3987 Coincidence

Thursday, October 16, 2014

Older computer games couldn't be won. They just got harder and faster until you died.

Just like real life.

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Funniest thing - in 1999 Frederick Aldrich published a book, a thriller titled Absolute Zero, available on Amazon, at  http://www.amazon.com/Absolute-Zero-Frederick-Aldrich-ebook/dp/B008MKPLSQ/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1413513498&sr=1-2&keywords=absolute+zero

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It seems to be available now only in the Kindle edition.

Quoting the book description:

Ebola. The very sound conjures up hideous images, images that cannot begin to convey the horrors of the disease itself.

An African man carrying the virus has arrived unhindered in Dallas. Experts assure the public there is no cause for fear. But is there really nothing to fear?"

How 'bout that?

It's a thriller, about a terror attack.

Repeat - Africa, Dallas, Ebola, written in 1999.
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3986 Don't believe the ebola hype

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

"The world is run by 'C' students."

--Al McGuire--

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Shep Smith just pretty much called his network fearmongers.  Let's see now if he keeps his job.


[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2KBfynW09I]
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3984 Head Banging

Thursday, October 9, 2014

"I have no problem with God. It's his fan club I can't stand."

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The World Health Organization (funded by members nations of the UN) has issued a bulletin saying that ebola can in fact be spread by aerosolized droplets produced from coughing or sneezing, if you inhale or touch those droplets.  It can also be spread by touching contaminated surfaces, and those surfaces can be contaminated by sneezes.  So people who visit the home of a patient after the patient has left the home, can acquire the infection from surfaces (sneezed or coughed on - and you'd be surprised how far a sneeze travels) in the home.

[NOTE - spread by aerosolized droplets does not fit the medical definition of "airborne".  Airborne spread involves dried stuff floating around in the air.  Technical difference.  Flu is airborne, ebola is not (so far).]

That's how that latest patient in Texas got it (I haven't heard the results of his test yet)(Update - he tested negative.).  He went into the other guy's home with the cleaners without protective gear.  It's interesting that he bragged that he didn't need the gear.  Oh dear.

So asking if folks have been in contact with an infected person is not a good question.  You have to ask if they had touched anything a symptomatic person had touched - or sneezed or coughed on, or near, or in the same room as, or in the next room, at any time in the past.  And how can you know that?  What do you know about the last dollar bill you handled?

Something that really bothers me is that in the involved areas of Africa, space in the treatment clinics is severely limited.  They just don't have the beds, space, or workers to handle the load.  So people show up at the door with symptoms, and they are turned away!.  The treatment centers and quarantine centers can't take anyone in until someone else dies.

Where do those people go?  Back home.  Back to their neighborhoods.

How the hell can you slow down, let alone stop, an epidemic with a response like that?  Nope, no room at the inn.  Go spread it some more.

This whole thing is a mess.

I made an online contribution this evening to Doctors Without Borders for $1,000.   I don't know how much they are involved in the ebola thing - mostly World Health Org. is mentioned, but I don't think WHO takes contributions - but I guess it couldn't hurt.

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Another thing - I had mostly read that victims were being cremated.  Now I find out from several sources that they are being buried.

Hey, this is a virus!  Are we infecting the ground water?  If you want to know how nasty stuff does in the ground, ask any farmer about anthrax.  Anthrax is a bacteria.  Viruses encapsulate, which gives them an advantage over bacteria.

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Workers for a company that cleans airliners went on strike earlier today at LaGuardia.  I don't blame them.
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3981 Shall we become hermits?

Saturday, October 4, 2014

"The ability we value most is plausible deniability."

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Airports are checking passengers for fevers before they can board a flight.   Great.  I guess this can help to assure that no one on the flight is exposed to someone with ebola in the contagious stage.  But it does nothing to prevent someone with ebola in the not-yet contagious stage from traveling anywhere they want.  So it does nothing to stop ebola from spreading around the world.

I don't understand.  It doesn't make any sense.

And then there was the guy who thew up on a plane arriving at Newark from Brussels.  He was taken off the plane by people in full protective gear, the other passengers were held on the plane for a while, and then given handouts of what to do if they start showing ebola symptoms and they were let go, BEFORE the sick guy tested negative for ebola.  [http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2014/10/04/port-authority-cdc-investigating-sick-passenger-for-possible-ebola-at-newark-airport/] 

I don't understand.  It doesn't make any sense.

Some folks are saying that anyone coming from a country with ebola cases should be quarantined for three weeks after arrival somewhere else.  Well, we, the US, have at least one and possibly more ebola cases here.  So should Americans be quarantined for three weeks if they travel?  Should Arizona close their borders to Texans?

This is scary.  There's an attitude like "No big deal.  Even if a few cases show up, we can simply isolate those people and stop it in its tracks."  Duh.  The big problem in west Africa is that people are uneducated, not trusting the government and medical folks, and hiding sick relatives away.

Lack of education, distrust of government, distrust of doctors ("death panels", anyone?), distrust of "the system" --- yeah, sure, we don't have any of that here....

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The other thing that bothers me is that in the cases of Americans and other westerners who have been diagnosed, nobody ever talks about HOW they got it.  Ok, the doctors and nurses, I can see that they had a higher chance of exposure, but they know how to protect themselves.  They know what to do and what not to do.  They are completely suited up and have decontamination procedures and know the punishment for screwing up.  So what went wrong?  And the reporters and that cameraman, how?

Why aren't they looking into that?  Maybe it's not as easy to avoid as they want us to believe?
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3974 Perspective

Saturday, September 6, 2014

Ebola is the big health news right now.  But it's not the biggest killer.  Malaria killed 627,000 people in 2012 alone (World Health Organization, http://www.who.int/malaria/media/world_malaria_report_2013/en/), and that's after intense efforts to control it, it's supposedly down by 45%, and the fact that malaria is treatable.  But still, 627,000 people died of malaria in one year.  I find that number shocking.  Ebola has killed less than 1/600th the number in the 6 months of this outbreak.

So, I'm not sure why ebola gets all the press.  Maybe because ebola can travel to the US easier than malaria?  So that scares us more?

But ebola is a lot easier to avoid than malaria:
1. Don't eat bats or monkeys
2. Don't touch body fluids from strangers.
3. Don't touch body fluids from family members who have done 1. or 2.

You want to be scared for a more logical reason?  How easy would it be to dump some ebola virus into your local reservoir?
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