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Health,
1.)Regarding AIDS You said “Btw, how could they make a law that e/o has to have health insurance? How do they enforce it? I have a way for anyone to get tested, but first answer my question!”
They can’t. You think evreyone has health insurance? Plenty of people don’t have health insurance, do drugs, don’t pay their taxes and speed etc. if those things were contagious diseases we would have a major epidemic in this country. And none of those things are anything like getting tens of thousands (probably even hundreds of thousands) of people to report for government testing knowing that if they test positive they are going to jail (or quarantine, or whatever you want to call it) for life!
2.) Regarding ebola, so you agree that a travel ban would be ineffective and instead we should test all those who come in from affected countries.
Health: She is claiming they don’t have a right to quarantine her because she is asymptomatic. They are looking at legal options to keep her locked up. Her “quarantine” was not an official legal one yet.
Health,
Regarding AIDS,
You said “My idea is that – at that time- all from the high risk groups -we tell them they have to get tested. When they get sick & want to be treated – they have to prove that they were tested; otherwise we don’t treat them!”
And then what? How does that stop the disease from spreading?? The question was how on earth would you get at least tens of thousands of people (probably 100s of thousands) to submit to testing knowing that if they tested positive they would be locked up (“quarantined”) for life? You were suggesting that the government should have tested all of the people in the populations that AIDS was first clinically observed in and anyone that they had contact with in the previous 10 years (that’s how long HIV can circulate before becoming symptomatic) and quarantine evreyone who would have tested positive. Your idea above does not explain how they would do any of those things.
Regarding Ebola,
Whether or not the Government is doing a good job enforcing quarantines has no bearing on the fact that a travel ban on North Africa would not keep the disease out of the USA I elaborated more in my earlier posts and you failed to address any of my points
Health,
So you think people would have just lined up to be tested knowing that if they test positive they will be locked up for life in order to receive “treatment” that wouldn’t even cure the disease. Whatever. The assumption is so ridiculous, and you havn’t addressed any of my points. I also think Reagan handled it horribly for the reasons I outlined above. Reread my posts and actually address the points.
Regarding Ebola,
Again you are ignoring my point. If a travel ban would not keep the disease from reaching the USA it’s useless. Read my posts and address my points.
000646, you have made some valid points which are contrary to other views, but you give them improper priority in the hierarchy of importance. In other words, faulty conclusions.
And if it can be proven HIV was brought to America by a European, how does that in any way mitigate the dreaded origins of HIV in Africa, and it’s subsequent influence in America.
Maybe the European should have been banned from America and who knows how many lives would be spared from HIV.
You need to realize containing disease is not a new thing on the planet earth. Geographic quarantine does work and does save lives. You can’t rewrite the book on epidemiology. Well, you can, but no MD’s would read it.
On an altered lighter note, if someone sitting right behind you in shul lets out big juicy sneezes all morning, it’s all the same to you as if they had to stay home until their cold was no longer contagious?
The idea that Ebola is a dreaded plague in Africa, but in America there is no way it can ever be a problem, is false idea; and life threatening one, as well.
BTguy,
The point is that by the time HIV was noticed tens of thousands of people where already infected and the disease had been circulating in the USA for decades. Even if an effective “geographic quarantine” had been possible at some point it was too late by the early 80s.
There was close to 10,000 people infected from tainted blood products alone, not to mention thousands of people who had used intravenous drugs, were G— or had been to or had a relationship with a Hatian. And that’s making (the almost certainly false) assumption that the virus was only circulating in those populations it was first clinically observed in. The reality is that there is almost no way it could have stayed in that population. I elaborated much more in my earlier posts.
Regarding Ebola,
I don’t have anything against testing those who come in from infected countries and quarantining those who test positive. The point is that all a travel ban will do is make it less likely that we will know who is coming in from where and will be ineffective in keeping the diesease out of the US for reasons I listed earlier.
Health,
Please explain why you think people would report for ineffective treatment at the cost of being locked up for life. Terminal patients turn down ineffective treatments that will effect their quality of life a whole lot less then that.
And all that rests on the certainly false assumption that HIV was only extant in the populations in was first clinically observed in.
You have not addressed my point about Ebola at all.
000646, It is not the points you are making, in particular, that I contest. It is the “why bother” context that drifts like a smokey haze through your argument. Apathy? I dont know.
BTGuy,
The “why bother” sentiment that you may be picking up on would only be about the specific solutions brought up by “Health” that I do not think would work.
Just because a reaction is necessary does not mean that ANY reaction is good.
I hear/read you 000646.
I guess I understand you view that you have a right to think specific procedures may not work, but what would be wrong with ALL measures of containment being enacted, even the ones that in hindsight would turn out to be fruitless, until we could have gotten a handle on this?
Again, Ebola is a dreaded plague in Africa and we must realize that the idea it cannot be such a problem in America is dangerous. Viruses mutate.
Aside from this, I am glad that most of those thought to be infected have not been, thank heaven.
On another, similar note, do you know just how off they are in the protection offered in the flu shots? And they have been offering them for decades, I think.
Professional health care workers have made arguments that flu shots are way off in offering protection from the strains that actually become manifest, and are not nearly as complete protection as believed.
Basically, we humans know about as little about things as we do know a lot about things. We have great knowledge on one hand and we are clueless on other hands.
