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by ghshephard 4291 days ago
Your recommendations are exactly contrary to the guidance from those who have spent their entire careers studying the best way of responding to these types of epidemics.

Attempting use "force" to seal off the area, is perhaps the single most effective way to lose all control of this disease, and see it spread to hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people who (quite reasonably) decide to fight back against such an activity.

Careful Training, use of locals who have developed immunity, massive injections of beds, medicine, and supplies, can have a huge impact, and keep this current epidemic under control
1 comments
rwallace 4291 days ago
Your argument is from authority, but authority is trumped by empirical fact. The kind of strategy you advocate was, yes, the right thing to try back in spring, when there was reasonable hope that it could work. It conclusively failed, at a time when the outbreak was far smaller and more tractable than it is now. It cannot possibly keep the current epidemic under control, because the current epidemic is already not under control, hasn't been for months. Meanwhile, hundreds of healthcare workers have, despite training, been among the dead. No amount of training can compensate for the fact that with a caseload of this magnitude you get overworked to the point of exhaustion and start making mistakes.

By contrast, the strategy I advocate has thus far been working.

Nigeria? Cut travel to the affected area. One idiot had slipped through, causing an outbreak. Because it was only one small outbreak, it was possible to contain it.

Senegal? Same. Tougher problem because it has a land border with the affected area. In response, citizen groups have been supplementing the security forces, patrolling the border and turning back people trying to enter the country, thus far successfully.

Ivory Coast? Cut off travel from the affected area. Thus far, no Ebola detected.

Do you believe in results? I advocate abandoning the strategy that has been proven not to work and focusing on the strategy that has been proven to work.

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