Infecting people at an exponential rate

Ace of Spades continues to have excellent analysis of the ebola crisis. He summarizes:

We have a serious public health crisis. We have known since March that ebola was back, and in subsequent months the disease infected people at an exponential rate. As full-blown epidemics do.

They suffered a 70% death rate for ebola infections in West Africa. (Here in the States, supposedly we will only have a 50% death rate-- but I'm not confident that the "experts" are right about that.)

Now, given the fact that ebola is raging across West Africa, killing thousands of people, would anyone who is serious about epidemic containment think, back in, say, June, "Well, we sent out a memo and posted an instructional video. Our work here is done."

No. Back in June, the CDC should have offered hospitals a major crash course in ebola containment. They should not have relied upon their previous memos. They should have actually checked and followed up with hospitals to ensure that people knew at least the basics of containment.

And when Duncan was diagnosed with ebola, they should have sent out a team of experts to oversee the hospital's handling of the matter or simply taken over treatment of Duncan themselves.

After disaster has already struck -- and after six months of the disease spreading exponentially -- the Commander in Golf Togs finally announces:


President Obama said that the U.S. would become more aggressive in coordinating the national response to Ebola, including sending a CDC team to any hospital with a confirmed Ebola case.

Congratulations on doing on October 15th what you should have done on March 25th.

Read much more here.