PrairiePundit

Washington Post: U.S.-built Ebola centers in Liberia are nearly empty The epidemic had drastically subsided by the time the first new treatment facilities were finished. Several American-built centers haven’t seen a single patient infected with the virus. This appears to be a case of too much too late.  Fortunately the epidemic subsided  while the facilities were being built.  Hopefully they can find another use for them in a poor country like Liberia.

Michael Fumento: The great Ebola lie — Outbreak hyped for funding & media attention While it was still a tragedy for its victims there were many fewer than the outcries suggested.  It was still a very contagious disease.

Dallas Morning News: Gov. Perry asked the president to rectify the fact that state health officials have not been contacted or spoken with the administration’s so-called Ebola czar, Ron Klain. He invited Klain to Texas to meet with top experts. “The president readily agreed,” promising that Klain would contact Dr. Lakey, according to Perry’s office, which provided more details of the call. Obama also agreed to have Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell look into Texas A&M University’s application to manufacture ZMapp, an Ebola treatment. Lastly, Perry asked for more “streamlined and accurate” information from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the event of future Ebola cases. And he asked the president to prod CDC to reexamine Ebola-related guidelines for waste disposal; lab testing; hospitals that can treat Ebola; and handling of remains of Ebola victims. ... This sounds like an unusually productive conversation between the two.  On other issues ...

The Daily Signal: Seeking a more robust defense in the event of a bioterrorist attack on the United States, the Bush administration created a $6 billion fund to prepare the nation for such threats, including the deadly Ebola virus. The Obama administration, however, has not used the range of tools and budget provided by the post-9/11 project, focusing instead on only three targets and diverting at least $1 billion to other priorities, a review by The Daily Signal found. Nearly five years ago, in fact, the administration’s own biodefense science board warned that project funds “should not be diverted to support other initiatives, regardless of the merit of other purposes.” Repeated diversions of funds “raise doubts about the intention of the U.S. government to consistently fund the enterprise,” the science board adds. The government’s use of money from the program, Project BioShield, for other purposes also comes under question in a recent report prepared for Congress. ... In Septemb...

Daily Mail: Exclusive: Americans want travel ban from Ebola infected countries and full quarantine for suspected cases, MailOnline poll reveals MailOnline/YouGov poll finds 60 per cent support outright travel ban for anyone planning to enter the US from one of the affected countries Larger 69 per cent majority says the US 'should not allow foreigners from Ebola infected areas to enter the United States' 48 per cent want mandatory quarantines for everyone who has been to Liberia, Guinea or Sierra Leone – including two-thirds of Republicans Only 10 per cent approve of the job 'Ebola czar' Ron Klain is doing – a lower rating than Congress Just 34 per cent 'have faith in the president to handle the Ebola crisis effectively' – compared to 49 per cent who don't – and 55 per cent say the Obama administration has been 'slow to react' to the crisis 9 out of 10 of those surveyed said they are registered to vote The administration is on the wrong...

NBC News: NBC/WSJ Poll: 71% Back Mandatory Quarantines for Ebola Health Workers The administration's arguments are counter intuitive and unpersuasive as demonstrated by this poll.  While these healthcare workers should be applauded for taking trhe risk to help those with this disease, the rest ofthe world has not accepted that risk and they should be willing to accept a three week quarantine to lessen the risk to the general public.  In the long run it will save lives and money that is spent on trying to track all the contacts they have once they become symptomatic.

NY Times: Alarmed by Ebola, Public Isn’t Calmed by ‘Experts Say’ Shifting guidelines on how to handle Ebola, combined with a mistrust of elites, have fed the public’s mistrust of assurances by government officials and scientists. If the experts were right we should not have had to nurses come down with Ebola after treating a patient.  If the experts were right we should not have had to scramble to notify hundreds of people who had been exposed to one of those nurses. If the experts were right the doctor currently being treated for Ebola in New York should not have past the test at the airport.  If they were right New York would not have had to scramble to notify all the people he came in contact with. As for science, it is a scientific fact that keeping people exposed to the virus quarantined for 21 days after exposure means fewer people will be put at risk in spreading the viral disease.

