Spain’s Ebola patient zero…
Unlike the accusations that have been leveled at Thomas Duncan, no one can say she kept mum about the fact that she’d been near an Ebola patient recently. That’s because she was on the team that cared for a Spanish missionary and a Spanish priest, both of whom were shipped back to Spain after they contracted Ebola in Africa. Both of them have died.
But there is a similarity between the unnamed nurse’s disease trajectory and that of Duncan. As with him, there also was a delay in hospitalization and diagnosis. She is said to have reported her first symptom, a fever, on September 30, and yet she was only hospitalized this week. Since authorities knew in advance that she’d been exposed, why the delay, which put many more people at risk? Should they not have erred on the side of caution?
There are various possibilities. Perhaps the authorities had such faith in their isolation and protection techniques that they thought it impossible that a health worker could contract Ebola while working under state-of-the-art conditions in a Western hospital, as opposed to in Africa. Or perhaps (as I’m beginning to suspect) the diagnostic criteria for Ebola aren’t rigorous enough.
One of the first symptoms of Ebola is a fever, defined as above 101.5. But see this [emphasis mine]:
Health authorities said on Monday night that the nurse was in stable condition. She had alerted them to a slight fever on 30 September, said Antonio Alemany from the regional government of Madrid, and checked into a hospital in Alcorcé³n with a high fever on Sunday. Ebola protocol was immediately activated at the hospital and initial and secondary tests were both positive for the virus.
A “slight fever”—in other words, not high enough to be textbook Ebola. But the textbook may be wrong. Her fever didn’t become high enough to fit the criterion until five days later. The same mild fever was the case with Duncan, whose temperature was 100.1 on his first visit to the ER, when they sent him home with antibiotics (unlike the nurse, however, he already had other symptoms of Ebola). According to the woman who two days later called 9/11 for an ambulance for Duncan when he became extremely ill, his temperature even at that later stage was only 100.4 when she took it.
If both the US patient zero and Spain’s patient zero presented with mild fevers, it becomes harder to think of it as a freak occurrence. It just may be that mild fevers are more common in Ebola than previously thought, especially in the early stages. In fact, could they not be fairly common, and this fact previously missed because in Africa people don’t typically tend to get medical help until the later stages of the illness?
This is speculation on my part, of course; I’m not a doctor. But logic suggests it as a possibility, and it seems to be a potentially important issue to look into. If fever is being used as a marker for Ebola, it makes sense to make sure that fever is defined in a way that conforms to the disease’s early presentation, not just its late manifestation.
One other important question the Spanish nurse’s illness raises is how she managed to contract Ebola in the first place. There are only two possibilities, as I see it. The first is that an error (either hers or someone else’s at the hospital) was made in following the procedures for the isolation of Ebola patients. The other is that the procedures were followed but are sometimes inadequate, and more must be done to protect the people who care for Ebola patients.
This particular epidemic, as opposed to previous ones, has been marked by more medical staff contracting the disease. Is it because they have been careless? Is it because the epidemic is larger? Or is it because something has changed and made Ebola easier to contract?
These three possibilities are not mutually exclusive, either; the answer could be “all of the above.” But the most frightening one is that third one.
Given the way deseases work, some people may just get a mild fever, and thats that… they would never be tested and so would never be included in the death rates or any other stats. that is, to reiterate, those that get the condition in a serious way, will be examined and confirmed as having Ebola. they may not be the whole of it, there may be thousands who get it, and have very little reaction to it, and they would not be examined, and so not counted.
desease can be funny that way, and the “textbook” on this is still be written, with liberal oversight based on the idea that its best never to tell the public anything honest as they can never take it. though often the public does better than the politicians who are the ones who imagine whatever that gives them the basis for this practice. katrina response comes to mind, as the state acted in ways that blocked the more rational people from assisting and SELF ORGANIZING.
Self-organization is a process where some form of global order or coordination arises out of the local interactions between the components of an initially disordered system.
while there is evidence that this is as common as a virus being assembled by particles in the blood, to rescue of people by citizens, and all manner of stuff. our college edumacated know it alls who deny the invisiable, cant cogitate it, and so act as if it doesnt exist and that there has to be some hand in it all.
capitalism is self organizing, as are cities, social groups, and much more.
Im guessing theres also the issue of false positives. A temp of 100 could be just to common
They’re saying that her equipment was not WHO-compliant. As a partial reason or possibility.
This is looking worse all the time.
