To think that anyone coming to the UK from Africa should be tested for Ebola before they touch down on British soil?

[SuperWifeANDMum]

Just that really.

I really hope the government is doing all they can to prevent this disease coming to the uk.

I think it's considerably too early to be staying that the US has contained the virus in Texas. It's only been recognised as such within the last few days, the public were exposed to an infected individual, showing symptoms for 4 days, after he was discharged from hospital. A clean up wasn't ordered until days after he was admitted for a second time, and the incubation period is up to 21 days.

Come back in a month, and we will see if they've effectively managed it.

Also, the patients who have recovered received an untested drug, which is no longer available as they received the only doses. Without that, we are back to managing symptoms.

I know malaria and ebola are not comparable as ebola does not need an animal vector, the point I was trying to make there are many, many more infectious diseases out there that, personally and professionally, I find more worrying for my/my family/my community.

The current Ebola outbreak is another freaking nightmare that the affected region of the world did not need.
I have seen whole village with nobody but grandparents looking after dozens of AIDS orphans and this looks like it could be even more devastating as it affects potentially the whole population.

I also appreciate that the situation in the States is not done and dusted, but it is being managed with everything a rich superpower can throw at it. I am quite sure that the States will be Ebola free well before West Africa.

I just with the media would not pounce on this as it did and that reporting was a wee bit more responsible.

you don't need to worry too much about coughs and sneezes though as the virus isn't airborne

if you ingested some vomit you would be at risk but not from being near it

Some people have too much time on their hands. YABU.

If you don't know the region of the Ebola outbreak at all, you will not appreciate that Liberia and Sierra Leone are especially poor and especially troubled and chaotic. This is a large part of why the disease has gained such a foothold and is still spreading there. It isn't going to be the same story in every country in the region, even though none is wealthy and all have much more limited health care than a developed country.

Senegal has had one case. Nigeria has had eight, and successfully contained the outbreak caused by one man arriving there while infected. All their cases were health care professionals involved in treating that man, I think.

Ghana, Cote d'Ivoire (despite the recent conflict), Benin and other places are similarly much better able to deal with Ebola than Liberia and Sierra Leone.

Unsurprisingly, given how it is reported, an awful lot of people really do regard 'Africa' as one massive mess and tend to assume there is nothing and no one there who can do anything. Which isn't true. West African countries may be nowhere near as well equipped to handle a pandemic as Western Europe but they aren't all some hopeless morass of the evil and the passive who can't/won't fix anything.

I don't think malaria can be used as a comparable, not only does it require an animal vector to spread, that vector is inhibited itself by climate requirements to survive.

AbbieHoffmansAfro, v well said

Ah, *Stratters, I know it's not comparable

Let's all remember malaria not being a problem in Europe when global warming really kicks in. Possibly best to try to beat it now, while it's only billions of people in other countries affected...

You can really see how irrational fear can get a hold of people looking at threads like this. Ebola does not spread easily and the areas where it really affects the population are places with very poor sanitation.

And it is mainly in 2 countries not 'Africa' (which is freaking huge btw)

Ah lovely, it wasn't aimed specifically at you.

Oh. Sorry.

Lawks, don't apolgise

AAARRRGGHH

BODY FLUID EXCHANGE ALERT

Like most i think the OP's fears are irrational. But the level of aggression and bile aimed at those who - like me - dare to not immediately criticise the OP: i really cant understand that. There are some seriously smug, sanctimonious, bitter people on Mumsnet who really ought to get out more instead of aiming insult after insult at people whose only 'crime' is to have a slightly different world view to them.

I don't thjnk it's unreasonable to be scared of it tbh, I think the OP was just not thought through, and a tad over the top; impossible to implement, but an understandable fear.

MrsBolden

"It won't get out of control world-wide. It just won't."

^^
that view is not one taken by the government Cobra committee which has said that ebola "poses a very serious risk to the UK". Maybe you have access to information that they don't, but I would be surprised. I don't think there is room for platitudes and complacency, sadly. Obv hysteria is no better but there must be room for sensible discourse about how the UK can minimise the risks to its citizens (which might well be to address the problem in W Africa, which we should also be doing anyway for humanitarian reasons).

I agree, not need for nastiness.

I do get rather irked when the reporting of very real problems gets sensationalised to the detriment of any real informations.
Take MRSA: serious problem for ill people in hospital, frail elderly at home, but really not something that everybody should fumigate their house for, or carry anticac hand gel everywhere. It would be FAR more important to point out that some of us and more likely our children's generation are in danger of not being able to have, say, hip replacements or open heart surgery because there are going to be so many resistant bacteria that no current antibiotic will be effective. So, no, you don't need an antibiotic for that sore throat/cold/cough/runny nose even if it has been going on for 3 days (for the record: the average time for an upper respiratory tract infection to pass is 2-3 weeks. Just because it's 'just' a virus does not make it any less miserable).

Any rage I feel is towards the reporting and misinforming.

There are some seriously smug, sanctimonious, bitter people on Mumsnet who really ought to get out more instead of aiming insult after insult at people whose only 'crime' is to have a slightly different world view to them. My irony alert is sounding.

I was involved in pandemic planning re SARS, bird and then swine flu.
There are very scary projections out there; millions dead, breakdown of all supply chains, civil unrest etc.
These are Worst Case Scenario projections to allow for planning (don't ask, v little that really can be done IMO tbh).

There is absolutely no point in fretting about this in daily, normal life.

Wash yer hands, people.
That is the single most important infection control issue for all of us.
Not the human tragedies in far away lands - they just touch the humanitarian in all of us and get us donating, not fretting.

YY wash your hands.

Lots of soap and hot water, and sing two verses of Happy Birthday.

And NO SNOGGING

Calm down
Wash your hands
Send money to help fight the epidemic
All we can do

If it was as simple as washing your hands then how come the healthcare workers are wearing hazmat suits?

Just a little aside on malaria, the last recorded case of secondary transmission in England was as recently as 1950s. And this Independent article describes mozzies living here already, so it could happen again any time.

One of the extra sadnesses for the outbreak countries is that the death rate from malaria and other diseases are also up, as a result of buckled health infrastructure and fear of seeking treatment.

So donate, to MSF or any other NGO you prefer that's out there in any capacity.