Washington Post: These scientific studies show that airport Ebola screenings are largely ineffective I think the new cases demonstrate the folly.   For some reason the Obama administration thinks this is science but quarantines are not.  But quarantines are like abstinence, they work every time they are tried.   

Rasmussen Reports: Voters Strongly Support Quarantines, State Action to Fight Ebola It is not even close. Those who favor Quarantines want 21 day requirement for those coming from Ebola areas.

Washington Examiner: President Obama said Tuesday that when it comes to dealing with Americans who have come into contact with the deadly Ebola virus, there are simply different standards in place for U.S. civilians and members of the U.S. armed forces. The president’s remarks were made Tuesday during a scheduled press briefing on the federal government’s handling of the outbreak. Are you concerned “[t]here might be some confusion between the quarantine rules used by the military and used by healthcare workers by some states?” a reporter asked. “Well, the [U.S.] military is in a different situation, obviously, because they are, first of all, not treating patients,” the president said. “Second of all, they are not there voluntarily, it’s part of their mission that has been assigned to them by their commanders and, ultimately by me, the commander in chief. “We don’t expect to have similar rules for our military and as we do for our civilians. They are already, by definition, if they’re...

NY Times: White House Presses States to Reverse Ebola Quarantine The Obama administration has pushed the governors of New York and New Jersey to reverse their decision ordering all medical workers returning from West Africa who had contact with Ebola patients to be quarantined, an administration official said. While these medical professionals deserve some credit for putting themselves at risk to help others, the rest of the country did not sign on to that risk and it makes sense to quarantine them for a few weeks so that we are not trying to run down all the people they have exposed to the disease at some point.  The fact is that the administration has yet to make a persuasive argument against the quarantines.  At best they say it is an inconvenience to the those who have put themselves at risk.

Real Clear Politics: SNL's Obama: Ebola "One Of My Greatest Accomplishments" The actors playing the media ask tougher questions than the real media in Washington.

NY Times: New York Ebola Response: The Polar Opposite of Dallas’s Learning from missteps in Dallas, officials and health workers took a different approach in the case of a doctor who fell ill in New York, quickly diagnosing and isolating him. While some of the things they learned from afar, it should be noted that Texas Governor Rick Perry called the governors of New York and New Jersey to fill them in on the lessons learned and offer any assistance he could.  Dallas did not have the benefit of that experience and some of the suggestion it got from the CDC proved ineffective. It should also be noted that the screening process as modified by the CDC is still inadequate.  The 21 day quarantine order in New York and New Jersey on returning medical staff mirrors the recommendations made by the Texas task force.

CBS New York: A health care worker who was quarantined at Newark Liberty International Airport after returning from treating Ebola patients in West Africa developed a fever and was being evaluated Friday night. The woman was the first person quarantined under a new screening system announced earlier Friday by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. The woman landed at Newark after treating Ebola patients in Sierra Leone, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said at the news conference. A legal quarantine was issued for the woman, who was not a New Jersey resident and was set to go on to New York afterward. “This woman, while her home residence is outside the area, said her next stop was going to be here in New York,” Christie said. “Governor Cuomo and I discussed it before we came out here, and a quarantine order will be issued.” At the time, she was not experiencing any symptoms. But Friday evening, she developed a fever and was in isolation at University Hospital ...

Daily Mail: NYC Ebola patient PASSED new 'enhanced screening' at JFK Airport -- only to fall victim days later 'He went through multiple layers of screening and did not have a fever or other symptoms of illness,' the CDC tweeted. He had a 103-degree fever six days later. Clearly the current protocol is not adequate to contain this disease.  They are requiring a 21 day quarantine for people who are from the West African countries that have suffered from the viral disease, why was this doctor not required to do the same thing. Update:   The Governors of New York and New Jersey have imposed a 21 day quarantine on doctors coming from treatment of Ebola patients.