The CDC has been reassuring the public (us rubes) that they know everything about Ebola necessary to protect us when they clearly know very little. It would be better if they were honest rather than lying about what they know.
The doctors in both cases apparently followed the protocol when they released those patients since neither of the patients fulfilled the criterion for Ebola provided by the CDC and WHO. The responsibility for this disaster rests with the governments and their scientists who have not bothered to ensure that their statements are scientifically accurate.
The evidence available now raises the strong possibility that Ebola can be transported through air born droplets without direct contact. In other words we are dealing with a much more dangerous epidemic than the authorities have told us.
Here’s a link to a more extensive WSJ article:
So, worst case scenario, the nurse’s assistant was infected the first day she came in contact with the patient, which would have been on the 22nd of Sept. Eight days later she has a slight fever. Five days later she’s admitted to the hospital as an infected Ebola patient. Which means that she contracted the disease and showed symptoms just THIRTEEN DAYS after first coming in contact…
Plus, “The female medical worker was infected while working at Madrid’s Carlos III hospital, which had been specially prepared to treat the disease.”
It’s a given that anyone treating or assisting in the treatment of a patient with Ebola would be highly trained. Yet a highly trained, presumably competent professional went from first contact to showing symptoms in no more than 13 days.
Which leads me to surmise that the MAYO Clinic’s estimate of 5-15 days is much more accurate than the 21 days that the CDC is touting.
We are not being told the truth and BTW, the head of the CDC is a political appointee of one Barack Obama.
Well, I´m spanish. Let me say how it has happened from the point of view of an spanish person.
To understand what follows: be aware that one of the big problems of Spain (maybe the biggest one) it´s that downplaying is culturally right. Everytime somebody points out that things are not being well done, very often they hear “don´t overstate”, “not a big deal”. Spain if full of good professional and hardworking people, in a country that never has taken them seriously.
The spanish CDC-equivalent recommended not to bring the missionary. It was ignored. When the missionary came, it was recommended to bring him to a BSL4 hospital (there´s a military one) instead of the lower security one. It was ignored. Nurses claimed they had no formation enough to deal with this disease. They were ignored. They claimed too that their material didn´t fit the security protocols. It was ignored.
Here you have a report from a military doctor (google translated version)
http://goo.gl/d22wdZ
Here a public letter from one of the hospital male nurses. It´s scaring.
http://goo.gl/JqAxMK
Every professional in Spain said this was being done just plain wrong.
They were ignored.
When the missionary died, were nurses quarantined? Nope, instead of it, they went on vacation.
RIGHT NOW, there´s 22 possible cases of Ebola, the ones that had contact with the infected nurse. What has happened to them? Has been them quarantined?
Nope, they have been told TO GO HOME and call the doctor if they think they have any Ebola symptom. You know, they are the 22 people that can start an Ebola outbreak in Europe. They´re home right now, checking their temperature THEMSELVES, because, who knows, some of them have Ebola.
http://goo.gl/es0bpk
Maybe in the rest of the world that has been a surprise. Not in Spain. Many of us knew that something like this happening was only matter of time. Sadly, we were right.
As I commented on another thread here dealing with Ebola, a few days ago I saw a quote from the UN official charged with stopping/containing the Ebola epidemic in which he said he was afraid that, the more people who became infected, the more the chances would also grow for a mutation that would allow airborne spread of the disease.
Viruses generally do not cause high fevers. Bacteria and parasites (e.g. malaria) do.
HaHaHa. From today’s Dallas News:
Dallas Independent School District officials are working to prevent bullying of students from Africa or the apartment complex. They also are working to prepare students for the day when the five students who came in contact with Duncan – who are now staying home and being monitored – return to school. The virus has a 21-day incubation period.
“We are … in the process of having a team develop guidance lessons for students around sensitivity, around how Ebola is actually spread and how students can help create a support group for the students when they return to class in a couple of weeks,” said Jon Dahlander, DISD spokesman. “Part of the lesson will be about helping all students understand the fear that the students who were exposed to the virus are currently facing.”
Can’t make this sh*t up.
Yann,
You’re asserting that a cultural characteristic of Spanish society is denial and wishful thinking.
The antidote is holding the relevant officials accountable. Until the bureaucrats, politicians and lawyers are held accountable by the public, nothing will change.
Don Carlos et al,
If the incubation period of Ebola is 21 days, then how did the Spanish nurse’s assistant go from contact to showing symptoms severe enough for admission to a hospital in no more and possibly less than 13 days?
