the preparation, propagation and propagandization of this horrible weapon have permanently destroyed trust

cidrap |  Healthcare workers play a very important role in the successful containment of outbreaks of infectious diseases like Ebola. The correct type and level of personal protective equipment (PPE) ensures that healthcare workers remain healthy throughout an outbreak—and with the current rapidly expanding Ebola outbreak in West Africa, it's imperative to favor more conservative measures.

 

The precautionary principle—that any action designed to reduce risk should not await scientific certainty—compels the use of respiratory protection for a pathogen like Ebola virus that has:

• No proven pre- or post-exposure treatment modalities
• A high case-fatality rate
• Unclear modes of transmission

We believe there is scientific and epidemiologic evidence that Ebola virus has the potential to be transmitted via infectious aerosol particles both near and at a distance from infected patients, which means that healthcare workers should be wearing respirators, not facemasks.

The minimum level of protection in high-risk settings should be a respirator with an assigned protection factor greater than 10. A powered air-purifying respirator (PAPR) with a hood or helmet offers many advantages over an N95 filtering facepiece or similar respirator, being more protective, comfortable, and cost-effective in the long run.

We strongly urge the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO) to seek funds for the purchase and transport of PAPRs to all healthcare workers currently fighting the battle against Ebola throughout Africa—and beyond.

There has been a lot of on-line and published controversy about whether Ebola virus can be transmitted via aerosols. Most scientific and medical personnel, along with public health organizations, have been unequivocal in their statements that Ebola can be transmitted only by direct contact with virus-laden fluids^2,3 and that the only modes of transmission we should be concerned with are those termed "droplet" and "contact."

These statements are based on two lines of reasoning. The first is that no one located at a distance from an infected individual has contracted the disease, or the converse, every person infected has had (or must have had) "direct" contact with the body fluids of an infected person.

This reflects an incorrect and outmoded understanding of infectious aerosols, which has been institutionalized in policies, language, culture, and approaches to infection control. We will address this below. Briefly, however, the important points are that virus-laden bodily fluids may be aerosolized and inhaled while a person is in proximity to an infectious person and that a wide range of particle sizes can be inhaled and deposited throughout the respiratory tract.

The second line of reasoning is that respirators or other control measures for infectious aerosols cannot be recommended in developing countries because the resources, time, and/or understanding for such measures are lacking.

Controlaspecies: Just Let It Happen...,

alt-market |  Back in 2014 during the Ebola scare in the US I published an article warning about how a global pandemic could be used by the elites as cover for the implementation of an economic collapse as well as martial law measures in western nations. My immediate concern was the way in which a viral outbreak could be engineered or exploited as a rationale for a level of social control that the public would never accept under normal circumstances. And this could be ANY viral outbreak, not just Ebola. The point is the creation of an “invisible enemy” that the populace cannot quantify and defend itself against without constant government oversight.

I noted specifically how the government refused to apply air travel restrictions in 2014 to nations where the outbreak had taken hold when they could have stopped the spread in its tracks. This is something that was done again in 2020 as the UN's WHO and governments including our government in the US refused to stop air travel from China, pretending as if it was not a hot zone and that the virus was nothing to worry about.

This attitude of nonchalance serves a purpose. The establishment NEEDS the pandemic to spread, because then they have a rationale for strict controls of pubic activities and movements. This is the end goal. They have no care whatsoever for public health or safety. The end game is to acquire power, not save lives.  In fact, they might prefer a higher death count in the beginning as this would motivate the public to beg for more restrictions in the name of security.

Authorities went from downplaying the outbreak and telling people not to bother with preparations like purchasing N95 masks, to full blown crisis mode only weeks later. In January Trump initially claimed he "trusted" the data out of China and said that "everything was under control"; as usual only a couple months down the road and Trump flip-flopped on both assertions.  The World Health Organization refused to even label this outbreak a "pandemic" until the virus was entrenched across the globe.  The question people will ask is, was this all due to incompetence, or was it social engineering?

The Ebola event six years ago seems to have been a dry run for what is happening today.  I believe it is entirely deliberate, and I will explain why in this article, but either way, governments have proven they cannot be trusted to handle the pandemic crisis, nor can they be trusted to protect the people and their freedoms.

At the same time, the pandemic itself is tightly intertwined with economic collapse. The two events feed off one another. The pandemic provides perfect cover for the crash of the massive debt bubble central banks and international banks have created over the years. I noted in February that the global economy was crashing long before the coronavirus ever showed up.  At the same time, economic chaos increases 3^rd world conditions within each country, which means poor nutrition and health care options that cause more sickness and more deaths from the virus. As outlined in 2014:

“Who would question the event of an economic collapse in the wake of an Ebola (virus) soaked nightmare? Who would want to buy or sell? Who would want to come in contact with strangers to generate a transaction? Who would even leave their house? Ebola (viral) treatment in first world nations has advantages of finance and a cleaner overall health environment, but what if economic downturn happens simultaneously? America could experience third world status very quickly, and with it, all the unsanitary conditions that result in an exponential Ebola (pandemic) death rate. 

...Amidst even a moderate or controlled viral scenario, stocks and bonds will undoubtedly crash, a crash that was going to happen anyway. The international banks who created the mess get off blameless, while Ebola (viral outbreak), an act of nature, becomes the ultimate scapegoat for every disaster that follows.”

those thirteen year old incident response plans may fool a lazy auditor, but they won't fool ebola

mcclatchydc |  A Liberian man who arrived by ambulance at a Dallas hospital with symptoms of Ebola sat for "several hours" in a room with other patients before being put in isolation, and the nurses who treated him wore flimsy gowns and had little protective gear, nurses alleged Tuesday as they fought back against suggestions that one of their own had erred in handling him.

