ve seen and heard of horses spooked by a beer can. And beer cans don't usually attack horses often. So there's not much reason for running from a beer can. This is more of a beer can at this point than a snake.”
However, calls for travels bans will also pick up. And if another case appears, it may be more difficult to say no to such calls, says Dr. Peter Hotez, an infectious diseases expert at the Baylor College of Medicine.
“That is something we have to actively fight against,” Nuzzo said. “It may make people feel better but it won’t make them any safer.”
Teko, thank you so much for your kindness. Yes, with the flu starting I can imagine many people panicking and going to the ER. I won't be doing that, I am not going outside.... joking, I have to go out to stock up on masks and gloves. So, right as I am calming down, getting my ducks in a row so to speak. I hear this news that makes me once again want to hunker down :) There is a really good podcast called "How stuff works" These two guys have podcasts on all kinds of things. Really helpful.
So...just as everyone (me and my friends, family) is getting used to the idea that hysteria is not the answer. Today I hear this :) I am thinking of throwing my TV out :) Everyone take care
Ebola
Shock W.H.O. report: Ebola has 42-day incubation period, not 21 days!
So...just as everyone (me and my friends, family) is getting used to the idea that hysteria is not the answer. Today I hear this :) I am thinking of throwing my TV out :) Everyone take care
Ebola
Shock W.H.O. report: Ebola has 42-day incubation period, not 21 days!
LOL, no dont take a break! Happens to all of us!
I think between the media with their 24/7 fearmongering and the politicians wanting to make hay right before the election, the whole thing has been taken to illogical heights. The snaffoos came from Texas, and we must remember, the success with the rest has not been covered enuff to counteract the fear. And we have the flue coming and the other viruses that need attention and monitoring as well, yet we are not hearing much about them and they have killed way more people. We have not had anymore positive tests and it appears that things are calming for now. I hope. Looking at the glass half full here.
I think between the media with their 24/7 fearmongering and the politicians wanting to make hay right before the election, the whole thing has been taken to illogical heights. The snaffoos came from Texas, and we must remember, the success with the rest has not been covered enuff to counteract the fear. And we have the flue coming and the other viruses that need attention and monitoring as well, yet we are not hearing much about them and they have killed way more people. We have not had anymore positive tests and it appears that things are calming for now. I hope. Looking at the glass half full here.
It turns out Dr Robin Cook is a fiction writer, I am sorry. I think I am taking a break
Dr Gil Mobley is a doctor, he said the following:
"They're not even using the word 'airborne', but they're saying now it can be transmitted within 3 feet. That sounds pretty airborne to me."
Mobley — who made a splash earlier this month when he visited an Atlanta airport wearing a Hazmat suit with the words "CDC is lying!" on the back — said the lack of clarity could have bad repercussions.
"The way to get a panic is to give out misinformation, like blaming the healthcare workers for a breach in protocol when there was none and not saying we don't know how it spread," he said.
"Dr. Robin Cook, the guy who wrote the book on Ebola, said last week on national TV he doesn't think anybody knows how it's spread . . . The fact of the matter is, we don't. If they were to be honest, we wouldn't be freaking out."
"They're not even using the word 'airborne', but they're saying now it can be transmitted within 3 feet. That sounds pretty airborne to me."
Mobley — who made a splash earlier this month when he visited an Atlanta airport wearing a Hazmat suit with the words "CDC is lying!" on the back — said the lack of clarity could have bad repercussions.
"The way to get a panic is to give out misinformation, like blaming the healthcare workers for a breach in protocol when there was none and not saying we don't know how it spread," he said.
"Dr. Robin Cook, the guy who wrote the book on Ebola, said last week on national TV he doesn't think anybody knows how it's spread . . . The fact of the matter is, we don't. If they were to be honest, we wouldn't be freaking out."
Good article,
The way it has been handled seems to have been irresponsible. There has been a lot of confusing information being handed out.
Why would they clean a school room in Ohio for a teacher who happened to see the nurse from Dallas before she exhibited signs or symptoms?
Cleaning out a plane thatthe nurse flew in before she exhibited a fever.
Searching for people who flew on the plane, not with her but after her. WTH?
The reverse compression suits they are wearing doesn't make me feel any better.
The nurses who admit they were given no training while the CDC tells us "everything is under control"
The media coverage has caused the concern and fear. We would not be aware of any of this if not for their minute by minute coverage.
It reminds me of people who get a child all excited and then say, ok that is enough, calm down now. :)
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