I have great confidence that the protocols at UNMC are way better than in Spain, but this is concerning. If the virus is air borne, then Katie bar the door. UNMC only has 10 beds for this.
Which all points out the importance of prudence in this matter. What harm to the USA did ban all flights out of three West African countries for a month? As Neo wrote, err on the side of caution.
I live in Omaha and drove by UNMC on Sunday. Note that it is only about a mile from Warren Buffett’s business and three miles from his house.
Excellent article from the LA Times of all places;
Some Ebola experts worry virus may spread more easily than assumed
“Ebola researcher says he would not rule out possibility that the virus spreads through air in tight quarters
‘There are too many unknowns here,’ a virologist says of how Ebola may spread
Ebola researcher says he thinks there is a chance asymptomatic people could spread the virus”
Dr. C.J. Peters, who battled a 1989 outbreak of the virus among research monkeys housed in Virginia and who later led the CDC’s most far-reaching study of Ebola’s transmissibility in humans, said he would not rule out the possibility that it spreads through the air in tight quarters.
“We just don’t have the data to exclude it,” said Peters, who continues to research viral diseases at the University of Texas in Galveston.
Dr. Philip K. Russell, a virologist who oversaw Ebola research while heading the U.S. Army’s Medical Research and Development Command, and who later led the government’s massive stockpiling of smallpox vaccine after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, also said much was still to be learned. “Being dogmatic is, I think, ill-advised, because there are too many unknowns here.”
If Ebola were to mutate on its path from human to human, said Russell and other scientists, its virulence might wane – or it might spread in ways not observed during past outbreaks
“I see the reasons to dampen down public fears,” Russell said. “But scientifically, we’re in the middle of the first experiment of multiple, serial passages of Ebola virus in man…. God knows what this virus is going to look like. I don’t.”
Keeping a calm perspective on the issue is vital but there is no excuse for not taking common sense precautions. It is not hyperbole to state that Obama is clearly willing to put at risk literally millions of American lives in order to keep flooding the country with illegals.
GB, I’m not a doctor but my understanding is that 21 days is the outer limit for exposure — that is, if symptoms haven’t appeared by then, they aren’t going to. In other words, all CDC is saying is that if you haven’t developed illness by the time 21 days have gone by following exposure, you aren’t going to.
Obviously, once a SINGLE ebola virus gets inside the body — it’s off to the races.
That explains all of the evidence to date.
&&&&
To restate: our resistance to ebola stops with our skin/ haz-mat suit.
The REASON that victims don’t have a significant fever is that such fevers are a direct result of the human immune system keying up to fight off a pathogen.
But, when our immune system is blinded by ebola, it doesn’t even gear up at all.
This also explains the snappy speed of the terminal advance of ebola.
%%%
This should put ones hair on fire.
The Spanish are doing EVERYTHING backwards.
They need to place every candidate into unique isolation ASAP.
Group isolation merely assures us that they will cross-infect each other; all to die.
&&&
Even now the ‘experts’ have a totally wrong model of infection.
STILL we have ‘experts’ who think that viruses have an ‘incubation’ period.
If you read the press it’s obvious that the powers that be actually believe that ebola candidates can wander around — without being infectious — until they pop up under their fever protocol.
EVERYTHING about this nostrum is TOTALLY WRONG.
Because the human immune system can’t stop even a single ebola virus that gets in, even asymptomatic victims can’t be allowed to mingle.
EVERYTHING they touch figures to have some level of contamination.
At this stage of the pandemic, it’s possible — and wise — to isolate every candidate in a desert or on an island. A free vacation is in order, in every case.
&&&
A total quarantine is needed — yesterday.
Even survivors stumble away damaged.
&&&
As for the Press: they’re dull as dust.
Where is the scientific community?
It can’t be the case that I’m the only one to see the flamingly obvious.
Once ebola cuts loose in Europe its passage to the New World is absolutely assured.
Any quarantine of west Africa has to be global. America can’t be the nation that keeps violating the quarantine.
BTW, the idea that Barry Soetoro is going to escape ebola by dint of office and the Secret Service: it’s a fantasy.
Ebola will wade through America like the Terminator in an LA police station. Just like individuals, our only defense is out at the perimeter. Once ebola gets inside — it will ROCKET through — at jet speed.
It’s that contagious.
&&&
I’ve seen some pretty stupid and nervy graphics implying that ebola is as impossible to contract as HIV.
