patrick.net

Straw Man says

How is turning around everyone who visited Africa during last 21 days equals to "burning money"? The money paid to keep CBP officers on duty will be burned anyway. This common sense measure is practically free. As in no cost. Even if there is no benefit, we still lose nothing.

Equipping them with remote-read thermometers, gloves, gowns, masks, training time. Quarantine stations and supplies. It is an additional duty with a MEDICAL evaluation component they must be given training materials and criteria and procedures for. It will also add TIME to each person processed. So either CBP lines get longer, or more personnel are hired to keep times short. Alternatively you hire shifts of healthcare workers who are not CBP to perform this specific function.

Great you've just caught someone with a "high" temperature according to the station. Now what? They don't have a return ticket, and do you want to dump a possible Ebola case onto ANOTHER plane full of people? Probably not, so you have to have personnel able to detain and attend 1 or more persons, and a holding area to keep them. A place stocked with medical supplies and special cleaning regimens in case they are contagious.

I'm surprised I have to even outline these basics to a "fiscal conservative" who should know all about nothing comes for free.

Vicente says

Straw Man says

How is turning around everyone who visited Africa during last 21 days equals to "burning money"? The money paid to keep CBP officers on duty will be burned anyway. This common sense measure is practically free. As in no cost. Even if there is no benefit, we still lose nothing.

Equipping them with remote-read thermometers, gloves, gowns, masks, training time.

All they have to do is check stamps in traveler's passport to see if he visited Africa during last 21 days. You don't need thermometers, gloves and special training for that.

Straw Man says

All they have to do is check stamps in traveler's passport to see if he visited Africa during last 21 days. You don't need thermometers, gloves and special training for that.

Please explain how that works at "no cost".

I am an American citizen! I demand to see your supervisor and my lawyer!

Vicente says

Straw Man says

All they have to do is check stamps in traveler's passport to see if he visited Africa during last 21 days. You don't need thermometers, gloves and special training for that.

Please explain how that works at "no cost".

I am an American citizen! I demand to see your supervisor and my lawyer!

Citizens will have to be let in, of course. The measure would be aimed mainly against Africans fleeing to US for medical care, like that Liberian dude did. No cost. Most of them won't even reach our shores once airlines learn about the policy.

Call it Crazy says

Let's see... seasonal influenza has been in this country for how many decades?

Ebola has been in this country for approximately 2 weeks in Dallas...

Yep, I would say that's an Apples to Apples comparison...

Ebola is not a strain of influenza.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidkroll/2014/10/09/enterovirus-d68-and-influenza-far-more-dangerous-than-ebola-in-u-s-say-top-infectious-diseases-physicians

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/aug/05/ebola-worrying-disease

Per the above, you are afraid this is worse than being portrayed? Correct?

Deflect much?

Vicente says

So far as I can see, no American citizens who have remained on American soil has died of this disease. So don't go to Africa, problem solved for Fox News watchers. Not that very many of them have ever gotten a passport anyhow.

A kid in NC just died of influenza. In a slow year it kills about 3,000.

The point is to stop disease from spreading, isolate and eradicate.

Someone just as smart as you years ago had the same liberal cavalier attitude about aids. Didn't do what they could when time was appropriate. And look at it now, those aids came a long way from a little thing in Africa.

This liberal arrogance is what will allow eBola to become the next catastrophe, by not trying to stop it while it's early on.

Rich liberals don't care, they got their homes in places where poor can't even come near. It's us poor and middle class folk that will have to deal with these consequences of liberal hubris.

FortWayne says

The point is to stop disease from spreading, isolate and eradicate.

Someone just as smart as you years ago had the same liberal cavalier attitude about aids. Didn't do what they could when time was appropriate. And look at it now, those aids came a long way from a little thing in Africa.

This liberal arrogance is what will allow eBola to become the next catastrophe, by not trying to stop it while it's early on.

Rich liberals don't care, they got their homes in places where poor can't even come near. It's us poor and middle class folk that will have to deal with these consequences of liberal hubris.

There is a big fire burning, in the house next to yours. It's across the street. The winds are high.