The statements came as Nina Pham, a 26-year-old nurse at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, fought off the Ebola virus after contracting it from the Liberian, Thomas Eric Duncan. The statements by the Dallas hospital nurses were read by representatives of the Oakland, Calif.-based group National Nurses United.

RoseAnn DeMoro, executive director of National Nurses United, said the nonunionized Texas nurses could not identify themselves, speak to the media independently or even read their statements over the phone because they feared losing their jobs. In a conference call, questions from the media were relayed to the unknown number of nurses by National Nurses United representatives, and the responses were read back to reporters.

DeMoro said all of the nurses had direct knowledge of what had transpired in the days after Duncan arrived at the hospital on Sept. 28.

Among other things, they said that Duncan "was left for several hours, not in isolation, in an area where other patients were present."

When a nurse supervisor demanded that he be moved into isolation, the supervisor "faced resistance from other hospital authorities," the nurses said.

They described a hospital with no clear guidelines in place for handling Ebola patients, where Duncan's lab specimens were sent through the usual hospital tube system "without being specifically sealed and hand-delivered. The result is that the entire tube system, which all the lab systems are sent, was potentially contaminated," they said.

"There was no advanced preparedness on what to do with the patient. There was no protocol; there was no system. The nurses were asked to call the infectious disease department" if they had questions, they said.

The nurses said they were essentially left to figure things out for themselves as they dealt with "copious amounts" of body fluids from Duncan while wearing gloves with no wrist tapes, gowns that did not cover their necks, and no surgical booties. Protective gear eventually arrived, but not until three days after Duncan's admission to the hospital, they said.

The nurses' allegations conflict with what hospital officials have been saying since Duncan's admission: that they have strict protocols in place for handling such patients and that a mistake led to Pham becoming infected while she treated him.

The hospital released the following statement after the nurses' comments:

"Patient and employee safety is our greatest priority and we take compliance very seriously. We have numerous measures in place to provide a safe working environment, including mandatory annual training and a 24-7 hotline and other mechanisms that allow for anonymous reporting. Our nursing staff is committed to providing quality, compassionate care, as we have always known, and as the world has seen firsthand in recent days. We will continue to review and respond to any concerns raised by our nurses and all employees."

DeMoro said the nurses came forward and asked Nurses United to publicize their statements out of anger they were being blamed for what had happened to their colleague.

The nurses statements come as an additional 76 health care workers who were involved in the treatment of Duncan are being watched for symptoms of Ebola and as the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention pledged to improve its response to hospitals in the event of more Ebola cases.

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/10/14/243412_dallas-nurses-describe-ebola-hospital.html?&rh=1#storylink=cpy

strict texas law protects medical-industrial egregores from patients and employees...,

observer |  One of the unexpected lessons from the Ebola cases in Dallas may well be how thoroughly Texas protects hospitals—and their insurance companies—from answering for critical lapses in care.

When Thomas Eric Duncan entered the Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital’s emergency room on Sept. 25 with a fever and complaining of stomach pain, there’s a chance that proper treatment might have saved him from the Ebola virus that would kill him 13 days later. Instead, the Liberian man was sent home with only painkillers and antibiotics. Duncan’s family and his fiancée are haunted by the question of whether Duncan might have survived had he been properly diagnosed. Executives at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital have admitted to mistakes and apologized to Duncan’s family.

But should Duncan’s family members seek more than an apology, and ask the courts to hold the hospital accountable for its missteps, they won’t find much recourse under Texas law. Neither will the nurses who contracted Ebola while treating Duncan, apparently for a time without sufficient safety gear, nor will anyone who might have contracted the virus from them later.

Thanks to a number of Texas court decisions and laws—including a sweeping 2003 Republican-led tort reform effort—lawyers say it’s unlikely that Presbyterian faces serious legal risk from the Ebola cases or others like them. Even if the hospital were found liable in court, the damages would be limited. Without the threat of expensive litigation, critics of tort reform argue, hospitals face little consequence for turning away sick, uninsured patients, even ones with Ebola.

The Dallas Morning News has reported that Duncan’s family members are considering a lawsuit against the hospital. The first challenge they would face is probably the greatest: proving that Duncan ever had a better-than-even chance of survival once he’d contracted the virus. With Ebola’s global mortality rate estimated recently at 70 percent, doctors and hospitals are probably safe from ever answering for even the most blatant malpractice against an Ebola patient. That’s not necessarily true in states where courts have adopted what’s known as a “loss of chance” doctrine allowing lawsuits even when the chance of survival is under 50 percent. But Texas’ courts have consistently shut the door to that possibility, ruling that if a patient was likely to die, then the hospital can’t be held liable for malpractice.

If there were a way past that barrier, Duncan’s family would face the same obstacles any other patient has since Texas’ 2003 tort reform law took effect. The law requires emergency room patients to prove not just negligence on the part of hospital staff but “willful and wanton” negligence. That “emergency room standard” is one of a few changes introduced in the tort reform law that raised the standard for lawsuits against hospitals. Another section of the law, related to hospitals’ responsibility for credentialing dangerous doctors, has protected another Dallas-area hospital from litigation over a dangerous Dallas neurosurgeon who killed two patients and paralyzed four others in a series of botched surgeries.

Tekmira Provides Update on TKM-Ebola Phase I Clinical Hold

tekmira |  Tekmira Pharmaceuticals Corporation (Nasdaq:TKMR) (TSX:TKM), a leading developer of RNA interference (RNAi) therapeutics, today announced an update on the TKM-Ebola Phase I clinical hold. The Company has received the clinical hold letter from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and is preparing a Complete Response to the Agency. The Company anticipates this matter will be resolved by Q4, 2014.

