

Ask HN: What can we do about ebola? - peterlk

This site attracts enough intelligent minds that surely we can find some way to help.<p>I was hoping to leave this open ended because I don&#x27;t know what I don&#x27;t know about this situation. I want to help, but I&#x27;m not keen on flying to West Africa.
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saluki
First off contact your rep. and sen. to raise concern, questions and ideas.
Donate to charities that are making a difference.

Here are some general thoughts . . .

I'm not an expert on anything healthcare related . . . but I would like to
throw some ideas out there of what I think could be done . . . I have been
thinking about this lately . . . a lot of this is thinking out loud . . . but
maybe this can generate some ideas/brain storming and be passed along to
someone who can implement any ideas that would be helpful.

My first thought is containment . . . we need to quarantine anyone leaving W.
African countries for 21 to 30 days . . . this might sound extreme but we have
to contain the spread of the virus (this could apply to US cities as well and
should apply to those who have had contact with an infected person anywhere
including the US). It would probably be worth setting up quarantine areas near
airports that are a comfortable place to stay during the quarantine. Internet,
TV, free food, easily disinfected, etc, etc . . .

So now we generally have the virus contained to W. Africa. Now we need to pour
aid and doctors in to those countries to prevent further infections and stamp
it out.

-Tom Frieden (CDC) is saying that a travel ban will make the outbreak worse . . .

-Here's his quote:

"We really need to be clear that we don't inadvertently increase the risk to
people in this country by making it harder for us to respond to the needs in
those countries," he said, "by making it harder to get assistance in and
therefore those outbreaks would become worse, go on longer, and paradoxically,
something that we did to try and protect ourselves might actually increase our
risk."

Frieden added that a travel ban could make it difficult to get medical
supplies and aid workers to the affected regions in West Africa.

Ummm, I think controlling people leaving the country can be done while at the
same time increasing supplies and medical personnel. Volunteers are risking
their life to go help, I don't think they would be deterred by a quarantine
before they come back.

I'm asking for a simple quarantine for people leaving W. Africa and increasing
travel and supplies to W. Africa I don't see how a quarantine for those
leaving would affect supplies and Aid coming in . . . they could allow pilots
and ground crews to leave and fly back as long as they aren't interacting with
anyone on the ground . . . and medical staff should understand a quarantine
period before leaving . . .

Treat infected personnel outside the US and other countries . . . setup a
state of the art hospital in Africa to treat infected healthcare workers . . .
this would further isolate the virus from un-infected countries. If this isn't
possible I would treat them at a central location in the US initially till
they can setup a central location in W. Africa.

Ok so we have limited people leaving W. Africa if they are infected and we are
pouring in supplies and experts to help.

In the US we need to prepare better.

Sounds like lots of people were exposed in Dallas before the patient was
quarantined.

All hospitals and urgent care should have an area, maybe even outside where
they evaluate patients with fever and other ebola symptoms where they are
isolated from other patients. Basically prevent an emergency room full of
people waiting in the same room with an Ebola infected patient.

Counties should have special ebola response units. Basically an ambulance that
is only used for transporting suspected ebola cases. Even some that might only
be pick up only where they go by and the patient comes out and rides alone in
the back . . . setup the ambulance where it can be disinfected easily . . .
and then other ambulance crews where they have an EMT suited up in full bio
gear to interact with the patient if needed.

Family members should immediately be moved to a new location for their
quarantine, not confined to the location where the patient was . . . this
location should monitor their temperature, provide TV, Internet, coordinate
remote work if possible with their employer, food provided, etc.

Waste disposal, setup a clean team in each county with training and a plan for
cleaning houses/apartments and where to dispose of the waste.

Healthcare workers . . . how can someone get infected treating a patient in
the US, I know accidents could happen but I expect everyone would be following
protocol to the letter on the first one.

Lets expand the protection level/suit types for healthcare workers . . .
better filtration masks, etc . . . the buddy system is a good idea . . . build
ebola areas in the hospital so healthcare workers can be sprayed down with a
solution to kill the virus on their equipment before removing their
suits/masks after interacting with the patient . . . also setup a waste
disposal plan at every hospital.

Contacting your rep. and senator is always a good idea so they know you're
concerned and donations are always a positive way to make a difference.

~~~
Mimu
I think you overestimate the spread big time here, you have 0% chance to get
Ebola by sitting next to an infected person.

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Aheinemann
Compartmentalization is key to stopping an epidemic.

1.)

Quarantine health workers caring for ebola patients in high risk setting
(contact to patient, infectious material)

like a tour of duty in the military:

you take the assignment and move into combined quarantine & work, no family
contact, no contact to general population.

after your tour ends you stay in post-action quarantine until your incubation
period has passed and you get the all clear.

Very important:

taking are of an ebola victim even in 1st world top tier medical facilities is
- as shown by the cases which have developed in america and europe - still a
high risk operation. Anyone willing to knowingly take that risk is brave.
Imposing a quarantine on them still is the sane thing to do to curb secondary
infections from the care givers to their families and the general population.

there is no place for talking down care providers on tv or media that they
"breached protocol", e.g. they did something wrong and they are to blame. Just
find out what went wrong, publish it, correct it. Help the victim. no blaming.

There would be no need for panic since you quarantine the heros giving care to
the ebola victims thus stopping tertiar infections to get R_0 (spread of
infection) down.

2.) research if ebola survivors carry an immunity to ebola. If they do, they
are the most useful group at the frontline of care. Train the survivors and
let them (with reduced risk to themselves) help.

3.) Anyone with contact to a victim into quarantine, not let them stay in the
house in the rooms where the ebola victim lived. Extract them to proper
facility. Desinfect the places where the victim stayed.

4.) get a Vaccine

5.) get a treatment

~~~
peterlk
Is there publicly available data about ebola survivors? What would it take to
anonymize and publish this data?

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jMyles
The immediate action is clear: Donate generously to an organization like
[http://doctorswithoutborders.com/](http://doctorswithoutborders.com/)

They're on the ground and trying hard to treat people. They need resources.

Slightly longer term is figuring out a cure and vaccine.

Longer yet is improving the health care systems in Africa and around the
world.

~~~
peterlk
Do they need any digital resources that we can provide them with?

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jonbarker
I like Nate Silver's take on disasters. Model it like Earthquakes and anything
else bad that happens on a log scale. Then make a plan for every possible
contingency. Although it is already an outbreak there is still a range of
possible endgames. Unfortunately policy planners don't do any of this IMO.

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peterlk
Foldit helped AIDS researchers. Is there a similar game that could help with
ebola?

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danieltillett
There is not much you can do beyond lobbying for serious action to be taken.
While in the long term we need drugs and vaccines, working on these will not
help us in the short term.

