yes, these selfish ****s who are risking their lives trying to help some of the folks in the poorest countries in the world with an epidemic which is killing over 50% of those infected...thank God you are able to fire up Sonar in NYC!
 
 
 
I seriously cannot believe your post and really really hope you a long and happy life. Unlike this poor doctor may have.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/15/opinion/frank-bruni-scarier-than-ebola.html
 
should be mandatory reading for all

mgh
yes, these selfish ****s who are risking their lives trying to help some of the folks in the poorest countries in the world with an epidemic which is killing over 50% of those infected...thank God you are able to fire up Sonar in NYC!
 
 
 
I seriously cannot believe your post and really really hope you a long and happy life. Unlike this poor doctor may have.

 
Well yours seems to be a common response to anyone who has a problem with this doctor breaking his quarantine to have a night out on the tiles, so I'll address it. 
 
First of all, traveling to Africa to help others isn't a blank check to come home and show an immediate disregard for the health and safety of the people in this country. I don't know why people think it is. Yes, helping the sick and poor is a virtue, we get it. But the guy is supposed to be a doctor, and just a few days after returning home from a gig in which he was at a high risk of contracting the disease, and a full day after he reportedly started "feeling sluggish," he decides that screw this quarantine, I'm going out for meatballs and bowling in one of the busiest cities in the world and I'm going to use public transport. Remember at this point, as far as he was concerned, he might well have Ebola. Did he stop to think what would happen to the businesses he visited should he turn out to test positive? Already they've had to be disinfected from top to bottom at great expense, not to mention any business they may have lost. What if, in his "sluggish" state, he'd suddenly taken a turn for the worse on the subway and vomited? I've sure as hell had the onset of a bout of flu happen during a subway ride before. Got on feeling a little sluggish, and half an hour later I had a cold sweat and was aching all over. Symptoms can come on very quickly. 
 
We're continually told that there was no risk. But if there's no risk involved when a "possible" Ebola patient breaks his quarantine and mingles in crowds, then why a 21 day quarantine in the first place? Why bother? The quarantine period is there for a reason, and it's vital that people who have been identified as "at risk" stick to it. Easy enough to comprehend, yes? So spare me this "how dare you" crap, please. 
 
I read your New York times article, and others like it. Yes the flu kills more people than Ebola. But that's because we haven't had an outbreak of Ebola before, and people generally aren't whisked away to isolation units by hazmat teams when they get it. The flu is, to the vast majority of people, a low risk virus. It only really kills people who are weak to start off with. Ebola has a much higher mortality rate and can kill a strong, fit person very quickly. If it started spreading like flu due to the carelessness of a few people, you could start seeing a hell of a lot more deaths than flu. I really hate this whole "condition X or disease Y kills more people than Ebola" argument. You could say that about anything. Why worry about prostrate cancer, when more people die of breast cancer? Why worry about gun deaths, when more people die of drink driving accidents? The point is that no matter which way you spin it, people are quite legitimately worried about a possible outbreak of a virus which has an extremely high mortality rate. Which is why Dr. Ebowla's getting such a bad press. 

mgh
yes, these selfish ****s who are risking their lives trying to help some of the folks in the poorest countries in the world with an epidemic which is killing over 50% of those infected...thank God you are able to fire up Sonar in NYC!
 
 
 
I seriously cannot believe your post and really really hope you a long and happy life. Unlike this poor doctor may have.

Being unselfish doesn't authorize you to risk tens of thousands of lives. Anyone who has worked in the ebola area in Africa, should know even better than the rest of us, how careful one should be. If anyone, a doctor should understand that.
 
If ebola becomes something like a pandemia, or even close, it happens with the help of people who think that "it doesn't happen to me". In that fight "something like it" or "that's about it" doesn't do. The precautions and attitudes must be extremely strict and exact. The line between life and death can be so incomprehensibly thin. Like in the case of the nurse: One accidental reflex, a split second, touching your face when changing clothes. And that's it.
 
 

I will avoid the political aspect of this convo other than to say, Bill O'Reilly is one of the last people I would listen to. I think the doctors involved in this, like most people have admirable and not so admirable traits. It is wonderful they risk themselves to help others. At the same time it is absolutely irresponsible and effed up to not quarantine themselves afterwards. Humans, even trained professionals do things without thinkong at times like coughing. A sudden hearty laugh can project spit in the air. I know I am not the only person who has had someone speaking to me so enthusiastically that they accidently spit on me. Doctors should understand this better than most and act accordingly. 21 days of quarantine sucks but is the smart thing to do. With that said, as scary as ebola is, the mass panic thing scares me more. If it's any comfort to anyone, I have simulated scenarios of making an ebola like virus on the game Plague Inc and it is pretty hard to wipe out humanity with it and my variation was like Ebola on steroids ;)

Ha apparently sales of Plague Inc have shot up over the last few weeks. I had it on my phone a year or so ago but lost interest for some reason, even though it seemed like a really cool game. I think I was obsessed with Blendoku at the time. 

I got the expansion packs and havebeen enjoying the guilty pleasure of using the zombie like virus and the planet of the apes one. Also enjoyed the black death and smallpox immensely. What's wrong with me!!! The game does make you see some of the benefits of living in greenland. Live narwals and better chance of surviving plague!

Why do I get the feeling all this attention from the media and government is more than ebola going on? 

bayoubill
Why do I get the feeling all this attention from the media and government is more than ebola going on? 

I would guess because you lean towards distrust of government in general, particularly current administration. That's not a judgement or anything, just seems obvious. :) I do love how whether I read leftwing or rightwing rhetoric regarding things like ebola it gets spun into virtually the same rhetoric but ebola specific on why [insert hated group of choice here] is up to something..blah blah [ insert insulting generalization or conspiracy].

Ebola scare will likely blow over just like the last few disease scares have. Yes, this one will change some things like how volunteers/medical workers coming from high risk areas are handled, but we will just get on to the next thing to be outraged by in no time. HIV made many changes to how we go about simple things. Remember when athletes could continue to play while dripping blood? That seems crazy now but when I played childhood sports my coach would have ripped my head off if I asked to come out due to blood unless I was gushing like a geyser.

I would guess because you lean towards distrust of government in general
 
 
So many agendas,so little time