Tekmira's other clinical development programs are unaffected by the TKM-Ebola clinical hold and all remain on track. The key milestones for these programs in the second half of 2014 are:

• Presentation of TKM-HBV Pre-Clinical data                      
• Filing IND (or equivalent) for TKM-HBV    
• Interim Phase IIa TKM-PLK1 data
• Nomination of the next product development candidate

The clinical hold letter confirms that the FDA is seeking data to elucidate the mechanism of potential cytokine release and a modification to the protocol for the multiple ascending dose portion of the trial to ensure the safety of healthy volunteers.

"It is important to highlight that the study protocol for the TKM-Ebola Phase I trial called for an interim review of the data from the single ascending dose portion of the trial before proceeding to the multiple ascending dose portion of the study. I wish to emphasize this trial is unique. It represents the first RNAi study involving the daily treatment of healthy volunteers, without steroid pre-medication or any other type of pre-medication, and with multiple ascending doses," said Dr. Mark Murray, President and CEO of Tekmira Pharmaceuticals. "Furthermore, the multiple ascending dose portion of the study, as originally proposed, reflects the intense dosing regimen that would be used in patients lethally infected with Ebola virus."

On May 21, 2014, the Company disclosed the results of the single ascending dose portion of the study which demonstrated the administration of TKM-Ebola in the absence of any steroid-containing pre-medication was well-tolerated at a dose level of 0.3 mg/kg, determined to be the maximum tolerated dose in the absence of steroid cover. At that time, Dr. Murray said, "These (TKM-Ebola Phase I) results are significant as they establish the safety of 'third generation' LNP formulations and confirm that dosing at efficacious levels may be accomplished without the need for pre-medication."

cdc recommends hermetically-sealed fema coffins for ebola victims - and has stockpiled them for this contingency...,

alt-market |  I have been warning for quite some time that the banking establishment in particular is well aware that an economic collapse of incredible proportions is coming. In fact, they have done everything in their power to make one possible. This collapse, according to my research, is designed to clear the way through monetary carpet bombing for a new international Bretton Woods-style agreement which will plant the foundation of a truly global economic system centralized and controlled by a highly select few elites. Needless to say, the internationalists would prefer not to take the blame for such a calamity.

Regional or widespread war, terrorism, cyber attacks, etc, are all useful vehicles to conjure mass confusion, and can also be used as scapegoats for the eventual downfall of our economy. That said, a viral pandemic truly surpasses them all in effectiveness. All other tragedies could easily be tied to the first “domino” or “linchpin” (as Rand Corporation calls it) of Ebola transmission, but the strategy goes deeper than this...

An Act Of Nature

Even though most people are well aware of the fact that governments have been engineering biological weapons for decades, few people think political leadership would ever use them at all, let alone use them on the people they are tasked to protect. Even with the complacency and inaction of our government in terms of the response to Ebola, the general assumption by most of the American population will be that any viral outbreak is a product of nature, not of men.

Acts of nature are not things that the common man can easily rebel against. People rebel against governments and corrupt despots all the time, but not the plague. If a viral pandemic strikes, nearly everything a government does after the fact, no matter how corrupt or destructive, can be rationalized as necessary for the greater good of the greater number. If anyone does rebel, they will be labeled as pure evil, for they are now disrupting the government's ability to stop the pandemic from spreading, and thus, are partly responsible for the mass deaths that follow.

During a viral outbreak, government becomes mother, father, nurse and protector. No matter how abusive they are, most people will still look to them for safety and guidance, primarily because they have no knowledge of disease. What they do not understand, they will fear, and fear always drives the ignorant into the arms of tyrants.  One should also take into consideration the fact that most globalists lean towards the ideology of eugenics and promote the concept of population reduction.  A pandemic would fulfill this desire nicely...

Rationalized Economic Collapse

Who would question the event of an economic collapse in the wake of an Ebola soaked nightmare? Who would want to buy or sell? Who would want to come in contact with strangers to generate a transaction? Who would even leave their house? Ebola treatment in first world nations has advantages of finance and a cleaner overall health environment, but what if economic downturn happens simultaneously? America could experience third world status very quickly, and with it, all the unsanitary conditions that result in an exponential Ebola death rate.

The treasury, labor department, and private Federal Reserve have gone to vast lengths to skew statistics and rig markets with trillions in fiat dollars. Despite historic numbers of Americans falling off unemployment rolls, imploding shipping and manufacturing statistics, and the U.S. teetering on the edge of global “de-dollarization”, a large portion of the citizenry has been led to believe that economic recovery is assured. What they do not understand is that fiscal implosion is unavoidable, and the whole bull market is a circus designed to distract.

Amidst even a moderate or controlled viral scenario, stocks and bonds will undoubtedly crash, a crash that was going to happen anyway. The international banks who created the mess get off blameless, while Ebola, an act of nature, becomes the ultimate scapegoat for every disaster that follows.

charles ellison putting in yoeman's work..., ebola-race-class

theroot | It’s a question that’s left people scratching their heads: How does a fully equipped hospital send an Ebola-infected man home—right after he arrived from West Africa and complained about being sick?

Some observers and public health experts are beginning to wonder if there’s an elephant in the room that no one wants to talk about: race and the politics of health insurance. Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas, the private medical campus where Thomas Eric Duncan is currently under care and isolation, still can’t explain exactly how medical staff let the 42-year-old Liberian national go home with useless antibiotics. Hospital officials have only said that Duncan’s travel history wasn’t “communicated,” and now mainstream media reports are stuck on everything from malfunctions in Presbyterian Hospital’s electronic record system to Duncan being dishonest about the level of his Ebola exposure when he left Liberia.

But few want to touch the pointy eggshells of race and class in the frantic discussion over Ebola as it enters the United States. Did Duncan get initially turned away because he is black and, possibly, uninsured?

Would it have been different if Duncan had been white and insured?

We may never know for sure, and it’s unclear if Duncan had insurance (it’s unlikely, considering that he’s a Liberian national on a U.S. visa).