As IF!
Ebola is a natural bio-warfare agent — for a madman. It is sure to mutate and blow-back against any weapons lab that ever messes with it. It’s more deadly in the First World than it is in the African bush.
Yann, thanks for writing a terrific comment.
Geoffrey,
There´s no way to do so. Citizens have no power enough to hold relevant officials accountable it they don´t want to be held.
In England, politicians that have made serious mistakes leave. Period. But that doesn´t happen because of people. That happens because this is the english way, this is how the english culture works (though probably not for long, since England is not gonna be culturally english in a few decades).
If an english politician doesn´t leave after screewing some issue, he would feel completelly ashamed. His own colleagues would look at him as a non-grata person. He leaves non because of citizens power, but because of cultural norms power.
In Spain, he just keeps low profile for a while and comes back again. His colleagues telling him “well done, mate, you rode out the storm”.
Thanks, that makes sense.
“Ebola outbreak: Spread of deadly disease across Europe is ‘unavoidable’, warns WHO chief”
Actually, Spain’s Patient Zero is the person being treated by the nurse.
Q: Could Ebola have spread on the airplane?
A: No, it is only spread to medical workers wearing protective biohazard suits. (Zero Hedge)
During the 2013 fiscal year, national statistics from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security website show Border Patrol agents apprehended 112 immigrants from Guinea, 231 from Liberia and 145 immigrants from Sierra Leone, which are the three countries currently experiencing the most cases of Ebola.
Experts worry virus Ebola spread more easily than assumed…
[its starting to look like a bio warfar critter]
some scientists who have long studied Ebola say such assurances are premature – and they are concerned about what is not known about the strain now on the loose. It is an Ebola outbreak like none seen before, jumping from the bush to urban areas, giving the virus more opportunities to evolve as it passes through multiple human hosts
Dr. C.J. Peters, who battled a 1989 outbreak of the virus among research monkeys housed in Virginia and who later led the CDC’s most far-reaching study of Ebola’s transmissibility in humans, said he would not rule out the possibility that it spreads through the air in tight quarters
Lets hear it for the communists open borders one world order and govt!!!!
Ebola outbreak: Spread of deadly disease across Europe is ‘unavoidable’, warns WHO chief
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/ebola-outbreak-husband-of-spanish-nurse-placed-in-quarantine-as-22-contacts-identified-9779682.html
The spread of Ebola across Europe is “quite unavoidable”, a health chief has warned as four people were in hospital after a Spanish nurse became the first person known to have contracted the virus outside Africa.
The World Health Organisation’s European director Zsuzsanna Jakab has said while more cases will spread in Europe, the continent should be well prepared to control the disease.
Health officials in Spain today said four people – the nurse, her husband and two others – were being monitored in hospital in a bid to stem the spread of the virus.
“Such imported cases and similar events as have happened in Spain will happen also in the future, most likely,” Ms Jakab told Reuters.
“It is quite unavoidable … that such incidents will happen in the future because of the extensive travel both from Europe to the affected countries and the other way around,” she said.
The important thing is not that we survive, but that whatever we do, wherever we go, we do it and go together. If we die we die: and we all die together, holding hands and singing songs of a god-free human solidarity. That’s what’s important. Yeah …
I watched the recent Youtube video someone somewhere linked to, of Ben Affleck having a conniption when Bill Maher mentioned that the penalty for “apostasy” in Islam was death, and that a demonstrable majority of believing Muslims endorsed it.
Afflek looked like his head was going to explode as he seethed with resentment and sputtered objections.
Maher kept trying to say “look at the facts”. In response Affleck waved his arms around and alternated between bitter denunciations and glaring insinuations of “racism”.
What can you do with someone who seems to get an almost sexual satisfaction out of being a victim?
You certainly cannot share with them the kind of political space that posits ends as the purview of government. Unless you are a goddamned masochist.
Ben Afflek and his comrades are the limousine liberals who are deep down (unwilling to admit it to themselves…but it’s there) certain that with their money and position they are immune from the fall-out of their absurd beliefs. They will never be able to square the circle and they are self-deluded. As has been said, the belief in the innate goodness of man is most pronounced among those that live in gated communities.
Good luck Yann. Seriously. Wishing you the best.
You are right about the trends in the rest of Europe and even the US. As honor is increasingly equated with successful place-holding and patronage rather than manifest virtue, our systems deteriorate as well.