Washington Times: The pitch was intriguing: U.S. health officials wanted to fast-track trials for an Ebola vaccine and sounded the call for volunteers. Charles Sullivan called up the hotline on a whim, figuring the National Institutes of Health already had filled its queue and wouldn’t need him. But he was accepted for three rounds of shots of a deactivated virus, a year’s worth of blood analysis and a $900 check for his trouble. The clinical trial went well, and the vaccine seemed promising. A decade later, the country is still waiting for a vaccine amid a worldwide Ebola outbreak, and Mr. Sullivan is wondering what happened to the research conducted on him and 27 other test subjects in 2003. “It seems like they’re fast-tracking the same thing they were fast-tracking a decade ago,” said Mr. Sullivan , a 51-year-old resident of Rockville, Maryland. ... IThis suggest that the vaccine was not a priority for the Obama administration which took office shortly after the trials.

streiff: For reasons that are not entirely clear, but seem to have more to do with ego than anything else, the administration has dug in it s heels on the issue of a travel ban affecting nations with active Ebola outbreaks. Over the weekend, they enlisted baseball analyst, poll analyst, and erstwhile shill, Nate Silver, to make the case that a travel ban could not work because people could evade the few direct flights from West Africa to the United States. For Silver’s analysis to make any sense whatsoever you have to ignore the fact that international travelers have passports AND that most airlines are already curtailing travel from affected nations and travel of nationals from those nations. Concurrently The Daily Beast posted a story by someone named Abby Haglage, titled They May Sound Like a Good Idea, But Travel Bans for Ebola Won’t Work . Miss Hagalage,based on an English degree from Miami Univeristy, covers infectious diseases for The Daily Beast. Contemplate that information...

Doug Ross: In November 2011, David Willman of The Los Angeles Times described another instance of taxpayer abuse by the Obama administration, this time in the Department of Health and Human Services. Obama's first "Ebola Czar" -- Dr. Nicole Lurie -- is said to have directed nearly half a billion dollars to a huge Obama donor for a vaccination no one wanted . Perhaps some of the geniuses in the GOP can dredge up this article when they're accused -- falsely -- of slashing someone's budget. First off, no one's budget's been slashed. Second, MRC has documented the copious, criminal waste of money by the National Institute of Health and the Center for Disease Control . ... Perhaps this explains why she had such a low profile as the Ebola virus hit in Dallas and spread fear around the country.  You have to wonder why she still had her job after this story hit nearly three years ago.   Perhaps it was before Obama lost the trust of most of the country.

Fox News: America’s top infectious disease expert on Sunday again acknowledged that the safety protocols used for the country’s first Ebola patient were inadequate and that the Obama administration overstated the country’s readiness for the deadly virus, amid concern that Americans have already lost faith in the government. Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told “Fox News Sunday” that the adopted World Health Organization protocol for handling an Ebola patient was better suited for field work than confined hospital care. As a result, two nurses at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital, in Dallas, were infected with Ebola while treating Thomas Eric Duncan, the Liberian national who arrived from West Africa with the virus and later died. “It was very clear … that is not the optimal way,” Fauci said. Fauci said he wasn’t sure how nurse Nina Pham became infected, but it was “likely” because “she was not completely covered” by ...

The Hill: A top official at the National Institutes of Health on Sunday said a travel ban on flights to and from West Africa would only make things worse in the fight against Ebola, pushing back against calls from lawmakers to institute one. “The fact is it would be very, very difficult if we lost control of easily tracking people,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said on CNN’s “State of the Union." Fauci said roughly 36,000 people tried to get on flights out of one of the three West African countries hit hardest by Ebola during August and September. Seventy seven were blocked because of a "health issue." "When they investigated them, none of them had Ebola, a lot of them had malaria," Fauci said of the 77 that were stopped. “So there is not a lot of people trying to get into the country,” Fauci said. ... .I don't buy his argument.  These people can't even keep up with the health care worker...