Overnight Open Thread (10-27-2014) – Ebola Monday Edition

Might as well get the big ole ebola roundup out of the way. Dr. Maetenloch prescribes 1000mg Vitamin C, 10mg Prozac and a glass of wine q.d.

Quote of the Day I - And It's That 4th Category That Can Kill You

"Our health care authorities are guilty of a combination of stupidity and hubris. They indicate that they believe they know everything there is to know about the science of the way this disease is transmitted, and are arrogant about it. But they don't even know what they don't know."

Quote of the Day II - Missing the Point Version

"To quarantine everyone, in case, you know, when you cannot predict who may develop Ebola or not, and to make me stay for 21 days, to not be with my family, to put me through this emotional and physical stress, is completely unacceptable," Hickox told Crowley. She added, "I feel like my basic human rights have been violated."

-- Nurse Kaci Hickox complaining about being quarantined in New Jersey.

Well if we could predict who would develop ebola after possible exposure, there would be no need for any special procedures for people who've worked with Ebola patients in the first place. But because we can't, we have to have this period of isolation known as a 'quarantine'.

So far Hickox has tested negative but note that testing negative for ebola is not as definitive as it's been made out to be:

The virus builds up in the body as patients get sicker. In fact, people in the early stages of Ebola infection often test negative for the virus, because there's not very much in their blood.

A Tale of Two Ebola Research Mishaps

The stories of a Russian and an American researcher directly exposed to the ebola virus illustrate lessons learned and lessons not learned.

On February 11, 2004, a scientist was injecting a test treatment into laboratory animals (mice) deliberately infected with a mouse-adapted strain of Ebola Zaire, at the US Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases in order to study the disease. She inadvertently stuck herself with the needle. It went right through her bio-safety suit glove and her surgical glove into the soft muscle of her hand. (She was trying to inject the sample into the mouse's belly, whilst holding the mouse in her hand). She was in a Bio Safety Level-4 containment lab at the time, the strictest and most inconvenient of medical precautions.

...Anyway, she thought the plunger didn't move, but instantly reported the accident, and took basic first-aid measures. And things started to happen. Because an ebola patient is not infectious for 24 hours, she was allowed to go home and pack for a month away from home. (Home wasn't very far, because the same facility where she worked hosted her quarantine area). Then she came back to USAMRIID, and walked through the round stainless-steel vault door of RIID's "Patient Isolation Suite," or, as everybody called it, The Slammer. There she would stay for 21 days.

If she lived that long.

Ebola is Breaching Our Maginot Line

Who would have thought the arrival of one ailing Liberian could have uncovered such unpreparedness and incompetence within our health care system? ...Each line of defense was breached, one by one, in ways that have seemed frighteningly careless. Our Maginot Line failed to protect as promised. Through it all there were repeated attempts to reassure us, but as the problems mounted, those confident assurances were exposed.

Exhibit A in the CDC's carelessness:

If that weren't bad enough, the fourth line of defense was breached: monitoring.

The CDC unaccountably failed to demonstrate the excess of caution needed when trying to prevent a further spread from a very small at-risk group into the general population. Duncan's stepdaughter Youngor Jallah, a nurse's aide who had cared for him up to the point of his hospital admission, had been exposed to Duncan's body fluids without any protective gear. Once it was determined that he had Ebola, caution should have dictated that she be quarantined by public health officials until the 21-day incubation period was over. Instead, the CDC told Jallah that she could continue to go to work as a nurse's aide as long as she was monitored for temperature changes.

Jallah herself decided that wasn't good enough, and she chose to stay home until the full period was up.

How Long Can Ebola Survive on Surfaces?

The CDC says just a few hours but researchers say up to 60 days under the right conditions. (Thanks to RD Brewer)

Those Ebola Vaccines in Testing Now? You Can Thank Dick Cheney for That

Insurers Now Writing "Ebola Exceptions" Into New Policies

Can the Government Quarantine Me?

Answer: It depends. Which is a yes*.

Media Should Stop Lecturing Americans About Their Ebola Concerns

More than anything, though, I just want reporters to stop lecturing me about how interest and concern about the deadly Ebola virus means I'm panicking. I'm not panicking. But I'm sure as heck not going to calm down because the same profession that knows little about everything else in the world is telling me that they've totally got this complex viral outbreak down pat.