Option A) rush with all means to put it out. Allow anyone willing to fight, refuge back from the flames, even if they are burnt.

Option B) let it burn to the ground and hope it doesn't hop the street.

I love how AIDS was a liberal disease. Awesome. If partisanship has gotten this bad here, one can only imagine. That's freaking bat-shit-Ebola-infected crazy.

(Edit: Whoops, forest fires burning in houses!? LOL. Analogy fixed.)

Rew says

There is a big fire burning, in the house next to yours. It's across the street. The winds are high.

Option A) rush with all means to put it out. Allow anyone willing to fight, refuge back from the flames, even if they are burnt.

Option B) let it burn to the ground and hope it doesn't hop the street.

Replace "burn victim" with "people with their clothes still on fire" and your analogy would be proper. Now, would it be smart to let people with their clothes still on fire to take refuge in your home while you help putting out fire across the street? Of course not: you first make sure they can't inadvertently ignite your home and only then offer them refuge. Because, all selfish reasons aside, fighting two house fires is at least twice as hard as fighting one.

Therefore stopping travel from Africa makes perfect sense and doesn't harm "firefighting mission" in any way. It actually helps. Because, if (god forbid) epidemic starts on our soil, the public will demand to bring every resource back to fight it here first.

I'm not sure chemical castration was FDA approved way back then...

FortWayne says

Someone just as smart as you years ago had the same liberal cavalier attitude about aids. Didn't do what they could when time was appropriate.

Straw Man says

All they have to do is check stamps in traveler's passport to see if he visited Africa during last 21 days. You don't need thermometers, gloves and special training for that.

Customs is going to check every page of every passport looking for a west africa stamp? Yea right. The cubs are going to win the world series this year too. That's just too funny.

Since we are dealing in nonsense let's go further into the absurd. What about the traveller who know about this, flies to a city outside the US, dumps his passport, and gets a replacement from the embassy. Most embassies can provide a replacement passport in a day or two.

FortWayne says

The point is to stop disease from spreading, isolate and eradicate.

Someone just as smart as you years ago had the same liberal cavalier attitude about aids.

AIDS is difficult to stop because it's so very slow, and someone can be symptom-free for years and unaware they have it and are spreading it. AIDS has also been very difficult to tamp down, because people seem to have gotten the idea "that's an 80's thing" and don't take it seriously because treatments slow it now and there's nobody laying quilts on the Mall.

Ebola is infectious while symptomatic, and if it hasn't killed you within a month or two you're probably going to be just fine.

I am not a doctor but I have kind of a hobby of studying infectious diseases. In the 80's I was that kid who could tell you the differences between Ebola and Marburg. Soviets spent BILLIONS researching weaponizing ebola family, and it never really went anywhere. This class of virus has been around for thousands of years, mutating only slowly. It's never amounted to a Spanish Flu level epidemic, must less Black Death. It's symptoms are horrific though, which gives it high shock&awe value to Americans.

Next year, you will be admitting you were wrong when the epidemic I had "cavalier attitude" about, just never happened on US soil.

You seem pretty certain, so take 100:1 odds and we'll put money on this. Hey does Vegas have any bets on this?

Vicente says

AIDS is difficult to stop because it's so very slow, and someone can be symptom-free for years and unaware they have it and are spreading it. AIDS has also been very difficult to tamp down, because people seem to have gotten the idea "that's an 80's thing" and don't take it seriously because treatments slow it now and there's nobody laying quilts on the Mall.

Everything is difficult until you do it. Putting a man on the moon wasn't easy too, until we did it. Making a smart phone was difficult too, until Steve Jobs made one.

We can get it done, we just have to put effort into it. And right now I don't see any effort from our government, I just see arrogance and hubris.

bob2356 says

Customs is going to check every page of every passport looking for a west africa stamp? Yea right. The cubs are going to win the world series this year too. That's just too funny.

So argument "this costs too much" has morphed into "CBP officers won't do their job anyway"? Too funny.

bob2356 says

Since we are dealing in nonsense let's go further into the absurd. What about the traveller who know about this, flies to a city outside the US, dumps his passport, and gets a replacement from the embassy. Most embassies can provide a replacement passport in a day or two.

