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Yesterday I was walking through the grocery store when a 60-something man walked by (fairly unkempt and smelly) and as I was picking through the potatoes, I heard him cough 2-3 times RIGHT as he passed by my basket full of fresh veggies and fruits.
I thought, "How rude!" and then I thought, "Eek, I wonder if he has the flu - or worse."
Sorry to say we've become pretty rude as a society. Coughing and sneezing without covering yourself is shockingly common.
I once had an open cup of coffee in dunkin donuts (I usually don't take the plastic covers) and someone sneezed within six inches of me. I asked for a new coffee. Men take money out of the same pocket that their used handkerchiefs are in, and women have kleenex stuffed in their handbags next to money. People's hands sweat while they handle money. I was at a buffet luncheon yesterday and for the first time noticed how people were hovering over open plates of sandwiches, within inches. Some people involunatily "spit" while they speak. It's not at all hard to see how colds, flu, and other viruses are transmitted, just from everyday human actions.
Anyway, flu season is upon us. We shall have lots of hysterical people who will ignore getting the flu shot, and then swarm the emergency rooms claiming that they may have Ebola ("I've got a temperature! I coughed!").
For the most part I do not see people being hysterical. I see a lot of people following this Ebola story closely, because in history, what goes around tends to come around, even if in a small way. (Most) people are thinking deeply, reading various credible sources (not just the tabloids), questioning the inconsistencies in reports, checking up on the claims of the CDC, and, more than anything, wanting to err on the side of caution for the sake of public safety.
Someone like Nurse Kaci, even if she heartily disagrees with the measures, should, as a public health worker, at least not disparage efforts to keep the public safe. She could better use her quarantine time by staying at home the 10 more days and writing a researched article or two to disseminate to publications. That would occupy her in a professional way. Her willingness not to err on the side of caution would make her suspect as to how careful she was in the Ebola care setting. She appears bratlike and cavalier, and that is not a wise position to take. She may never get another job, for one thing.
And infected people are human, they tend to sneeze, cough and spit....onto "things: like other people, grocery carts, and money in hand after recently coughing.
Time to play what if.....
Do you honestly think that a health care worker that is self monitoring will be spitting and sneezing on someone else's food. Just more hysterics and drama. If it was truly that easily transmitted we would have a good deal more infected people.
I will note that those whom advocate quarantine of those health care workers who are returning to this country have not really thought it through: namely, they keep harping on quarantining these people after they have already travelled, via airplane, from the 'hot zone' back to the US.
Now, if I were in favor of automatic quarantine for all healthcare workers working in the Hot Zone, I would, using logic, demand that the quarantine be carried out in western Africa, before the people enter an airplane.
Of course, I am not for automatic quarantining of people. I will note that I also am not one who 'suspects' the CDC or the WHO of covering up information.
I became interested in Ebola back when the book, The Hot Zone, was published in 1995. The CDC and other authorities have done a fine job of tamping out outbreaks since that time.
This is a large outbreak. I agree with the logic that the best way to keep Ebola confined to those countries is to send healthcare workers to the affected areas (recall that Nigeria has succeeded in stopping the outbreak within their borders).
As I have said several times herein, it is scary enough to have 13,000 human beings infected in western Africa: it would be outright horrifying if that number were allowed to reach the hundreds of thousands.
The people of those countries would fan out across the continent of Africa, into Europe, into Asia, and so the world. Recall that those affected countries are all on the coast, with working ports, and many would take ship to escape. Escape they will do if they think that the world is abandoning them to their fate.
I will again note that those whom are afraid of there being a large outbreak of Ebola here are ignoring what the quoted poster, above, as well as DC and others have mentioned several times: it is not that easy of a disease to pass on.
One must also recall, as I have stated before, that our healthcare facilities here have been very successful in treating those people who came down with Ebola in this country (save for Mr. Duncan). As one medical doctor noted, there is a vast difference between treatment here and treatment in the Hot Zone, such as having clean water to keep the patient hydrated. We Americans also generally enjoy much better health than those in the Hot Zone, with better immune systems.
Anyway, flu season is upon us. We shall have lots of hysterical people who will ignore getting the flu shot, and then swarm the emergency rooms claiming that they may have Ebola ("I've got a temperature! I coughed!").
Happy Halloween indeed.
Well stated, without people like Hickox attacking it at it's source we would be in dire straits some seem to think we can just shut the door and this will go away. If this increases in western Africa it will most certainly arrive here. They have limited travel in some of the wealthier countries but in countries like Liberia and Sierra Leone they do not have that option nor do they have the facilities to treat.
Nurse Hickox has left the building for a bike ride with her BF.
She is a hero fighting for our constitutional rights. She is, in essence, a political prisoner. Maybe her defiance of this medically unnecessary quarantine will garnish unbiased publicity and educate the public a little more. The ignorance about the risks of ebola goes well beyond this forum.
And the thousands of people she has helped would be sad. You should be ashamed for your hatred of a noble person and nurse. Why it's so easy to belittle her (and nurses in general) we were talking about at work.
I am taking notes. When it's down and dirty for you in the hospital it won't be your friends, it won't be your health insurer, it won't be your mommy and it won't even be the doctor saving your life. It will be a nurse.
You all may want to think about that in your antagonism and hubris. This is the USA. People have to stand up for something. She did and she claims her right as an uninfected person to be free of detainment.
And, you all put her down. Hatred I guess has it's own reward.
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