Ebola is spiraling out of control in Africa.
From NBC News:
Ebola Spreading 'Exponentially' as Patients Seek Beds in Liberia
The Ebola virus is spreading exponentially across Liberia as patients fill taxis in a fruitless search for medical care, the World Health Organization said Monday.
More:
For example, in Montserrado county, 1,000 beds are urgently needed but only 240 beds are available. WHO has said more than 3,600 people have been infected with Ebola in this West African epidemic, and 2,000 have died, but the organization predicts as many as 20,000 will be sickened before it’s over. Half of those infected have been dying.
And here:
Healthcare workers are being especially hard hit. “Some 152 health care workers have been infected and 79 have died,” WHO said. When the outbreak began, Liberia had only one doctor to treat nearly 100,000 people in a total population of 4.4 million people. Every infection or death of a doctor or nurse depletes response capacity significantly.”
From the Washington Post:
Oxford study predicts 15 more countries are at risk of Ebola exposure
Until this year's epidemic, Ebola did not exist in West Africa. Now with nearly 2,300 people dead from the virus, mostly in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, scientists still don't fully understand how Ebola arrived from Central Africa, where outbreaks of this strain of the virus had occurred in the past.
Meanwhile on our own turf - from the Boston Globe:
Hundreds in Lynn Tested for Tuberculosis
More than 30 Lynn Community Health Center employees and 800 patients are being tested to determine if they were exposed to tuberculosis after center doctors confirmed a case.
Center Director Lori Berry says after confirming the single positive test for tuberculosis in a male health care worker around Labor Day, center medical workers contacted and tested employees as well as patients ‘‘having sufficient exposure to warrant testing.’’
And this just in - from the Cincinnati Enquirer:
Hospital sets patient record as virus spreads
Medical officials admitted a record number of children to a local hospital over the weekend because of what they believe to be a rare respiratory virus spreading throughout the country.
Although there's been no confirmed cases of the enterovirus at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, officials admitted 540 patients Friday, said Dr. Derek Wheeler, associate chief of staff at the hospital.
The previous record was around 515, Wheeler said.
Some reports out of Missouri and Colorado suggest the virus, with symptoms similar to the common cold, brought sicker patients to hospitals, Wheeler said.
A bit more:
This particular type of enterovirus — EV-D68 — is uncommon, but not new. It was first identified in the 1960s.
We are open for a major epidemic and our friends in the middle east are not helping. Pandemics come and go and we are overdue...