Ebola - slow to spread, hard to catch. So something like AIDS?

Numbers speak louder than words, sometimes. Since June 4th, the number of ebola cases in Liberia have doubled every 21 days. Consistently, for the past 2.5 months. MSF states it is out of control, and will be for another 6 months or so. That means until the middle of February. Here are the numbers, extrapolated for the next 2,5 months. And yes, I know the dangers of extrapolating, there are too many factors in play to really do that. But still. Maybe it is time the international community actually did something.
To those saying: who cares, if it comes here, we'll contain it: sure. Probably. But grow a heart, will you?

Current numbers (Source: WHO)

(I started color-coding: green is lower than previously predicted, red is higher)

Current Graph:


Extrapolated numbers:

Ebola is very dangerous. But it's too deadly for its own 'good'. It plays out like a novice player would play Plague Inc: infect and kill almost immediately. To win this game you have to mutate your virus to infect everybody before it becomes too deadly. I fear the day when Ebola or some other African swamp virus starts mutating so we only recognize it when it's too late. 200 days incubation time, 3 days to death? We're fucked.

Yes, the short incubation time is a blessing. That said, ebola is still managing to spread relatively easily, partially because people in Liberia are very distrustful of Western medicine and prefer to flee instead of staying where they are or actually going to a hospital, but also because traditional burial rites involve a lot of touching of the corpse - which unfortunately can still infect people after death. While we do have time, in Western circumstances, to properly control this as the numbers rise slowly in the beginning, as you can see with the extrapolated numbers, if they are not controlled soon, there will simply be too many people infected. The numbers I gave predict 25k cases by the beginning of November. But that could quickly explode, even to 1 million by the end of February - which is the time MSF say they need to 'control' the outbreak. I trust that, as more people become infected, spreading of the disease will slow as people become more careful, travel will be more restricted, etc. but it is still a nightmare scenario.

As long as it is contained in rural areas... the problem I see is when it reaches Lagos. Super chaotic metropolis of 10 million, multiple huge seaports, international airport. It's paradise for a virus with ambitions.

Lagos is actually more like 16 milion or over, by now, official numbers don't include the poor, it seems. Huge slums, and indeed a worst case scenario if that should happen. Luckily the Nigerians are aware of that and have contained it so far. But in Liberia, it is not contained in rural areas, it is in the capital Monrovia. My housemate actually spent several weeks in Monrovia, recently. She's coming home on monday But luckily, she spent 4 weeks in Uganda after that, so she's fine. There is a lot of fear in Liberia and people not only fear ebola, but civil unrest and violence as well, it is not a very stable situation. Keeping my fingers crossed.
Still, the question is why this is not being dealt with more efficiently - there is a shortage of people, nurses mainly, and of all kinds of material, for protection (health workers refuse to work unprotected of course) and transportation (I read reports of dead bodies not being collected for 6 days). I really think there is more we can do, but because we see not much of a threat to our own countries, it doesn't seem to be a priority. I hope we're not going to regret that.

Given the infrastructure down in Africa I wonder: what could we do? Send the military to comb every village? As you said, many sick won't come to western aid workers because they distrust them.

But I do agree this isn't very dangerous for the west at the moment. Every small rural hospital in Europe or the US has the equipment to isolate possible cases. Still, rereading THE STAND and stocking up on zombie apocalypse provisions. Just in case

'The Hot Zone' will do as well, for fun reading King said: "The first chapter of The Hot Zone is one of the most horrifying things I've read in my whole life--and then it gets worse." It's non-fiction.

I favor the Andromeda Strain for this type of thing.

The problem with the West stepping in to do something is that it is the West stepping in to do something. It's easy for us to manage/treat an ebola outbreak in Europe or North America, but the cultural barriers to an African intervention our significant. And I'll be honest, here. It may seem cold and ruthless, but the numbers and especially the time line aren't enough to make it worth that effort. By the time we could have something substantial in place, it will have run its course, and yes, a lot of Africans will die.

To bring an uncontained spread closer to home, imagine a group of illegals about to cross/just crossed the Mexican border. Infect a few of them (granted not many Africans in Mexican border areas) and you get poor people with no access to what is generally sub standard health care - and once they cross they have to stay very under the radar for what could be the rest of their lives. And generally they are in enclaves in close quarters to save on housing costs.
Just sayin'

Practice and infrastructure for next time?

that's excellent too. much better than the movie.

There is a "treatment" for ebola, that has been used a couple of times with great success, but Western doctors are reluctant to use it for reasons I can't fully understand.

I put "treatment" in quotes, because its far from ideal, and can't be used in every situation. It worked successfully in Zaire in the '90s, and a couple of times during this outbreak. Its fairly simple, you take a pint of blood from someone who's survived ebola and has antibodies to it in their system, and transfuse it into someone who's contracted the disease. This has a roughly 99% success rate in the instances where its been tried. (The 1% were quite possibly so far gone that nothing could have saved them.) Of course, it requires that there be a few people who've managed to survive the disease in order for it to work.

Ebola bears watching (and treating), not simply because its the compassionate thing to do, but because sooner or later, the disease is going to mutate into one which is much more easily transmissible and takes longer to kill its host. Newly emergent diseases tend to kill quickly, but their "goal" is to infect as many hosts as possible, so over time, they tend to mutate into forms which are easier to spread and don't kill quickly.

And one wonders if that hasn't started to happen.

It worked for Charlton Heston in the Omega Man...