What we do know is that Ebola response in the U.S. is under enormous scrutiny as experts wonder if an already challenged health system—currently undergoing an Affordable Care Act renovation—is really all that prepared for something that is scaring us like a Contagion script. And the specter of race is lurking not too far behind: When white American aid doctors in West Africa showed signs of the virus, they were rushed back to the U.S. ... stat. The same happened when a white freelance cameraman for NBC News in Liberia was immediately flagged for treatment.

But it’s been rough going for black Ebola sufferers—even when one manages to sneak into the U.S. and access one of the most advanced health care systems in the world.

Former District of Columbia Chief Medical Officer Dr. Ivan Walks, who led the response against Washington, D.C.’s first bioterrorism attack, believes it’s a question we need to start asking. “I was stunned,” Walks tells The Root. “You could put [Duncan’s] picture in the dictionary under what you look for when responding to Ebola. How do you miss that guy?”

That’s where factors such as Duncan’s race and level of insurance could have influenced the hospital’s first decision in either subtle or not-so-subtle ways. “There is a lot of research showing that different people get turned away in different places,” argues Walks. “So if they turned him away at first because he’s an African with no insurance, that would not be inconsistent with what we’ve seen over the years.”

Walks draws on lessons from a similar event in October 2001 when the D.C. area was struck by multiple anthrax attacks that hit postal facilities particularly hard. When two black Brentwood-facility postal workers—Thomas Morris Jr. and Joseph Curseen—dropped by Maryland hospitals complaining of anthrax-triggered symptoms, at the same time that news of the attack and Brentwood as a focus of investigation was plastered on every cable channel, they were sent home and died soon after.
I

species final exams: dmitri orlov offers a prudent and scalable ebola mitigation strategy

cluborlov |  I have already mentioned that it may be a good idea to make arrangements through which survivors would be able to feed themselves, and provide them with the few other necessities for survival.

Beyond that, there are the basic mechanics of handling the pandemic. The current strategy treats it as a medical problem, best handled by doctors and nurses working in hospitals and clinics. This strategy only works for as long as the epidemic can be said to be under control; once it can be said to be out of control, the surviving doctors and nurses (medics are usually the first to be exposed—and to die) would be well advised to specifically refuse to handle Ebola patients.

In absence of any curative or preventive therapies, Ebola patients need shelter, hydration, hygiene, palliative care and, if and when they die, sanitary disposal of the remains. The goal is to do what is possible to give patients a chance to recover more or less on their own. To this end, it is very important to do all the things necessary to make sure that people are dying just from Ebola, and not from exposure, dehydration, or from any of the opportunistic diseases that thrive in disrupted circumstances, such as cholera and typhus. Sanitation is the most important aspect of the entire operation.

These services need not be provided by trained medics. The main two requirements for such service are: 1. psychological immunity to scenes of horrific suffering and death; and 2. immunity to Ebola. The first of these requirements comes down to natural talent; some have it, some don't. The second requirement is being provided free of charge by the Ebola virus itself, in cooperation with the survivors' immune systems.

English lacks a good word to describe this type of specialist, but we don't have to reach far to find one: the Russian word for it is “sanitar.” A popular Russian saying goes “wolves are sanitars of the forest” because they take care of disposing of the sick, the weak and the lame, thus giving those that survive a better chance. A sanitar need not be medically trained, but some training is needed: in diagnosis, palliative care, sanitation procedures and corpse disposal.

A third requirement is one that applies to the sanitation service as a whole: the number of sanitars has to scale with the rate of infection. Since the number of those infected is increasing exponentially, the number of sanitars assigned to serve them has to be able to increase exponentially as well. It seems outlandish to think that sufficient numbers of people will spontaneously volunteer for the job, and this means that they have to be press-ganged into service. And a super-obvious way to do just that is to simply never discharge Ebola survivors: once you are in, you are in until the pandemic is over, or until you die, whichever comes first. If you recover, you are given a bit of training, and then you go to work.

If you don't like the mitigation strategy I am proposing, please feel free to propose your own. Keep in mind, however, that what you propose has to automatically scale with the increase in the rate of infection, which is exponential. Sure, you can propose setting a public health budget, but then it has to double every couple of weeks—and keep doubling until the number of patients is in the billions.

doctors told to prepare for global outbreak after victim was allowed on two planes...,

Victim: Mr Sawyer, with one of his children, died from Ebola in West Africa

mirror |  Doctors fear Ebola victim Patrick Sawyer may have sparked a worldwide spread of the killer disease after being allowed on two flights while infected.

And tonight a desperate race was on to find dozens of passengers who flew on the same jets as the 40-year-old American.

British doctors and border officials have been warned to be on the lookout for people in the UK showing signs of the disease.

Mr Sawyer was allowed to board an ASKY Airlines flight in Liberia, where Ebola is rife, despite vomiting and suffering from ­diarrhoea. His sister was recently killed by the virus.

He had a stopover in Ghana then changed planes in Togo and flew to the international travel hub of Lagos in Nigeria. The dad-of-three died five days after arriving in the city.

Lancaster University virologist Derek ­Gatherer said passengers, crew and airport ground staff who came into contact with Mr Sawyer could be in “pretty serious danger”. Ebola is fatal in 90% of cases.

Doctors have identified 59 people who were near him and have tested 20. But they are struggling to find the others, who could have flown to anywhere in the world from Lagos.

Update: Doctors are reportedly investigating the first possible case of the Ebola virus in Hong Kong. A man has also been tested at a hospital in Birmingham and has been given the all clear. Get latest news in our live coverage and on our dedicated page.

