And yet, somehow, the taxi drivers are not all dead.

[Barack_America]

Here they are, Liberia's de facto ambulance drivers, shuttling Ebola sufferers around the city, from clinic to clinic, and often back home to die. Within easy striking distance of a cough, a sneeze, or projectile vomiting, breathing the same air as the infected.

Yet, there has been no mention of them being stricken to the same extent as the health care workers receiving these same patients. How can that be? The taxis are often mentioned in news reports, so it's not as if the press isn't paying attention to them. Conspiracy? Or are the reports of transmission only via significant and direct exposure to infected fluids actually true?

[TorchTheWitch]

1. it's the conspiracy of not giving a shit about the taxi drivers

and having no idea if they're dying like flies or not.

We also know that the man in Texas with Ebola merely helped to carry a woman with it by her legs from the taxi in which he sat in the front passenger seat back into the house after she was turned away at the hospital.

Is there some reason the press would be doing some Ebola study of taxi drivers? There's plenty of people in these poor areas that need a job, so there's always going to be someone else to take over the taxis of the ones that die.

And why would the press be doing their own study on taxi drivers when the CDC already has all that needs to be known about how Ebola is transmitted, how deadly this strain is, etc., etc.? Suddenly the press and taxi drivers in Africa are the experts here???

[Barack_America]

2. The woman was having convulsions.

And was at the peak of her contagiousness. Not to be too graphic, but if you're holding onto the legs of someone who has convulsed, chances are you're coming into significant contact with their urine.

[LisaL]

7. And the patient in the US was puking all over the place before

being loaded into an ambulance.
SO how many people came in contact with his puke?

[TorchTheWitch]

9. Did I say anything about his not knowing he'd be exposed?

I think he DID know and why he up split for the US to visit family he'd never visited before knowing that he'd be treated in a US hospital with WAY better sanitation and that wasn't crowded with too many dying Ebola patients. I believe he knew he'd been exposed and made the choice to high tail it to the US in his small time window of being symptom free while he had the chance since once he started having symptoms he wouldn't be able to leave Liberia... they have been taking the temperatures of every plane passenger traveling anywhere. And he knew that if he didn't get to a country with modern medicine and sanitation that wasn't packed with Ebola victims that if he came down with it himself he'd have a hell of a lot better chance of surviving. What happened to that woman he helped, her brother and several other people that had any contact with her dropping dead in days had to have been a huge motivator.

You were wanting to know about taxi drivers that has nothing to do with anything. We don't KNOW whether or not taxi drivers have been exposed or not. Depends on what they know about Ebola, if they clean their taxis (which they probably don't) or if they help to transport any fares that have Ebola by having to touch them. The press isn't doing some kind of study on taxi drivers because they already HAVE all that needs to be known about Ebola from the CDC who sure as hell would know more than anyone else.

What on earth is your point with all this nonsense about taxi drivers??? You want all the info you can possibly get about Ebola than go to the CDC. They've been studying every outbreak since the virus was first discovered.

[WinkyDink]

3. Not every single dead person will be noted. There are now over 2900 dead, according to WHO:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/26/world/africa/ebola-death-toll-is-more-than-2900-who-says.html?_r=0

[kestrel91316]

4. How many HAVE died? We will never know. It is likely that only 1/3

of cases have even been counted, since so many are getting sick and dying quietly at home, never becoming statistics.

[AverageJoe90]

5. That may be true.

I think we would have heard about that by now as well, if they were dying, too. So it looks quite likely that, at least for now, the reports of transmission only being thru significant and direct exposure to infected fluids are indeed factual, and hopefully, it all gets contained before that changes.

[LisaL]

6. They wouldn't all be dead.

Ebola has about 30 % survival rate.

[TorchTheWitch]

10. and if a taxi driver dies someone else gets a taxi driving job

Jobs aren't plentiful in these poor places.

I'd expect that taxi drivers being the ones transporting Ebola victims, helping them in and out of the cars, not sanitizing their cars, etc. that there would be higher infection rate among taxi drivers especially when so many of the people don't know about Ebola or how to keep from being infected. Ignorance and superstition has a LOT to do with how this virus has spread. These taxi drivers are the average Joe's not paramedics, and sanitation is terrible in these places to begin with.

Btw, survival rate is directly attached to whether or not a victim gets treatment and how soon. Someone coming down with it that just stays at home or being turned away from the hospital or just not going for superstitious reasons or ignorance has a far less chance of survival. Apparently, with so many of these people not seeking treatment or able to get it has a lot to do with the infection spread and the number of dead. People were just throwing the dead out into the street and may still be... just as what Europeans did during the worst times of plague centuries ago. It's chilling.

[alcibiades_mystery]

8. Don't bother...the Monster-Under-The-Bed crowd is in full throttle

Best to just stand by and be embarrassed when they refuse to acknowledge their silliness next week.

[JayhawkSD]

11. It cannot be contracted through the air.

Contact by means of "a cough, a sneeze" or "breathing the same air as the infected" will not cause you to catch the disease. Even contact with "projectile vomiting" will not cause infection unless you get it in your eyes, nose or mouth, or if it hits an open cut on your skin.

[grahamhgreen]

12. You have statistics on taxi driver deaths in Africa ?????

[grahamhgreen]

13. LA Times: " taxi drivers are at particular risk"

Ebola deaths - Los Angeles

Sep 16, 2014 ... "Taxi drivers are also at particular risk, Casey said.

http://www.latimes.com/world/africa/la-fg-africa-liberia-ebola-deaths-20140916-story.html

[pnwmom]

14. How do you know that many haven't died? n/t

[KG]

15. wait, wut? is this, like, an ebola troofer thread?

[Orrex]

16. What do you do when you come to a yellow light? Go more slowly.

Whaaaaaaaat..... dooooooooo.... yooouuuu.... dooooooo...... wheeeeeeeen......