And actually this is the method being used by Zmapp, albeit more sophisticated. Harvested mouse antibodies after exposure to deactivated ebola. The link to tobacco plants isn't clear (to me), but they are genetically engineered to produce the antibodies. Big shout-out to RJ Reynolds.

The Zmapp guys, even at full production, don't have the capacity right now, to treat more than a handful of people. Give them a few years, and they'll be able to produce the drug in large quantities. Until then, though, the blood transfusion method is all we got.

As for the use of the tobacco plant, one of their backers is a tobacco company, but it does actually make sense, as the tobacco genome is well-known, and is apparently easy to splice things into. (Also, little danger that anything is going to munch on the leaves and get sick.)

The logistics of locating ebola servivors willing to donate blood in the dark depths of Africa would be overwhelming, I think.

The Zmapp guys, through their tobacco company owned partner Kentucky BioProcessing appear poised to ramp up production large scale, should the market provide the demand. The problem is without more experimentation, no one knows if it works. But I bet if the infection spread uncontrolled to Europe or the Americas that in 6 months the Zmapp and Kentucky guys will be gazillionaires.

Given that those who've survived are most likely to be in a medical facility, and have to remained quarantined for weeks afterwards, I'm thinking that its really not that much of an issue. I'm sure anyone who's just survived a disease that can kill up to 90% of its victims is going to be more than willing to help out by donating blood, if it'll save lives.

We can't help to locate a couple of hundred missing schoolgirls kidnapped by terrorists so I'm guessing the blood donation thing is not going to happen.

200 days.......

Yeah humanity would be toast.

And I think you're wrong on both of those points. You are speaking of a Western context, not a rural African context.

I doubt if anyone on Wordforge knows the rural African context better than I do, and I dare say I have long since proven my commitment to humanitarian aid for Africa. But I wouldn't know where to start in trying to do something like what has been proposed in this thread. There are Westerners helping out (I have received a bit of information on this through the humanitarian channels with which I work), but it is very local. Trying a massive intervention that would really put a stop to the epidemic is pretty much an unthinkable logistics nightmare.

The bottom line, as is so often the case with Africa, is that there just isn't much we can do. Sending aid for some local work somewhere is very good, for those people who happen to benefit from it. But thinking about trying to wipe out the whole problem? I really don't see how it can be done.

Que? Where have I proposed "massive intervention"? The transfusion method I'm talking about can be (and has been) done in remote parts of Africa. The supplies needed, PPE, blood typing equipment, tests for other diseases (HIV, malaria, etc.) are compact, and with all those devices, the medical personnel in the area are generally already trained on how to use them. They're also cheap, and commonly available, so that even if there's a shortage in the local area, the delays involved in raising money and transporting supplies to where they're needed, isn't nearly as great as what's needed when dealing with an experimental drug that can only be produced in small amounts. (There's even several charities dedicated to sending surplus gear like that to places like Africa.)

Yeah, I know, many of the natives flee at the sight of anything which looks like medical personnel, or someone sick with ebola, but at the same time, even with the best medical care in the world, the survivability of ebola can be pretty low. (We'll have to see with the Zmapp stuff, that may change things.) Once people who contract ebola start being cured of the disease, there will be a shift in attitudes towards medical people in those situations in Africa. It'll be slow at first, but as more and more people who contract the disease survive, after being given up for dead by their loved ones, then you won't see entire villages fleeing in terror at the approach of a WHO team during an ebola outbreak.

Let's not forget, Dr. McCoy used this same technique to save Jim Kirk.

it never happened

Bump.
It's been a week since the last WHO numbers. Their last update was August 22nd, with statistics as of August 20th. The numbers then, for Liberia:

real as of august 20th: Total: 1082 (of which confirmed: 269, HUGE difference). Total deaths: 624 (of which confirmed: 222).
predicted as of aug.26: Total: 1422 and total deaths: 820

What's with the delay? They used to update every 2 days. Maybe it's because they can no longer give accurate estimates? The gap between the total (include suspected cases) and the confirmed number has been widening fast. So is the panic spreading, or the virus?
Regarding the suggestion of a blood transfusion 'cure': that is not only an illusion, but also seriously underestimating the problem. In Liberia there is 1 doctor for about 100,000 people, if not less. Doctors without Borders (MSF) indicate: 'the unprecedented influx of patients is forcing MSF to reduce the level of care. It is not currently possible, for example, to administer intravenous treatments.' Forget transfusions, you will not be able to find cured patients fast enough to donate, nor doctors to do the procedure.

In the meantime: one of the most popular articles on African news sites, blames the Nigerian cases on.... the Illuminati. I shit you not:

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, a WHO lab had to be shut down after a worker came down with Ebola.

Nature culling the herd. Between Ebola & AIDS, I'm surprised anyone is still alive on that continent. Remember, we're talking about primitive savages who run around chanting voodoo and raping virgins to cure themselves.

And in the latest news, an American obstetrician in Monrovia--NOT working in an ebola ward--has come down with ebola.
http://www.foxnews.com/health/2014/...or-ebola-organization-says/?intcmp=latestnews

You mean the doctor not wearing protective gear while working in the same hospital that has an ebola isolation ward, treating a "woman (who) was "highly suspicious" and displaying Ebola symptoms." ? Yeah, I am very surprised.
http://www.foxnews.com/health/2014/...otective-gear-100-degree-heat-says-colleague/

WHO comes around to using different treatments to try and control the outbreak.

Will Smith agrees!