There were today questions over how Liberian government worker Mr Sawyer was let on flights while clearly showing symptoms of Ebola – which has killed 672 people in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone since it broke out in February.

the ebola epidemic in West Africa has U.S. biowarfare programs written all over it.

washingtonsblog |  WASHINGTON’S BLOG: You said recently that laboratories in West Africa run by the Centers for Disease Control and Tulane University are doing bioweapons research.  What documentary evidence do you have of that?

You mentioned that a map produced by the CDC shows where the laboratories are located on the West Coast of Africa?

DR. FRANCIS BOYLE:  Yes. They’ve got one in Monrovia [the capital of Ebola-stricken Liberia] … one in Kenema, Sierra Leone [the third largest city in the Ebola-hotzone nation], which was shut down this summer because the government there believed that it was the Tulane vaccines which had set this whole thing off.

And then they have another one in Guinea, where the first case [of Ebola] was reported.

All of these are labs which do this offensive/defensive biowarfare work. 

And Fort Detrick’s USAMRIID [the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases] has also been over there. So it’s clear what’s been going on there.

CDC has a long history of doing biowarfare work. I have them doing biowarfare work for the Pentagon in Sierra Leone as early 1988.

WASHINGTON’S BLOG:   And how do you know that? Have you seen official documents?

DR. FRANCIS BOYLE:  An official government document: the Biological Defense Research Program, May 1988.  I analyzed it in my book, Biowarfare and Terrorism.

It’s clear that [the U.S. bioweapons researchers] were using Liberia to try to circumvent the Biological Weapons Convention.  And CDC – for years – has been up to its eyeballs in biowarfare work.

They always try to justify the development of offensive biological weapons by claiming it’s being done for “defensive” purposes.  That’s just a lie … and it’s always been a lie.

It’s been the case on Ebola and just about every other biowarfare agent you can think of.

WASHINGTON’S BLOG:  Does that type of research violate the Biological Weapons Convention?

DR. FRANCIS BOYLE: Well, of course! It also violates the Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act [which Boyle drafted], which was passed unanimously by both houses of the United States Congress and signed into law by President Bush, Senior.

That Act creates life in prison for this type of “Dr. Menegle” type work.

WASHINGTON’S BLOG:  And Obama recently said – as quoted in the New York Times article – that he’s “curtailing” this type of defensive research, or putting it on hold.

Do you believe him?

DR. FRANCIS BOYLE:  That’s the smoking gun, right there. Read that article [the New York Times article quoted above, which notes "a sudden change of heart by the Obama administration" about labs creating ever-deadlier versions of germs which are already lethal].  

The reason they’ve stopped it is to cover themselves, I think, because they know that this type of work was behind the outbreak of the [Ebola] pandemic in West Africa.

But that’s an admission right there, de facto.

please help a brotha out: wtf feed talkin-bout?

withintheblackcommunity |  Remember that compliment I gave to you when I was in Ethiopia last week about your handling of the Ebola situation?

I was in the airport in South Africa when I streamed your video of the (White) lady and I noticed that SINCE she was ONLY talking about "Ebola" from the perspective of the DEFENSE OF THE UNITED STATES and AMERICAN POLITICS - and didn't GIVE A DAMN about the condition of West Africans - that her views - affirmed by you - must represent YOUR VIEWS.

Please allow me to take my compliments about your handling about Ebola back.

I didn't understand your "riddle" of a response at the time.

But now everything seems perfectly clear.

My ALL ENCOMPASSING theory is:

1) IT IS IRRELEVANT WHO (which entity) created the Ebola virus and set it loose in West Africa - the symbolic homeland that the AMERICANIZED NEGRO was stolen away from through American Chattel Slavery

2) The ONLY thing that matters is the COMPETENCIES to DEFEND AGAINST this "Genetic Warfare Agent" on the ground where it is ravaging the people, their HOPE and their INSTITUTIONS

3) The key distinguishing feature of MY "Conspiracy Model", however, is my inspection of the REACTIONS BY THE AMERICANIZED NEGRO:

*** After years of bringing up the "Fidel/Che (Cuba) went to Africa to fight White supremacy and provide medical care - the AMERICAN COUP IN LIBYA and related CIA insurgency and Drone bombings did not compel these same operatives (your buddy Dr Spence for example) to protest the most recent American actions - defining the personas of "good and evil" as they did in the past.

********INSTEAD when "EBOLA" came to bear -THEN they spoke up about "Africa" and the "Cubans sending medical doctors to fight in Africa"

*** After HURRICANE KATRINA in which the HUDDLED MASSES of the Americanized Negro was presented for the world to see at the "SuperDome" and "The Morial Convention Center" this crisis was framed as AMERICAN (Right-Wing Government) benign Neglect

******YET to-damned-day WHEN the Americanized Negro heard that up to 1.4 MILLION AFRICANS might be dead by February 2015 - THIS WAS NOT POWERFUL ENOUGH of a bit of INFORMATION to have the NEGRO LEADERS suspend their AMERICAN CAPITALISTIC POLITICAL OPPORTUNISTIC CAMPAIGNING for the American Mid-Term Elections in which they vow - via LIFE AND LIMB to defeat the WHITE RIGHT-WING ENEMY - and look across the SLAVE TRADE ROUTES of the ATLANTIC at the DESPERATE NEED OF THEIR "BLACK ANCESTORS"

***********The very same ancestors that Dr Henry Louis Gates induced them to purchase a DNA CHEEK SWAB TEST to determine their "West African Slave Ancestry"

*********** EXCEPT THIS TIME they turned away from the NEEDS OF THEIR ANCESTORS as they were watching MSNBC/DailyKOS/Thing Progress who themselves was watching FOX NEWS for OFFENSIVE COMMENTS against AFRICANS and AMERICANIZED NEGRO - that they would syndicate in order to keep the NEGRO IN AMERICA TRAINED ON "RACISM CHASING" - .........