I don't know if we're just witnessing some sort of dramatic self-soothing technique or if it's disdain for typical Americans or if it's some kind of psychological trauma related to journalists' inability to deal with the failures of the administrative state and progressive ideology. And I don't care. But there is no doubt that the single most annoying thing about media coverage of Ebola is the hair-trigger response of some to disdain any discussion of Ebola as panic.

Ebola is a deadly disease but through hard-gained experience we know how to deal with these. But what we can't deal with is ebola mixed with official stupidity and arrogance. And it's the incompetence and haplessness of the authorities along with their refusal to learn from early screw-ups that's unnerved me.

Thomas Frank: We Are Such Losers

Frank has a case of the Obama sads after having drunk the kool-aid.

Barack Obama survived his re-election, but he is suffering a form of Jimmy Carter's fate nevertheless. The ambiguous idealism of Carter's first run for the presidency was precisely what set the table for his downfall later on. Being a "blank screen" or the personal object of the enthusiasm of millions-these may play well when a candidate is unknown, but they are postures impossible to maintain as president. In both cases, they led inevitably to disappointment and disillusionment.

The moral of this story is not directed at Democratic politicians; it is meant for us, the liberal rank and file. We still "yearn to believe," as [Rick] Perlstein says. There is something about the Carter / Obama personality that appeals to us in a deep, unspoken way, and that has led Democrats to fall for a whole string of passionless centrists: John Kerry, Al Gore, Michael Dukakis, Gary Hart and Bill Clinton. Each time, Democratic voters are enchanted by a kind of intellectual idealism that (we are told) is unmoored from ideology.

We persuade ourselves that the answer to the savagery of the right-the way to trump the naked class aggression of the One Percent-is to say farewell to our own tradition and get past politics and ideology altogether. And so we focus on the person of the well-meaning, hyper-intelligent leader. We are so high-minded, we think. We are so scientific.

We are such losers.

Rehana is Dead

She was captured and beheaded by ISIS during the defense of Kobani.

Hillarynomics

Appearing at a Boston rally for Democrat gubernatorial candidate Martha Coakley on Friday, Hillary Clinton told the crowd gathered at the Park Plaza Hotel not to listen to anybody who says that "businesses create jobs."

"Don't let anybody tell you it's corporations and businesses create jobs," Clinton said.

"You know that old theory, 'trickle-down economics,'" she continued. "That has been tried, that has failed. It has failed rather spectacularly."

Girl Scouts Struggling, Membership Plummeting, Facing a Split

As CBS News reports, for the second straight year, both youth and adult membership in the Girl Scouts has dropped dramatically. Over the past year, the total youth members and adult volunteers declined by six percent, from 2,994,844 to 2,813,997. The past two years have seen total membership down 11.6 percent, and since 2003, when membership peaked at more than 3.8 million, total membership has plummeted 27 percent.

And it's likely to get worse as the organization considers going even more left:

However, as Will Doig at The Daily Beast observes, the Girl Scouts is facing a split between those who believe the organization should return to its traditional values and principles and those who want the group to focus on more "global" concerns and issues, such as "female body image" and how to reduce one's carbon footprint.

...However, as Breitbart News has extensively reported, not all is "fun" at Girl Scouts USA, and Parisi, formerly vice president of Marketing and Communications at the Ms. Foundation, had joined a national campaign during her tenure there to punish the Susan G. Komen Foundation for trying to defund Planned Parenthood.

But the alternative American Heritage Girls seem to be growing and thriving.

Of Course: MoveOn Ignores the Rules and Votes in Their Video Contest, Choose Distant Runner-up Leftist Video Instead

Politicians Order Women into the Infantry

Whether they can meet the standards or not.

Venezuela Now Rationing Food

They're a victim of Heinleinian 'bad luck'.

The Family Pet Lion

Actress Tippi Hedren and her family (including her then-teenage daughter Melanie Griffith) lived with a pet lion named Neil for a while back in the 1970s.

Melanie has mentioned this a few times in interviews and her mother says that in retrospect it was a dangerous idea and they were lucky that nothing bad happened.

The Yahoo AoSHQ group - it's got electrolytes.

And my twitter thang.

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posted by Maetenloch at 10:27 PM

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