I am seeing pretty worrisome reports. The only English language report is from an source that I can't really tell if they are particularly credible. There are a number of Italian language reports that seem to be saying that Ebola may have arrived in Pisa with African refugees, but again, these don't seem like spectacularly credible news sources.
This is worth keeping an eye on. If this manages to spread into a country with airports, it could be quite dangerous indeed.
Ebola is not dangerous in a modern country, except to a few medical personnel. It is not contagious until the patient is quite ill, and then is spread only through contact with bodily fluid.
ReplyDeleteIn other words, there is nothing about this to worry about.
If even 1% of those with Ebola manage to spread it through bodily fluid contact, that's pretty darn dangerous, because of the high morbidity rate.
ReplyDeleteRelax.
ReplyDeleteThese are the air crashes of the epidemological world: spectacular, frightening, but very little chance of affecting the average person.
There was a big outbreak in Maridi, Sudan (now South Sudan) in 1976, 4 years before we arrived there. It affected 284 people (with 151 fatalities) out of a local population of at least 10,000 to 15,000.
And they've never had a recurrence (though a different center of the same? outbreak did have smaller outbreak a few years later. I can assure you it's not because of their improving medical-care regimen!
See:
http://www.cdc.gov/vhf/ebola/resources/outbreak-table.html
Very little chance of affecting anyone in the First World because usually these outbreaks remain in the Third World. It only takes one person who starts to cough infected blood in a First World airport to turn into a big problem.
ReplyDelete