****** RATHER THAN AWARE that after 50 years of VOTING FOR HIS SALVATION - their CONSUMER STATUS makes them INCOMPETENT to provide ONE DAMNED BIT OF STRUCTURAL ASSISTANCE to the people in West Africa.

In driving down Highway 74 in Georgia 20 minutes ago I saw a NEGRO IN A MASERATI . NO less than a $120,000 car.

This as the entire nation of Liberia has 10 ambulances for a population of 1.5 million.

THERE IS NO EFFORT AMONG THE AMERICANIZED NEGRO to purchase 100 Ford 150 trucks on the African continent.

50% of them to pick up EBOLA INFECTED LIVE HUMAN BEINGS for transport to the medical station.

50% of them to take away DEAD AFRICAN BODIES so they won't infect the rest of the population.

But a few weeks ago when I listened to a Radio One station I did hear Rick Ross say that he has a 12 cylinder vehicle that he only drives on certain days because of its color scheme.

THIS IS WHAT THE YOUNG NEGROES IN DETROIT are being INDOCTRINATED WITH.

SO I ASK YOU, CNU - "Occupy Wall Street Supporter" when you hear a "Niomi Klein type character attacking CAPITALISM - do YOU envision in your mind that she is ALSO talking about BLACK CONSUMER CAPITALISTIC EXPLOITATION - which - because it is seen as INFERIOR - is left unchecked to attack the NEGRO in a manner worse than a SUBPRIME LONE FROM COUNTRYWIDE MORTGAGE?

Naomi Klein: "All corporate capitalism is bad EXCEPT the version practiced by the Americanized Negro - whose songs are played 90% of the time in South Africa BECAUSE they are progressive allies. Beyonce, Jay-Z and 50 Cent are too valuable to our movement in compelling the Negro to vote for PROGRESSIVISM, unlike the Koch Brothers. "

why ARE so many deadly viral diseases breaking out all over the world right now?

economiccollapseblog |  Ebola, Marburg, Enterovirus and Chikungunya - these diseases were not even on the radar of most people coming into 2014, but now each one of them is making headline news.  So why is this happening?  Why are so many deadly diseases breaking out all over the world right now?  Is there some kind of a connection, or is the fact that so many horrible diseases are arising all at once just a giant coincidence?  And this could be just the beginning.  For example, there are now more than a million cases of Chikungunya in Central and South America, and authorities are projecting that there will be millions more in 2015.  The number of Ebola cases continues to grow at an exponential rate, and now an even deadlier virus (Marburg) has broken out in Uganda.  We have gone decades without experiencing a major worldwide pandemic, and many people believed that it could never happen in our day and time.  But now we could potentially see several absolutely devastating diseases all racing across the planet at the same time.

On Monday, we got news that the first confirmed case of Ebola transmission in Europe has happened.  A nurse in Spain that had treated a couple of returning Ebola patients has contracted the disease herself...

A nurse's assistant in Spain is the first person known to have contracted Ebola outside of Africa in the current outbreak.

Spanish Health Minister Ana Mato announced Monday that a test confirmed the assistant has the virus.

The woman helped treat a Spanish missionary and a Spanish priest, both of whom had contracted Ebola in West Africa. Both died after returning to Spain.

Health officials said she developed symptoms on September 30. She was not hospitalized until this week. Her only symptom was a fever.

How many people did she spread the virus to before it was correctly diagnosed?

ebola outbreak has experts rooting

Nature | When the Ebola Reston virus was discovered in pigs in the Philippines last year, it marked the virus's first known foray outside primates, and raised fears of a potential threat to human health.

Last week, a joint mission of 22 international health and veterinary experts returned from investigating the outbreak with more questions than answers about the virus's pathology and epidemiology.

The Ebola Reston virus was first discovered, in 1989, in crab-eating macaques imported to the United States from the Philippines. Since then, the virus has killed most infected monkeys, yet had no effect on the 25 people that it infected — unlike three of the four other strains of Ebola, which kill between 25% and 90% of the humans they infect.

Because few people come into close contact with primates in the Philippines, the risk of catching Ebola Reston in this way is relatively low. By contrast, the appearance of the virus in an important livestock species was unexpected and worrying, says Pierre Rollin, an Ebola expert at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, Georgia, who was part of the mission to the Philippines. "We never thought that pigs could be infected," he says.

Once inside the pig, it may be possible for the virus to mutate into a version that is deadly to humans, as the avian influenza virus is thought to have done. "And we still don't know what it might do to someone who is immunocompromised by HIV or by drugs," Rollin adds.

Been collecting, if not connecting, these dots for a minute now. What is it with the low-level pandemic vibe in the zeitgeist? Must be that Agro-Defense facility in the works just up the road a stretch in Manhattan KS....,

recovering americans and the top secret ebola treatment

theatlantic |  On Saturday, we saw images of Brantly's heroic return to U.S. soil, walking with minimal assistance from an ambulance into an isolation unit at Emory University Hospital.

"One of the doctors called it 'miraculous,'" Dr. Sanjay Gupta reported from Emory this morning, of Brantly's turnaround within hours of receiving a treatment delivered from the U.S. National Institutes of Health. "Not a term we scientists like to throw around."

"The outbreak is moving faster than our efforts to control it," Dr. Margaret Chan, director of the World Health Organization, said on Friday in a plea for international help containing the virus. "If the situation continues to deteriorate, the consequences can be catastrophic in terms of lost lives, but also severe socioeconomic disruption and a high risk of spread to other countries."

In that light, and because Ebola is notoriously incurable (and the strain at large its most lethal), it is overwhelming to hear that "Secret Serum Likely Saved Ebola Patients," as we do this morning from Gupta's every-20-minute CNN reports. He writes: 

Three top secret, experimental vials stored at subzero temperatures were flown into Liberia last week in a last-ditch effort to save two American missionary workers [Drs. Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol] who had contracted Ebola, according to a source familiar with details of the treatment.