Couple of creative cunts going to great lengths like the far-fetched schema you described won't make much difference. It just won't happen in big enough numbers. For obvious reasons. Besides, adding simple "no passports issued less than 21 days ago" rule also costs nothing. Next?

Straw Man says

bob2356 says

Customs is going to check every page of every passport looking for a west africa stamp? Yea right. The cubs are going to win the world series this year too. That's just too funny.

So argument "this costs too much" has morphed into "CBP officers won't do their job anyway"? Too funny.

The argument hasn't morphed into anything. It won't work and it doesn't matter. It won't work because the volume of customs entries every single day makes it impossible to check for west africa stamps in everyones passport. It won't matter because no matter how much hysteria is thrown up people in west africa aren't hopping planes to get their ebola infected asses to america. How many people living in the slums and rural area's where the outbreak mostly is actually have a passport, visa, and the financial means to do that? Get a grip.

Call it Crazy says

Not only that, but the government started screening at airports here today, so they have everything covered:

*



*

Oops, I think they missed a few....

What an idiot map from the article. Gee look at all those flights from Monrovia to America. Except there no direct flights from the US to west africa. The closest direct flight is to Nigeria. You remember Nigeria where they had no trouble containing ebola after a few cases don't you? Every flight from west africa to the US is a transfer somewhere else.

Why don't you bother posting the source of your crap. http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-holes-in-the-us-ebola-screening-strategy-2014-10-10. The scanning is 94%. Not perfect, but very good. No one ever said everything was covered. To get the extra 6% would require every intercontinental airport in the country to have screening. That's just not possible, there are hundreds. By the time you got thousands of people in place and working the epidemic will very likely be over.

BTW the head of the CDC disagrees with you about stopping flights, But what would he know about infectious diseases? He's not an expert like you. From the New Yorker article last week:

In response, Frieden explained that such measures would make it harder to send aid workers into those places because of the difficulty of bringing them home afterward. “They’re not going to be able to come out if they go in,” he said. “And because of that, it will enable the disease to spread more widely there and ultimately potentially spread more to other countries in Africa and become more of a risk to us here, so that the best way to protect ourselves is not to try to seal off these countries but to provide the kind of services that are needed so that the disease is contained there and to identify anyone who may come out.” There may be situations in which the U.S. could benefit from keeping out of other countries’ affairs; this, public-health officials seem to agree, is not one of them.

TX healthcare worker who treated Ebola victim who died , tests positive for Ebola.
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/texas-healthcare-worker-treated-ebola-death-man-test-100518969.html#sUpWQo8

Looks like healthcare worker was wearing protective gear.

http://news.yahoo.com/video/health-worker-contracted-ebola-wore-134118850.html

FortWayne says

Everything is difficult until you do it. Putting a man on the moon wasn't easy too, until we did it. Making a smart phone was difficult too, until Steve Jobs made one.

We can get it done, we just have to put effort into it. And right now I don't see any effort from our government, I just see arrogance and hubris.

Where's that bootstrappy get-er-done rugged individualism?

Why hasn't the free market already taken care of it first?

Oh right, no profit in it.

The last GOP-appointed Surgeon General who had a brain:

We are now a nation of home-schooled anti-vaxxer "I got mine fuck you!" fundamentalists.

Possible Ebola case in Mass.

http://news.yahoo.com/patient-isolated-massachusetts-clinic-displaying-ebola-symptoms-newspaper-200117720.html

Well Vincent you make a good point.
You're one to get all worked up, because someone elects not to help make Glaxco and Kline a little richer by having some medbot drone on about how they are saving humanity by jabbing and prodding them with needles of god knows what all that only has 80% percent success at preventing viruses. Which is a little worse than the chances of doing nothing and still not getting the Flu. More over, sometimes these vaccines end up making people sick.

So now here you get sucked into this arcgument where you cast your lot in with the rent seekers demandiing that everyone submits to the needle every time someone sneezes at the start of winter.