I vote for extra measures to cover the bases of saving human life. And if I were a health care worker helping Ebola patients, and I had to be quarantined, I would never dare have the chutzpah to violate the protocol.
“…what would be wrong with ALL measures of containment being enacted, even the ones that in hindsight would turn out to be fruitless, until we could have gotten a handle on this?”
What would be wrong with implementing “containment measures” that don’t work, “just in case”? A LOT. The more we subject American health care workers returning from Africa to unnecessarily stringent procedures, the more we discourage those workers from returning to Africa and others from going there in the first place to treat Ebola. Not to mention that the cost/benefit ratio has to make sense. The advantage of a “kitchen-sink” approach over a measured and methodical approach is infinitesimally small, especially compared with the collateral damage of such an approach– which, in addition to majorly inconveniencing doctors and nurses and their families, and depriving Africans of much-needed care, would also incite a blind national panic. It just doesn’t add up.
Incidentally, in the Dallas hospital, experts have noted that Ebola may have infected the nurses due in part to the nurses going above and beyond the recommended protective measures, e.g. wearing three pairs of gloves instead of two. You might think that more is always better, but it’s not true.
BtGuy,
You said,
“I guess I understand you view that you have a right to think specific procedures may not work, but what would be wrong with ALL measures of containment being enacted, even the ones that in hindsight would turn out to be fruitless, until we could have gotten a handle on this?”
If doing things did not come at any cost I would agree with you. However they do come at a cost, and using the limited resources that we have on “solutions” that won’t fix the problem will probably make it worse. These epidemics are a serious issue, they much too serious to deal with in a reactionary and ineffective fashion.
Health,
1.) No one will turn up for testing in order to receive pain meds at the cost of being locked up for life, at best a policy like the one you mentioned above would be great for the illegal dealers of pain meds.
2.) You completely ignored my point about the thousands of people who were infected in the early 70s by tainted blood products and other means. Just take the people infected by tainted blood products, do you really think that in about 10 years they didn’t have relations with “regular” people? Most of them were adults and did.
3.) Regarding Ebola a lot more people then those two nurses would get sick if a travel ban was in place, for reasons I explained in my earlier posts and you failed to address.
Health,
You said,
“They would! It doesn’t have to be a jail! It could be a locked facility like where they put the Mentally Ill. Did you ever see s/o die of AIDS? They need nursing care, usually either in a hospital or a nursing home. A little home meds won’t do it!”
Someone can test positive to HIV ten years before they start showing any symptoms. Your talking about spending 10-15 years in a quarantine facility before they would even feel sick. No one would be willing to report to testing in such circumstances. Even when suffering; terminal patients turn down treatments that affect their quality of life a whole lot less then that all the time. And all this is assuming that you could actually track down everyone who was at risk, which for the reasons I listed above is by itself a stretch.
It would be hard enough with only the thousands of people who were infected either first or second hand by contaminated blood products (add anyone who had used an intravenous drug and anyone they had relations with in the previous 10 years and the number would be astronomical), and that’s just one segment of what you are calling the “at risk population”.
I don’t understand why you assume either of these things would actually work.
Regarding Ebola,
You said, “
I did address it!
From above:
“It would stop alot of people from coming to the US; not all of them, but alot! It would make it very hard to travel to our country.”
That is irrelevant. If the disease will make it here eventually in the long term in spite of the travel ban, then the travel ban is in the long term useless and would almost definitely be harmful:
We would end up with what be more virulent strains that would have had longer to mutate in Africa (due to it being harder for Doctors to go get it under control) finding their way into the country through channels we would not know about or be able to control.
Health,
Regarding HIV
you said,
“I see you read Wikipedia!” ….. “How do you know?”
Again, I fail to see how your statements above address my points. I wrote the questions I have on your position below.
1.) Why do you assume that people would want to be tested knowing that if they test positive they will be quarantined for life in order to receive pain meds in the future? Once you consider that people test positive for HIV 10 to 15 years before even feeling sick, your assumption is even harder to swallow.
2.) Considering that even in the “at risk population” there were at least 6000 people in the USA infected from direct contact with contaminated blood products from companies like Hemo Carribean in the 70s; and considering that they did not know that they were infected, why would you assume that the disease would stay confined to that population? People who receive blood products do not only have relationships with others who have received them.
Once you consider the thousands who at some point in the 70s had used an intravenous drug and that the G– community was mostly underground with many of them maintained a facade of being married or being in a regular relationship this assumption as well gets a whole lot harder to swallow.
Regarding Ebola,
Sending qualified medical proffesionals to the affected areas to deal with the disease and help educate the public on how to avoid infection as well as to help treat the disease does help get it under control.
“It will help.”
No it will hurt. And 000646 explained why:
“Sending qualified medical proffesionals to the affected areas to deal with the disease and help educate the public on how to avoid infection as well as to help treat the disease does help get it under control.”
This is 100% correct. The way to stop Ebola is to stop it in Africa. And that requires people from other countries to go there and the last thing we should be doing is discouraging medical personnel from doing that.
If you want to quarantine someplace it would make more sense to quarantine all of Texas and all of New York City, because those places have had Ebola cases and do not need outside medical help. Of course, you would destroy the economy in the process.
Thousands of Americans die every year from influenza. It is MUCH more contagious than Ebola and yet there is no outcry, no call for quarantine, no call even for mandatory vaccinations. THAT is a disease that we should really be worrying about.
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