The CDC - will heads roll?

[TheLovelyBoots]

It seems like the US now has 2 Ebola cases that could have been prevented, and one of them was permitted to fly after reporting a fever. Shouldn't this guy just step down, already?

And where is Obama in all of this?

Yes I think at the very least Frieden will go and possibly those in charge at the Dallas hospital too.

I do appreciate how refreshing a "we screwed up, I'm sorry" might be but there's been too many, yes?

Very much so you can forgive one or at a stretch two screw ups but its gone to far now.

They allowed Thomas Duncan to leave the ER.
They didn't properly quarantine the family or it seems offer much support in the early days.
Medics it seems weren't wearing appropriate protection I've heard it said in the first few day the medics were wearing Type 2 suits whereas the other hospitals have been using Type 4 and it didn't pass onto their staff.
They now have two infected nurses.
They allowed one of those nurses to get on a flight even though she called to ask of it was Ok since she her body temp was raised. They allow it and within hours she's ill with Ebola.

The CDC seems out of their depth.

Surely Frieden can't go at this point? It would be very disruptive to efforts to deal with the Dallas cases and maintain focus on efforts to ramp up the response in West Africa. From what I have read, Frieden is genuinely committed to stopping spread in the countries involved. I have read criticism about his handling of the situation in the US, partly because apparently he is not known as a good communicator. Richard Besser, who was CDC acting director during the start of swine flu in 2009 was much better, and he is actually a really informative person to follow on twitter during this crisis.
Clearly CDC have not handled this well, but it's difficult to work out how much responsibility lies with them and how much with Dallas county and the hospital.

Oh no I don't think he'll go soon its be after the worst is over.
I agree that the CDC are. It alone in blame for the Dallas mess they are both responsible.

Are NOT alone.

Yes, that would make sense. He has certainly been damaged by this. It's a horrible mess with very blurred distinctions as to who was responsible for what. Thomas Eric Duncan and his family were treated badly, and the nurses not supported as they should have been.

Frieden can't go but they've made a really crap job of things so far. Don't forget Duncan's family being quarantined in an infected flat or the fact no one would pick up their waste.

It seems that the CDC were issuing very different guidelines for ppe than WHO do. Fortunately they are rapidly changing that. It was also an arrogant mistake to say any us hospital could cope with this. Well, yes, with the right equipment and training, but they can't do it by magic.

I hope there will be a proper analysis of what the CDC said/did/directed, and what e people on the ground actually decided and carried out. For it remains possible that CDC have not been greatly in error, but a hospital who put a previously untrained member if staff straight into a BL4 containment situation might merit extreme censure. Ditto advice on quarantine might be entirely correct, but that doesn't mean the people who had thr exectuive duty to enforce it did it in a way that met the policy standards.

Contingency planning for disaster scenarios is an area which is often in the front line for cuts.

Yes, oybbk, too complacent and making untested claims about ability of any US hospital to deal with this without specific training when places like Emory which have specialists were still discovering potential practical problems when treating Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol. I feel awful about Duncan's family - they shouldn't have had to go through that. And the nurses were not protected when they should have been

Surely the hospital acts at the CDC's instruction? Who else would a hospital look to in this case? They don't (or shouldn't) set their own ebola protocols - this should be set by, and maybe even enforced by? the CDC.

Thomas Friedman may be passionate about what he does, but this nurse spoke with someone at the CDC before boarding her plane and they did not tell her not to fly. I cannot understand this. The whole of Cleveland is now on lockdown because of this - she visited a bridal shop with five friends, feeling ill! Bloody hell!

TLB the CDC has no jurisdiction over US hospitals as far as I understand. There is no overall body to oversee hospitals - policy is set by local healthcare boards or at hospital level - it's rather like our own private hospitals really.

I have a friend in Cleveland and my fb has a few panicked threads. They are scared, but the reality is, it is still a very difficult virus to catch - unless you are nursing someone in the end stages.

Surely the nurse should have thought on a bit! I mean if you're around an ebola patient and you start to feel ill surely you'd put two and two together!
I know I would! There's a lot of people at fault here!

How are they dealing with the passengers on the plane?

She did, she reportedly phoned the CDC several times. If the CDC says its safe then an awful lot of people are going to believe them.

Ooops sorry for the misinformation!
Well I hope the CDC feel good about themselves! They've risked a lot of peoples health!

No one seems to be taking it seriously enough!

I think it's very important to not blame this nurse because if the HCPs are in the political as well as Ebola fire line, we're screwed.

That said, I cannot understand why she got on the plane. I understand the other nurse had not yet been diagnosed, this is key, but wouldn't you just be like "I have ebola! I am going to die!" if you developed a low-grade fever and felt unwell some days after treating an Ebola patient?

I would jump straight to thinking I had ebola! With the seriousness of it all, I'd be checking myself into quarantine at the first sign of a sniffle if I was round an ebola patient!

Then again I'm a drama queen.

How the CDC let anyone that had been in contact with someone with ebola who was now feeling unwell on a plane is beyond me.

I think everyone would be a drama queen in this case. I'm sure the CDC was trying to talk the nurse down from the ledge, she was probably incredibly worried and they probably soothed her with talk of temperature thresholds. But I would self-quarantine, too.

I don't think CDC has much (if any) executive function, and now is probably not the time to be restructuring. But I think I heard on the news that Obama is about to appoint an Ebola supreme, who perhaps will be able to give more force to CDC recommendations.

There is more to it than the CDC (or a federal Ebola czar) recommending things and the hospitals just following the recommendations.

I heard a report that said the staff at the Dallas hospital (and it must be the same at many others) didn't have the skills/training to use the personal protective equipment correctly.

Presumably that will change now, but it's not at all straightforward.