YET!!! Now this is the part that REALLY has me scratching my damn head.
Ebola is nothing to laugh about, and you are firmly in the camp of "Oh Ebola that's just a bunch of Hype, we'll never see one case in the US. OH we got a case, well nobody will ever die from it, Oh he just died? Well it will never spread! Oh it has, they must have not followed protocol, OH she did? Well Ebola is nothing to worry about. You're just talking trash, because you hate Obama."

I mean can you understand how that makes me wonder about your intent, when you defend seasonal vaccines and you think everyone should be mandated to take them, but you laugh in the face of Ebola, even it is spreading like wild fire?

It would be a good time for the GOP to confirm Obama's nominee for Surgeon General, who has been on hold for the better part of a year.

1 person dying is one to many, when it could have been prevented. Had we had a President who refused to enact any meaningful policy because it got him so much attention from his peanut gallery, by making the GOP moan for their safety.

Democrats are a detriment and a danger to them selves and everyone else.

Remember a vote for Republicans is a vote for your safety and your kids life.

This November if you don't want to Die, then don't vote for Democrats.

That's the message I'm hearing from the young and hispanics this political season. Nice job assholes.

CaptainShuddup says

1 person dying is one to many, when it could have been prevented. Had we had a President who refused to enact any meaningful policy because it got him so much attention from his peanut gallery, by making the GOP moan for their safety.

Democrats are a detriment and a danger to them selves and everyone else.

Remember a vote for Republicans is a vote for your safety and your kids life.

This November if you don't want to Die, then don't vote for Democrats.

That's the message I'm hearing from the young and hispanics this political season. Nice job assholes.

The guy who died was from Liberia. How exactly could the President have prevented that death?

anonymous says

Hey Captain - does that one to many thing apply to HIV also?

No it doesn't. That's different, because it was Reagan, so stop mentioning that.

Please be aware that "1 person dying is one to many" also does not apply in the following cases:

- 9/11
- Katrina
- The lives of young men and women thrown away on wars which did nothing

Airport screening safety was a huge joke bolstered by the left.
And repeated over and over again, "The chances of Ebola coming here to the states is next to slim" We're smart, we're educated, we said so! So therefore it is an undisputed fact!"

Where in the fuck did that get us?

This whole episode has been brought to us, by the Left's maniac desire to finger the Right, at any and all cost. Even to the health of this country and even at risking a major pandemic. Viruses mutate all the time, it's not uncommon, Ebola or any virus should never be treated with such disregard.

And to say, "Well what about the Republicans with Aids?"

Well that's fine, if you're trying to be "Ronald Reagan" but this guy rides on Kennedy and King's Coat tails. I guess there's room on Ronnies too.

That's OK Michelle you can come too, there's room for two? Take 'em around the block Guiper!

bob2356 says

Customs is going to check every page of every passport looking for a west africa stamp? Yea right. The cubs are going to win the world series this year too. That's just too funny.

I don't even think they need to do that. Travel arrangements are all computerized. They can tell who bought a ticket and from where. They can tell the country of citizenship.... as well as the country of origin. It's not like you can get on a plane without proper ID anywhere in the western world. It took us about a minute to figure out where the first Ebola patient connected from in order to get to Dallas. I don't think it all must boil down to some customs officer reading through all the departure/arrival stamps. They could start with the system that's already in place. The information is there.

CaptainShuddup says

"The chances of Ebola coming here to the states is next to slim" We're smart, we're educated, we said so! So therefore it is an undisputed fact!"

Where in the fuck did that get us?

That dead guy in Dallas lied his way into the country. How would stricter measures have stopped him?

The only way is to close ALL international airports for months, and ALL land and maritime borders: no inbound flights from overseas, ship crews to remain on board, and turn around once loaded/unloaded.

Are you capable of understanding how many lives will be lost due to the drop in GDP which such measures would create?

Nobody would dare leave the United States, which means it would be impossible to send help to African governments battling this. That would make it even worse.

CaptainShuddup says

The chances of Ebola coming here to the states is next to slim" We're smart, we're educated, we said so! So therefore it is an undisputed fact!"

Except that's not what is being said. What the knowledgeable folks are saying over and over is that the chance of it being an EPIDEMIC in the US is very slim. And they are correct.