Federalism which used to be a buffer of sorts here, is steadily dying under the impact of consolidationist minded judges and the complicity of the Democrat Party client class; which requires centralization in order to gather power to itself and away from the citizenry.
The one advantage we do retain in the Federal realm – at least for now – is the 1st amendment; which can at least highlight the activities of the nihilist class worms as they eat away at the civic body.
That no doubt will soon be attacked off campus as well.
“haron W Says:
October 7th, 2014 at 12:48 pm
Ben Afflek and his comrades are the limousine liberals who are deep down (unwilling to admit it to themselves…but it’s there) certain that with their money and position they are immune from the fall-out of their absurd beliefs. They will never be able to square the circle and they are self-deluded. As has been said, the belief in the innate goodness of man is most pronounced among those that live in gated communities.”
His fulminating barely suppressed rage is what most startled me. Next to it came the unrelenting and unashamed deployment of sarcasm and ridicule as opposed to argument.
I guess liberals really have internalized the principle that reason is just window dressing, and as such has little or no place in political argument.
These liberal males are certainly emotional. I think his little Bourne Identity buddy is much the same from what I have seen.
Yann:
Unfortunately, the US is going the way of Spain in terms of responsibility public officials take for their mistakes.
Or anyone takes for mistakes, for that matter.
Yann at 12:17 pm
“Geoffrey, There´s no way to do so. Citizens have no power enough to hold relevant officials accountable it they don´t want to be held.”
Of course they can do so, they have the power of the vote. Their inability to use that vote is due to the prevalent liberal stupidity in Europe not helplessness.
“In England, politicians that have made serious mistakes leave. Period.”
Not so. Rotherdam proves otherwise.
DNW:
Did you see the talking head (I forget who it was) who said we must continue to allow unrestricted travel from Liberia because of slavery and the history of its founding? I kid you not. He was advocating it as moral penance for guilt, apparently.
DNW,
I´m afraid all this is irrelevant. US is very proud of its Constitution, and they´re right to do so: it´s a great one. But the 1st amendment is not a wall against the history to come. It´s not even a fence. At the end of the day, what matters is demography.
US has a great Constitution, England has none. Both countries developped greatly, and in many ways they did similarly. It was never the laws that made a country great. It was never about the laws, but about the people behind the laws.
neo-neocon,
Not only US, but the whole western world. No safe place for meritocracy anymore, I´m afraid.
Neo, Here’s a link to a first hand account of an Ebola survivor. I think you’ll find it very informative if you haven’t read it already. Btw, I admire the tone you set on your blog. Quite refreshing.
http://www.thecable.ng/how-i-survived-ebola-2/3
Or is it because something has changed and made Ebola easier to contract?
nature needs a few more mutations to show humanity the real species killer. But they are probably tired of humanity being afraid of global warming.
Of course they can do so, they have the power of the vote.
Remind us again who it is that keeps talking about the moral responsibility of Democrats and about martial law in the future for this Regime, GB.
You act like you’re the only one that gets to talk negative things about them, but the rest of everyone is somehow wrong for blaming the same people you criticize every day.
Steve:
Thanks for the link (and the compliment). I would imagine that all Ebola patients, even those who survive, suffer greatly, both physically and psychologically.
The author seems to have come down with Ebola in Nigeria, which is one of the countries that has been effective (so far, anyway), in halting the spread of the disease.
GB,
Incubation is considered anything between 2 and 21 days. That means people can start having Ebola almost immediately after exposure.
“Remind us again who it is that keeps talking about the moral responsibility of Democrats and about martial law in the future for this Regime, GB.”
??? Clarify please.
“You act like you’re the only one that gets to talk negative things about them, but the rest of everyone is somehow wrong for blaming the same people you criticize every day.”
I find that an absurd accusation but make the case with specifics please as to how I act like I’m “the only one that gets to talk negative things about them” and how “everyone is somehow wrong for blaming the same people you criticize every day”.
It’s a nonsensical argument and I can only conclude that its motivated by personal animus, resulting from my having the temerity to opine the other day that I couldn’t ‘buy into’ a characterization you’d made. Vindictive little thing, aren’t you… but by all means, make your case.
Thanks neo, between Mrs Whatsit and you, I’m clear on it now.
neo,
Off topic, but I suspect you might find this to be the basis for a fascinating subject for a non-political post.
This woman singing multiple notes at once is a total ‘I didn’t even know humans could do that’ moment
FYI, the 21 day rule is that if you do not have symptoms by the end of 3 weeks, then chance that you will develop Ebola from the that particular exposure is essentially zero.