Brantly had been working for the Christian aid organization Samaritan's Purse as medical director of the Ebola Consolidation Case Management Center in Monrovia, Liberia. The group yesterday confirmed that he received a dose of an experimental serum before leaving the country.  

In Gupta's optimistic assessment, Brantly's "near complete recovery" began within hours of receiving the treatment that "likely saved his life." Writebol is also reportedly improved since receiving the treatment, known as zMapp. But to say that it was a secret implies a frigid American exceptionalism; that the people of West Africa are dying in droves while a classified cure lies in wait.

The "top-secret serum" is a monoclonal antibody. Administration of monoclonal antibodies is an increasingly common but time-tested approach to eradicating interlopers in the human body. In a basic monoclonal antibody paradigm, scientists infect an animal (in this case mice) with a disease, the mice mount an immune response (antibodies to fight the disease), and then the scientists harvest those antibodies and give them to infected humans. It's an especially promising area in cancer treatment.

In this case, the proprietary blend of three monoclonal antibodies known as zMapp had never been tested in humans. It had previously been tested in eight monkeys with Ebola who survived—though all received treatment within 48 hours of being infected. A monkey treated outside of that exposure window did not survive. That means very little is known about the safety and effectiveness of this treatment—so little that outside of extreme circumstances like this, it would not be legal to use. Gupta speculates that the FDA may have allowed it under the compassionate use exemption.

china dispatching some gunsels into liberia to "fight" ebola...,

HuffPo |  China will dispatch an elite unit of the People's Liberation Army to help Ebola-hit Liberia, the Foreign Ministry said on Friday, responding to U.N. calls for a greater global effort to fight the deadly virus in West Africa.

Washington has led the international drive to stop the spread of the disease that has killed nearly 5,000 people, sending thousands of troops and committing about $1 billion, but Beijing has faced criticism for not doing enough.

The PLA squad, which has experience from a 2002 outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), will build a 100-bed treatment center in Liberia, the first such facility in the three countries most impacted by Ebola to be constructed and run by a foreign country, said Lin Songtian, director general of the ministry's Department of African Affairs.

The center will be open for operation in a month's time, he told a briefing in Beijing. China will also dispatch 480 PLA medical staff to treat Ebola patients, he said.

It's the first time China has deployed a whole unit of epidemic prevention forces and military medical staff abroad, Lin said.

China is Africa's biggest trade partner, tapping the continent's rich vein of resources to fuel its own economic growth over the past couple of decades. Some critics have rounded on Beijing for not helping more in Africa's hour of need.

China has so far donated 750 million yuan ($123 million) to 13 African countries and international organizations to combat Ebola, according to the government.

"China's assistance will not stop until the Ebola epidemic is eradicated in West Africa," Lin said.

that magic orange grease though....,

farmingpathogens |   There’s something fishy about the bushmeat narrative of Ebola.

In August we explored the way the story internalizes the outbreak to local West Africans. It’s part of the ooga booga epidemiology that detracts from the circuits of capital, originating in New York, London and elsewhere, that fund the development and deforestation driving the emergence of new diseases in the global South.

But in addition, and not unconnected, there’s something missing from the model’s purported etiology. Indeed, Ebola may have almost nothing, or only something tangentially, to do with the bushmeat trade.

In this new commentary just published in Environment and Planning A, a team of ecohealth scientists of which I’m a part proposes Ebola emerged out of a phase change in West Africa’s agroecology brought about by neoliberal development.

We hypothesize more specifically that the pathogen arose as oil palm, to which Ebola-bearing bats are attracted, underwent a classic case of creeping consolidation, enclosure, commoditization, and proletarianization that at one and the same time curtailed artisanal production and expanded the human-bat interface over which Ebola traffic likely increased.

Explorations of such structural causes, the heart of the matter, have largely been shelved before they’ve begun. The emergency response, or lack thereof, has moved front and center. Both eminently understandable and opportunistically convenient. The failure to address upstream causes produces the crisis that becomes another way of avoiding such a discussion.

The tension manifests in some striking ways, with many veiled allusions to structural sources of the outbreak but few open declarations. It’s as if scientists and first responders are expected to talk about the outbreak’s origins without using anything more than generalities, careful euphemisms and pointed ellipses, avoiding offending funding sources whose capital accumulation helped drive the outbreak in the first place.

doctors without borders condemns global response to ebola

abc.net.au |  MICHAEL BRISSENDEN: The medical charity Medicins Sans Frontiers has issued a damning criticism of world leaders, saying the global response to the Ebola outbreak has been "lethally inadequate".

The agency, as well as the World Health Organisation and the US Centers for Disease Control, is warning the situation gets harder to control by the day.

North America Correspondent Jane Cowan reports.

JANE COWAN: Six months into the worst Ebola epidemic in the nearly 40 year history of the disease, it's a grim picture. Doctors Without Borders president Joanne Liu told a UN forum her agency is completely overwhelmed and the world is "losing the battle" against the virus. She says a global intervention involving both military and civilian personnel is needed to curb the outbreak.

JOANNE LIU: Leaders are failing to come to grips with this transnational threat. In West Africa, cases and death continue to surge. Riots are breaking out. Isolation centres are overwhelmed. Health workers on the front lines are becoming infected and are dying in shocking numbers. Others have fled in fear, leaving people without care for even the most common illnesses.

Entire health systems have crumbled.

Ebola treatment centres are reduced to places where people go to die alone, where little more than palliative care is offered. It is impossible to keep up with the sheer number of infected people pouring in our facilities.

JANE COWAN: The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director Tom Frieden says the medical community knows what to do to stop the spread of Ebola, but the challenge is to put those measures in place on the massive scale that's required.

TOM FRIEDEN: There is a window of opportunity to tamp this down, but that window is closing. We need action now to scale up the response.

