To cancel my holiday due to Ebola epidemic

[salonebabe]

I'm going to Sierra Leone in a few weeks time, but I'm getting extremely anxious about the Ebola epidemic (www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2014/jul/17/ebola-sierra-leone-epidemic).

The Foreign & Commonwealth Office advice is still that there is minimal risk to tourists. Maybe I am worrying needlessly, but I suspect the problem is far worse than the official WHO figures are suggesting. I also don't think the FCO appreciate the realities of travel within Sierra Leone - jam packed buses, ferries and taxis etc. Unless the FCO issue a 'don't travel' advisory, I'll be unable to cancel and claim on my travel insurance.

I've been looking forward to this trip for a long time, so really don't want to cancel. I also can't afford to lose the money already spent on flights and accommodation.

Are there any medical experts here who could help me decide whether I should cancel or not? I appreciate that I, like most people, am not very good at assessing risk objectively, and I don't feel that I have enough information to make an informed decision. If a doctor on these forums was to say that they would have no problem travelling, or the converse, then that would help me make my decision.

The Sierra Leone footballers aren't being allowed to travel for matches, their athletes who are in Glasgow for the games don't want to go home, they want to stay here until things improve.

The presentation in the media at least, and the WHO response, seems to be increasingly that people should not go. I really think it would be wrong to go for a holiday at this point. I really hope your family will all be ok, hopefully the tide will turn. I could understand wanting to go if your family were sick, but then of course you'd have to stay for a long time. I think they would rather you were safer.

OP I have no advice to offer regarding Ebola but I am bloody disgusted by some of the comments here. How rude.

I've now decided to cancel the Sierra Leone trip. Hopefully the FCO will revise its travel advice so that I can claim on my travel insurance.

I just wish the WHO/CDC etc. had been able to nip this outbreak in the bud over a month ago when the number of deaths was still

As others have pointed out the risk is likely to be very small. However, if you are unlucky enough to contract it the consequences are massive, eg 90% probability that you die.

x posted, slow internet here.

I feel for you having to make that decisions salone. I think it's the right one, not because I think that you would get infected - the vast vast majority of people aren't, but I think travel could get pretty awkward.

Thought I'd share a graph that I have been updating since the outbreak started in Sierra Leone. The rate of increase in reported cases is scary, but surely not unexpected. As I mentioned in my previous post, this could all have been avoided had some concerted action been taken back in May/June.

Not unexpected at all - I think the view has been that it would get worse before it gets better. The aid (troops, equipment, money etc) has only just arrived and it'll take time to see the effect of it x

I think going and then coming back to the ukis utterly selfish. You may not know you're infected until you are back and spreading it round.

You've already spent the money so its not like you'll be further out of pocket, so you're not actually losing it.

Travels jabs etc don't do anything to protect you.

I think the borders to people travelling from those areas should be closed, in which case you wouldn't be able to get back in

I

Magpie have you read OP's updates? She didn't go.

OP I think you have been very sensible not to go and I really hope that you don't have any family or friends affected by this dreadful disease.

I've been really shocked at the utter rudeness of some of the ignorant posters on this thread. Did it really not occur to half of you who were so scathing of Sierra Leone that the OP may have originated from the country in question and would be travelling to see family?

Magpie RTFT

Good call OP. And I'm sorry your visit to see your family has to be shelved for the mean time

Horrible, horrible comments from earlier posters regarding Sierra Leone. I thought straight away the OP is most likely from the country..Why didn't you think to yourselves, "I'll give the OP the benefit of the doubt before I blast the country and possibly hurt her feelings with insensitive and down right rude remarks". Bloody hell.

OP I hope you're extended some grovelling apologies from certain posters. But don't hold your breath m'dear.

OP- if you're from Sierra Leone or have family, take heart. Some people here are just are awful.

You would have to be bonkers to willingly travel to SL now, apart from humanitarian reasons.