It is not the case that symptoms appearing within days of exposure are not due to Ebola, just the opposite in fact.
To restate: symptoms occurring from 0 to 21 days after exposure is presumed to be Ebola until proven not to be. There is a probability curve for onset, possible Bell-shaped or Gaussian, where past 21 days is multiple standard deviations out from the mean or average time of onset.
That is not at all unusual. Look at the video I referenced, and you will see Nicholas Kristof doing virtually the same thing in substance. As if right on cue he smiles sickly and says in response to Maher and Harris’s contention that freedom and equality are liberal principles, that “The basic liberal principle is tolerance”.
He admits that what Maher is saying about Jihadis is true but asserts that it is a woefully incomplete picture because “the people who are standing up to them are Muslim too”
And then he lists a number of helpless Muslims placed in prison or killed for their liberal views.
So “standing up” effectively equates to being a victim too.
And whose fault is it? The west. The west for driving Muslim radicals to radicalism, the west for not supporting the “dissidents” who the radicals are killing and imprisoning because they embody to some extent western concepts of value which have presumably driven them crazy in the first place.
The liberal, it is clear, “analyzes” any moral question by constantly peeling away at the infinite onion-like layers of a victimhood he’s always newly uncovering. It’s his one method.
Again, for the umpteenth time, I think that conservatives and libertarians [myself included] have difficulty processing just how different the fundamental moral appetites or sensibilities of the collectivist class are. Conservatives sputter at the liberal credos. Libertarians analyze the grounds and assumptions behind them, but still wind up shaking their heads saying “how can lefties even pretend to derive their political and social demands from these nihilistic premisses?”
On a personal note, watching Kristof gives me the creeps; almost makes me want to vomit. The way he peels his upper lip back when he lisps, and talks with his hands is ….
Well, maybe that is a liberal male thing too. Charlie Rose does it.
DNW,
If we followed Kristoff’s advice and supported the dissidents, wouldn’t we just be painting targets on them for ISIS? Libs are really dumb. They will sacrifice anyone or anything to boost their own feelings of moral superiority.
If we only need to be concerned with catching Ebola when someone exhibits symptoms (that’s when they are contagious). But now we’re seeing low grade fevers in the assistant and in Duncan.
The implications are frightening! How do you know when you have an ebola fever as opposed to a regular fever? If there is an outbreak, things could get awfully uncertain.
Quite possibly; if liberals actually even bothered about it. Who do clowns like Kristof think the Islamists are: Pinochet? Botha?
Naw, even they are not that stupid. They just , as you say, get off so powerfully on their compulsive simpering, preening, and hand flapping that they cannot help themselves.
“Wait … wait … wait … look at me … it’s my turn to say the magic words … now here’s what we all need to do! …. “
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It looks as if the protective clothing worn by the nurse in Spain may not have been adequate:
I think similar problems with protective gear has been one of the reasons for the large number of infected health workers in Africa.
Ann…
Look at the photos.
No-one can wear haz-mat gear and survive in that climate, no-one.
This situation has been known for fifty-years. NATO and Warsaw Pact exercises established that all of the gear that stops the bad stuff cooks those who wear it.
Even in European weather, troops find that they can’t perform. Everyone is forced to spend most of their time sitting — in an attempt to cool off.
The only suits that can do the job are those used by the astronauts. They have auxiliary air-conditioners that are carried with them — for just this purpose. You can see them in the walk-up to the Apollo flights.
In bio-warfare test labs, the air is conditioned outside the haz-mat suits and refreshed constantly.
In Africa, one by one, everyone is forced to un-zip — before they keel over with a heat stroke.
It really is that bad.
This is in the U.S. — National Nursing Survey: 80% Of Hospitals Have Not Communicated An Infectious Disease Policy:
DNW,
Fully agreed. I was only stating that the 1st amendment will survive as long as people in US share the values that made those laws possible.
History is not a path towards freedom and democracy. It could happen that people in US will have a lower appreciation for freedom in XXIth century that they did in XIXth (the same happening in Europe, by the way). Though (sadly) I think we both agree in this.
Sure, without the 2nd Amendment generating virtue amongst a citizenry strong enough to defend themselves (and thus others), we would have every city be a Rotter like the UK does.
Then where would the 1st Amendment be while everyone’s daughter is a sex slave to the Mohammeds?
Fat lot of good that does you.