To wonder why there isn't more resource being thrown at Ebola?

[Roonerspism]

There are now reports this outbreak could kill a million people in West Africa. It could mutate. Countries like Spain cannot contain it properly.

I don't understand why countries have been so slow to react. It could have been controlled so much easier had we responded sooner. Now we seem to be dealing with a catastrophe for Africa. What if it spreads to India? It seems likely to hit most countries, even if contained.

It seems unbelievable we have slept walk into this.

What resources, that haven't aleady been deployed, do you think should be?

There's more going on (and has been for a while) than you're probably aware of.

The military have been training and gathering resources and personnel to staff a field hospital.

Lab staff have been working on medication and a vaccine.

The WHO and CDC have been tracing and managing cases.

And charitable organisations have been caring for and managing the sick.

You have to remember the initial case was a young child in a very rural location with very little local medicine, knowledge and awareness of the disease and contact tracing. Once it was identified as Ebola authorities sprung into action.

Protective suits for a kick off. 100 doctors in Sierra Leone have died.

But these charitable organisations simply can't cope. They don't have beds, personnel, suits, testing facilities. They are turning sick people back into the community.

Charities alone can't beat this. It needs a huge push from developed countries.

Have you been to Africa OP?

The British military aren't just staffing and equipping a clinic - they're building it. The government has also diverted £100m from the aid budget - but whether that's spent on protective gear or other vitally needed items will be decided by WHO and agencies on the ground.

What's your point? (And yes I have)

This is heartbreaking.

Agree - watched an interview with an expert in the region who said the initial response should have been like the international response to the tsunami of 2004 in terms of resources and effort. It would have been possible but the will was not there.

Unlike the tsunami, there wasn't one dramatic day.

This has been building for some months. It didn't get stamped out after a localise outbreak as has happened before, but spread and has become the largest. It is only in the last week (since the London conference) that WHO has been making urgent appeals, and only since than that the evidence showed that the rate of spread is now exponential (and the projections changed).

Auntie Stella - the number of infections was considered unprecedented in May. MSF called the situation 'out of control' back in July - that should have been the catalyst. Why wasn't this enough to trigger a co-ordinated international response?

I think you'd have to ask WHO that. UK governmental aid started last month, but the big call for international action really only started last week.

I think a game of dice has been played and lost.

I have a friend on holiday in Spain...wonder if she'll make it back before they close the borders....imagine the chaos!!

I very much doubt the borders will be closed in Spain or to Spain.

A few 'suits' op? Really?

But there was a all for international action before last week. The aid just hasn't been big enough or fast enough so far. MSF have been saying that for weeks.

It's not quite like the tsunami because it isn't one dramatic day. Massive international intervention would have been unnecessary in December, or even March but I'm not sure the OP is wrong to think that if it had happened in July/August we might not have got to this point.

I agree it sounds far fetched, but then so did the idea that the rate of spread might jump to exponential.

Perhaps it will burn itself out, or mutate such that it is less virulent, I think that's what most infectious agents do over time?

Of course not, soul. But the fact that local communities are fighting this even without proper protection is staggering. Brave souls risking their own lives and battling this alone.

There have been warnings about it for months.

It seems so entirely preventable.

Most largest Ebola outbreaks so far have been at risk of spreading to a large town. This time it did and the WHO wasn't really prepared for it.
It has been heavily criticised in the past for over reactions to SARS and H1N1, and the local offices system didn't work well. Plus, most Ebola outbreaks so far have been to hundreds of cases, maximum.

Senegal and Nigeria seem to have contained it and the country of origin has a much slower rate of case increase than Sierra Leone and Liberia. Sadly, these were particularly vulnerable (and still dangerous) countries.

More resources are being deployed, but there aren't many people who are trained in the correct procedures for Ebola. It takes some time and equipment is needed. And the last thing we want is for hundreds of health professionals to go to their deaths.

Would you volunteer to go, Rooner, as you might to a tsunami response?

There's also the logistics of getting the aid where it's needed, aid from the USA has been stuck in transit at a Sierra Leone port for months Here

July was the month when this outbreak passed the size of the largest previous outbreak, but I'm not sure at what stage the latest spread-if-unchecked projections began to emerge (there was a paper published on 26 Sept which probably led to much of what is appearing in the press now, haven't looked back to what analysis there was before that).

But back to OP, what else should UK (as a nation, or people here as individuals) be doing? How much more of the aid budget would you use (and, on the general assumption that you're not going to remove funding from existing aid commitments, if there is no more left, where would the money come from).

Military is being sent, NHS staff encourage to volunteer (I assume I wouldn't want to compel them).

What else? (And how to press for it?)

No llewji of course I wouldn't. I am medically untrained with young kids.

Does that mean I cannot scratch my head in bewilderment? I have followed this for months and it all seemed so inevitable. It's a global bloody cock up - that's what it is.

I dont think it seemed inevitable at, all swine flue, sars, every other outbreak people are convinced that the outcome will be apocalyptic, the current situation only looks inevitable with hindsight

Of course I haven't the answers stella. But an international response with far more weight behind it has been required for months.

My question posed was whether I was being unreasonable to wonder. Not whether I should now create a set of recommendations for western governments to now follow.

I'm glad so many of you are comfortable about it. I feel desperately unsettled. We see daily pictures of the horrendous goings on in the Middle East. But this has the capacity to kill millions in Africa, with a slow agonising death. Excuse me for continuing to scratch my head.