One foreigner dying in the US does NOT make an epidemic no matter what some of the dimmer people on pat.net want you to believe.

BenghazebolaHusseinCabronObama says

That dead guy in Dallas lied his way into the country. How would stricter measures have stopped him?

Quarantine passengers on all inbound flights from Ebola countries.

CaptainShuddup says

BenghazebolaHusseinCabronObama says

That dead guy in Dallas lied his way into the country. How would stricter measures have stopped him?

Quarantine passengers on all inbound flights from Ebola countries.

He came from Brussels.

ON second thought, you know what? It wasn't even about the guy who had Ebola how, where and when we discovered that he had it.

It was gross incompetence after it was discovered.

The CDC ONLY Sent over someone to decontaminate the poor guys house, and get his family out of harms way. Only after the good folks over FOX news put up a day long stink about lack of competence in the way it was handled.
Fucking Rodger with a pressure washer and all that.

It was a piss poor display and very hazardous, that the Democrats would put so many people in harms way, just to give Fox news the business.

I guess FOX got the last say. Obama does what FOX says not what stupid Libs say. Now who's a good boy?

Yeah that's leadership go from doing dick all, to just being ridiculously over baring and put the Fema camps to use. I already predicted that earlier in the original ebola thread. Libs are so transparent.

What's the big deal about quarantine? This is a deadly disease with which we have little experience. If I were infected, you wouldn't have to force me into quarantine. For the sake of my family, I'd welcome having a place to go that would keep them safer. I just don't see how having the right to die amongst your kin would be any consolation knowing that you made your own kids sick with a deadly disease.

The fact that a healthcare worker got the disease despite her space suit and training would seem to suggest that we aren't as protected as we could be. You just need to get a little infected vomit on you, touch your eyes or nose, and viola! This isn't about freaking out and going over the top. This is about choosing the least risky option until we get better at dealing with Ebola. I have no doubt that we would get there quickly, but the latest sick healthcare worker shows that we aren't there, yet.

If healthcare workers who are trained in dealing with infectious diseases, don the proper gear, go through decontamination chambers after contact... If these people can't keep themselves safe, what would that mean for the rest of us who have no such training or equipment?

turtledove says

The fact that a healthcare worker got the disease despite her space suit and training would seem to suggest that we aren't as protected as we could be.

As we're being led to believe.

tatupu70 says

CaptainShuddup says

The chances of Ebola coming here to the states is next to slim" We're smart, we're educated, we said so! So therefore it is an undisputed fact!"

Except that's not what is being said. What the knowledgeable folks are saying over and over is that the chance of it being an EPIDEMIC in the US is very slim. And they are correct.

One foreigner dying in the US does NOT make an epidemic no matter what some of the dimmer people on pat.net want you to believe.

They said the same damn thing about AIDS, no one thought it would spread. But it did, and now it's everywhere.

We are supposed to work to eradicate this disease now, not wait till it's everywhere and costs are astronomical.

Call it Crazy says

turtledove says

What's the big deal about quarantine?

That's going to be the ONLY way to contain it if a few cases pop up. It's the way it has been contained in all the villages in Africa in the past.

The difference is, the US is not Africa, and we don't live in small rural villages. How many groups of people/neighborhoods/sections of towns will be willing to lock down for 21 days and play wait and see?

Well if it spreads fast-now there is a possible case in Mass.- no debate needed. Most people will be dead.

Hmm how come all these things come from Africa-HIV came from there too???

FortWayne says

They said the same damn thing about AIDS, no one thought it would spread.

Who said that? Your idol?

BenghazebolaHusseinCabronObama says

anonymous says

Hey Captain - does that one to many thing apply to HIV also?

No it doesn't. That's different, because it was Reagan, so stop mentioning that.

Please be aware that "1 person dying is one to many" also does not apply in the following cases:

- 9/11

- Katrina

- The lives of young men and women thrown away on wars which did nothing

And seat belts;

http://www.cdc.gov/motorvehiclesafety/seatbelts/facts.html

Goddamn Gub'mint telling ME to buckle up- I'll show 'em!