Ebola: the current situation, measures being taken, and reasons for Spain to be optimistic

[Janet]

don't know, but I'll have another look tomorrow, and take my little bottle in and ask specifically if they have it or if they can get it in ...

[Janet]

Despite the optimistic nature of reports like that in Nature, and EU governments' messages of reassurance ...

The Ebola outbreak in West Africa is spreading faster than efforts to control it, World Health Organization (WHO) head Margaret Chan has said.

She told a summit of regional leaders that failure to contain it could be "catastrophic" in terms of lives lost.

But she said the virus, which has claimed 729 lives in four West African countries since February, could be stopped if well managed.

That's OK if it can be well managed. Thing is, asking for control to be well managed in countries where there is no functioning medical system and where people prefer witch doctors to trained medics and who snatch sufferers from hospital ... is asking rather a lot ...

BBC

This frightens the hell out of me.

@Myrtle Hogan-Lance ... they have the alcohol handwash in Mercadona, I picked up a couple of bottles today.  They're by the shower gels, on a shelf below the body sprays. If you would like one before, or if they've run out by the time you get there, you're welcome to one of mine!

[Myrtle Hogan-Lance]

I think we will just see dithering until a case actually arrives in the first world.  Then the measures will hit the fan spectacularly.

Thanks @Janet for the info about the hand sanitiser.  This means they have just moved it, as they did with the almond products and coco rallado, now to be found in the middle aisle if you are facing peanut butter, with your back to biscuits.

[Pelinor]

Is it me but does the use of the word 'Optimistic' in the current Ebola outbreak really useful?

[Myrtle Hogan-Lance]

I'm not sure about useful but I certainly do not think it is accurate.  I read in the Guardian today that the WHO says the outbreak is moving faster than their ability to control it. 

The defecation is about to hit the rotary oscillator. 

[Janet]

That's what I posted yesterday from the BBC, that it's moving faster than it can be controlled. "Optimistic", yes, maybe the wrong word, but it's either the word used, or the clear meaning I took, from the words used by the Spanish medical authorities, who are pretty sure that they can keep it at bay. It felt like they were "optimistic" ... 

[Perikles]

Is it me but does the use of the word 'Optimistic' in the current Ebola outbreak really useful?

I don't think that stupid word is ever useful, because it is either ambiguous or used incorrectly. The OED defines optimism as "the disposition to hope for the best".

Now if some illiterate journalist says he/she is optimistic about the outcome of a disease, it means either

1) I am disposed to hope for the best and that I hope that the disease will be contained, although it all probability it won't and we are all going to die horribly

OR

2) Things will be fine

So WTF do they mean? 

[Myrtle Hogan-Lance]

'We don't want to go home': Ebola outbreak sparks plea from Sierra Leone's Commonwealth Games team not to return to Africa

Who didn't see that one coming?

[Michael]

And apparently 2 Americans are being flown back to an isolation facility in Georgia.

Is that a good idea I wonder. 

[Myrtle Hogan-Lance]

I think it will be as it is a specially built isolation facility with just this sort of disease in mind.  I know a lot of people are dead set against it but it is a good opportunity for the US medical personnel.  Anyway I suppose the good news is that they are both still alive to be transported.