Sunday, October 12, 2014

New Ebola Case in Texas

A Texas health care worker who treated the first state’s Ebola patient, has been tested positive for the virus, the authorities said.

"A health care worker at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital who provided care for the Ebola patient hospitalized there has tested positive for Ebola in a preliminary test at the state public health laboratory in Austin,” said a statement from Texas Department of State Health Services.

[...]

Health officials have interviewed the patient to find out who he had been in contact with, or whether there were any potential exposures. They said that those who had contact with him “will be monitored based on the nature of their interactions and the potential they were exposed to the virus.”

[...]

Although no further cases of the often fatal disease have been discovered yet in the US, health officials in Texas were still monitoring 48 people on Wednesday who might have been previously exposed to the virus through [Liberian national, Thomas] Duncan.

  RT
And however many might have been exposed to the health care worker, which could be a heck of a lot.

Just what did the health care worker do with the original patient that he should become infected?  (Correction:  the health worker is female.)

From the CDC website:
When an infection does occur in humans, the virus can be spread in several ways to others. Ebola is spread through direct contact (through broken skin or mucous membranes in, for example, the eyes, nose, or mouth) with

• blood or body fluids (including but not limited to urine, saliva, sweat, feces, vomit, breast milk, and semen) of a person who is sick with Ebola
• objects (like needles and syringes) that have been contaminated with the virus
• infected animals
• Ebola is not spread through the air or by water, or in general, by food. However, in Africa, Ebola may be spread as a result of handling bushmeat (wild animals hunted for food) and contact with infected bats. There is no evidence that mosquitos or other insects can transmit Ebola virus. Only mammals (for example, humans, bats, monkeys, and apes) have shown the ability to become infected with and spread Ebola virus.

Healthcare providers caring for Ebola patients and the family and friends in close contact with Ebola patients are at the highest risk of getting sick because they may come in contact with infected blood or body fluids of sick patients.

[...]

Once someone recovers from Ebola, they can no longer spread the virus. However, Ebola virus has been found in semen for up to 3 months.
I’m not making any accusation. I just want to know. Surely a health care worker would not be touching a sick patient without wearing gloves??
The UN’s special envoy on Ebola, David Nabarro, told the UN General Assembly on Friday that the number of cases was doubling every three to four weeks, and the response needed to be 20 times greater than it was at the beginning of October.

He added that without mass mobilization of global resources to support the affected countries in West Africa, “it will be impossible to get this disease quickly under control, and the world will have to live with the Ebola virus forever.''

  RT
Well, there you go. The earth has finally figured out a way to get rid of us.

Or of course, it could be another CIA adventure gone wrong.  (First recognized outbreak was in the Congo in 1976.  And, according to Stanford University, "Despite the tremendous effort of experienced and dedicated researchers, Ebola's natural reservoir was never identified."  The CIA was heavily involved in politics in the Congo in the early 60s, including attempts to assassinate Patrice Lumumba, and in the late 70s.  Just saying.  Now don't start with the "conspiracy theories.")
US has enhanced special screenings for the deadly Ebola virus at the New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport. Squads armed with thermal guns and carrying questionnaires will test everyone arriving from the worst affected countries in West Africa.

JFK is set to become the first of five major airports to carry out the checks, aimed at travelers arriving from Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone – the countries where the majority of the 4,000 Ebola deaths happened.

Almost all travelers from these countries to the US – approximately 150 a day – land in five airports: JFK, Newark Liberty, Washington Dulles, Chicago O'Hare and Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta. Other airports are set to join the measure next week.

  RT
With the apparent ease with which this killer can spread, masked as any stomach virus or flu, surely you are at much higher risk of contracting Ebola and dying than you are of being killed by a terrorist, a threat which we are throwing away billions of dollars and battening down every airport against.

Expect all elites and persons with fortunes to soon have preventive medicines.

I can see the placards now:  Obamacare = Ebola.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

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