Global threat of Ebola: From the US to China, scientists plot spread of deadly disease

The Daily Mail ^ | 7 October 2014 | Ben Spencer & Lizzie Parry

[pepsionice]

I’ll go ahead and make this prediction...climbing out on the limb to say it. By late November....airlines start to report international travel is down by five to eight percent...due to fear over getting Ebola. By early January...all international airlines are reporting empty seats on cross-Atlantic flights, and cutting their ticket cost by twenty-percent.

The public will be the ones who implement it’s own version of ‘banning’ rather than rational governments or authorities.

By March of next year.....I’d expect international flights are cut by a quarter, with massive losses for the industry.

[PghBaldy]

If they predict it is bound to happen, then the govt can say they can’t shut the borders or borders or ban high-risk travellers since it is unstoppable.

[PghBaldy]

If they predict it is bound to happen, then the govt can say they can’t shut the borders or borders or ban high-risk travellers since it is unstoppable.

[ClearCase_guy]

Spain and Switzerland have lower risks of 14 per cent each.

I'm sure Spain will be relieved to hear this!

[logic101.net]

The risk in the USA due to Dumbo’s open border policy, 100%

[RC one]

There once was a time when HIV was just another African disease and we were pretty darned convinced that it posed no danger to us. Plus it was a gay disease so as long as you weren't gay or, if you were, you wore a condom, you were safe from the Human immunodeficiency virus-nothing to worry about. It all panned out a little differently.

Well, wearing a condom won't protect you from the ebola virus and it doesn't care about your sexual orientation and it has reached us. Oh, and what's more, there's a well organized terrorist organization that wants to spread it it across America. I wouldn't be surprised if there were even better organized forces than ISIS out there that would love to see Ebola wreaking havoc throughout this country as well.

So I'll go ahead and make a prediction: if we do not implement AGGRESSIVE measures to stop it, Ebola will take root in America just like HIV did. whether or not it infects and kills as many Americans as HIV has remains to be seen.

[DainBramage]

All planes will eventually be suspect as the international travelers use them to connect to other cities.
My prediction is that planes will begin to smell like disinfectant and the seat fabrics will be bleached out like a tie die shirt.

[cuban leaf]

How many cases have spread from that guy in Dallas? I’ve not heard about that one lately.

[cuban leaf]

There once was a time when HIV was just another African disease and we were pretty darned convinced that it posed no danger to us. Plus it was a gay disease so as long as you weren’t gay or, if you were, you wore a condom, you were safe from the Human immunodeficiency virus-nothing to worry about. It all panned out a little differently.

---

Not really. I’ve followed it closely since it was called GRID. I’ve never been concerned about it.

I’m not concerned about Ebola. Yet.

[Liz]

[LambSlave]

We need to take aggressive measures to stop it in Africa now; if it hits 500k or 1M by end of January, or makes it to India, forget it. I won't discuss my work, so suffice it to say that I was first introduced to filoviridae at the US Army Chemical school more than twenty years ago. Early in my career I did infectious disease and population dynamics modeling, as well as chemical agent modeling. Don't rely on my opinion, do the math yourself. Ro (number of people infected by each infected person) for this outbreak started at 1.5 initially, now it is stabilizing overall around 2+ (actually as high as 3.5 in some local regions of Liberia), with a case mortality > 50%-- using a basic SIRS model, the outcome is very clear. The beauty of epidemiological modeling is it isn't sensitive to the details of the mechanics of how the transmission is occuring, it only cares about the truth-- how fast is the disease actually spreading.

For all those who argue that personal sanitation makes Africa different-- there are subpopulations here that are similar; moreover, there are many other factors in the West that more than compensate. Mobility, massed people in close proximity (large schools, offices, public transportation)... don't underestimate that. Ebola doesn't care about your personal sanitation habits, it will spread by the weakest link, likely our children, pets, urgent care facilities, schools, public transportation, cube farms, homeless, urban immigrants...

Regional compartmentalization is trickier, but when the infected population gets high enough, people will flee. By boat, by foot, by hoof, by train, plane and automobile if they can-- at that point there will be no way to control this. In my opinion, even with the most conservative estimates of trans-national spread, every continent on earth will be significantly depopulated in two years if we don't stop this in Africa.

[eartick]

I know one thing for sure, I will not know what they smell like.

This ol country boy is staying his butt on the ground and out of the city.

Heck I do not even see a town but once every two week now and my wife gotta drag me kickin and screaming. If I did not have to go at all it would be fine with me

[Smokin' Joe]

Ping...

A link to this thread has been posted on the Ebola Surveillance Thread

[4Liberty]

They sure have worked hard to keep ALL images of that Duncan guy away from the public. I'm surprised the media hasn't gotten pics yet from a hospital staffers cell phone, something. That would really start a (justified) panic, to see how quickly his disease has progressed.

Also, they need to hide him -- b/c it would piss off the public to see how many hospital resources, space, time and staffers are being allocated to this interloper when our Vets can't even get an appointment to see a doctor!

[Liz]

They sure have worked hard to keep ALL images of that Duncan guy away from the public....b/c it would piss off the public to see how many hospital resources, space, time and staffers are being allocated to this interloper when our Vets can't even get an appointment to see a doctor!

He pays for none of it---parasite is sucking off taxpayers bigtime.

[cuban leaf]

My only concern about him is not about him at all. I want to know how many people are confirmed to be infected by him.

So far, as far as I know, the number is zero. I’m watching that one stat. I want to see if this spreads in the US and, if so, at what rate.

[VTenigma]

Excellent post, my thoughts in a nutshell.

[Verginius Rufus]

According to the headline, scientists are plotting the spread of the disease.

Evil scientists want to get us all killed.

[null and void]

Plot or chart?

I'm going with plot...

Bring Out Your Dead

Post to me or FReep mail to be on/off the Bring Out Your Dead ping list.

The purpose of the “Bring Out Your Dead” ping list (formerly the “Ebola” ping list) is very early warning of emerging pandemics, as such it has a high false positive rate.

So far the false positive rate is 100%.

At some point we may well have a high mortality pandemic, and likely as not the “Bring Out Your Dead” threads will miss the beginning entirely.

*sigh* Such is life, and death...