JANE COWAN: Latest figures show more than 1500 people have died from the virus, with more than 3,000 confirmed cases, mostly in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

To make things worse, the areas are about to be hit by food shortages as neighbouring countries close land borders, restricting the flow of grain from abroad.

The World Health Organisation chief Margaret Chan says the borders need to be reopened.

MARGARET CHAN: The three hardest hit countries are literally isolated and marginalised. And this is hampering very fast response when we cannot fly in our experts to help.

JANE COWAN: The CDC says there's a small chance the virus could become more infectious through a process of genetic mutation but so far it appears to be spreading the same way it always has.

dallas: serious have-havenot medical industrial segmentation plus dirty south and south of the border propagation vectors...,

motherjones |  According to officials from the Centers for Disease Control, the patient, a male, arrived in the United States from Liberia on September 20. He planned to visit with family members in Texas. He initially sought treatment at a hospital on September 26 but was sent home, and then was readmitted on September 28. Texas public health officials believe that the patient had contact with "a handful" of people while he was infectious, including family members. The officials are currently in the process of tracing those contacts. CDC officials do not believe that anyone on the flight with him has any risk of contracting Ebola.

During a press conference, CDC officials reiterated that Ebola is not transmitted through the air, nor is it possible to catch it from someone who has been exposed but is not yet displaying symptoms.

"Ebola is a scary disease," said CDC's Dr. Thomas Frieden. "At the same time, we are stopping it in its tracks in this country."

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has confirmed a case of Ebola in Dallas. While other patients have been flown back to the United States for treatment, this is the first time that a patient has been diagnosed stateside.
The patient is being kept in "strict isolation" at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital. While hospital officials are not currently discussing which countries the patient has visited, no doubt US officials will be looking very closely at where he's traveled in the recent past, especially within the United States. The CDC will be holding a press conference on this at 5:30 p.m. Eastern. You can see it live here.

Ebola has already infected more than 6,000 people—and killed more than 3,000—in West Africa. Quick action prevented the disease from spreading in Senegal and Nigeria, but the disease continues to wreak havoc in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea.

aaaawwwwwww snap! if this overseer's hot, shit's about to get unbelievably real....,

dailymail |  Texas sheriff's deputy rushed to hospital with Ebola symptoms after attending apartment of 'patient zero' who died today

• Dallas County Sheriff Deputy Michael Monnig went to an urgent care clinic in Frisco, Texas with his wife on Wednesday A witness at the clinic described him as 'hunched over and flushed' 
• The deputy was inside the apartment where Ebola patient Thomas Duncan fell ill - the officer wasn't wearing protective clothing 
•  The CDC said the person is not one of the 48 contacts being monitored 
• The CareNow clinic was placed in lock-down Liberian national Mr Duncan, 42, died from Ebola on Wednesday morning 
•  Sgt Monnig's family said today the CDC had told them that their loved one was not at risk and they were just taking precautions

A Dallas County sheriff's deputy has been hospitalized today with Ebola symptoms, a week after he went unprotected into the apartment of first patient Thomas Duncan. Sgt Michael Monnig went on Wednesday to an urgent-care facility in Frisco, Texas with his wife, after complaining of stomach problems. The deputy presented at the clinic a week after he visited the Dallas home where Duncan was staying when he developed Ebola symptoms. Sgt Monnig was at the home to deliver a quarantine order to family members. Neither Sgt Monnig, nor the other two health officials, Zachary Thompson and Christopher Perkins with him, were wearing protective clothing or masks despite being in the apartment as cleaning crews were going about their work in full protective gear.

if the virus is only spread thru direct contact with bodily fluids, how did 12 people at a funeral for an ebola victim come down w the disease?

sciencemag |   Two ScienceInsider reporters called in to the press conference, but there was so much interest from the media that they did not get a chance to ask a question. Here, however, are some of the questions they would like to have asked.

• Q: Dr. Frieden, it sounds like the patient wasn't tested for Ebola when he first sought medical care, on 26 September, even though he had just arrived from a country with an Ebola epidemic. Why not? Did the health care provider who saw him know he had arrived from Liberia 6 days earlier?
  
• Q: How many health care workers and how many others came into contact with the patient before he was isolated?
  
• Q: You said the patient's contacts are now being monitored. Can you give some details about this? Does it include going to their homes and taking their temperature daily? Or do you communicate with them by electronic means, such as phone calls, text messages, and e-mails?
  
• Q: Are contacts being told to isolate themselves from their friends and family while they are being monitored?
  
• Q: Does the government have any legal authority to force potential contacts to cooperate if they don't want to? Are they free to travel?
  
• Q: Has the house where the patient was staying been disinfected, and if so, how exactly?
  
• Q: What experimental therapies are available now for the patient, should he want to use them? Would you recommend anything specific?
  
• Q: Does the patient or his family members have an idea about how he got infected?
  
• Q: Virologist Heinz Feldmann has described procedures at the airport in Monrovia as a "disaster" and said it was the most dangerous situation he encountered during his visit to Liberia. Could the patient have become infected at the airport? Is that possibility being investigated?
  
• Q: What is the estimated number of people entering the United States each week who have recently been in one of the countries affected by the epidemic?
  
• Q: The number of Ebola cases is roughly doubling every 3 weeks; CDC's own worst case-scenario says there may be as many as 1.4 million patients by 20 January. Should the United States and other countries prepare to see imported cases on a regular basis?
  
• Q: The World Health Organization has raised the possibility that Ebola could become endemic in West Africa. If that happens, how should the United States deal with people traveling from these countries in the future?
  
• Q: One more question, Dr. Frieden. The United States is paying a lot of attention to this single case right now. Do you think that will increase the amount of money and number of people the United States is willing to dedicate to containing the outbreak in West Africa?