Chris Blattman

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Signs that something is seriously wrong in the global response to Ebola

From Buzzfeed:

When nurse Nina Pham contracted Ebola, she requested her dog, Bentley, be taken care of and monitored for the disease and not euthanized – similar to what was done with an Ebola-exposed dog in Spain.

The City of Dallas released a list of Ebola-related expenses, showing that care for the Cavalier King Charles Spaniel reached $27,000, about 17% of the total costs.

Here is the breakdown of Bentley’s expenses:

  • Supplies for Pet care – $1,068.96
  • Generator and labor for Pet care facility – $2,052.96
  • Facilities make ready and security at pet care facility – $17,057.46
  • Pet Care for Patient One – $259.78
  • Pet clean up – $6,445.00
  • Pet care/clean up – $938.00
  • Total Expenses – $26,884.16

Incidentally, can anyone recommend any recent analysis of how big the crisis is, how big it is likely to be, and a sense of what went wrong (i.e. why this outbreak has been so much bigger than past ones)? Most of the news coverage I’ve read gets this wrong, or hasn’t done any serious analysis.

I was only half satisfied by Helen Epstein’s NYRB piece, which makes some nice points (the MSF response was swift, the international health ramp up was not, but that’s not necessarily unique to this outbreak). But there was too much attention, in my view, to innuendo and rumor and mistrust as a role. Plausible but not very well substantiated.

20 Responses

  1. A big difference is that this outbreak happened in places that had never encountered Ebola before, which contributed to people taking a long time to realize what they were dealing with. Also I have heard that W. African burial practices are uniquely risky.

  2. From what I’ve seen re why this outbreak is bigger than previous: it started in an area that was *not* isolated, with a great deal of traffic and trade going considerable distances, and with very poor contact tracing abilities in the region. (Not sure where I read that. BBC referencing a NewEngJMed or Science article? I’ll try to find it & come back.) The regional burial practices that initially promoted spread did not help.

    Previous outbreaks were all in very isolated areas, which limited spread.

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