Did the nurse with ebola get on the plane because she has learnt to shrug off scientific

[snagglepuss]

warnings? In other words are the chickens coming home to roost after years of repukes and FOX dismissing scientists as having antiamerican agendas (climate change/fossil fuels), anti-religious agendas (evolution?

[riderinthestorm]

1. No. She got on the plane because the CDC told her it was ok even with a fever. Nt

[In_The_Wind]

5. That's mindboggling advice.

[morningfog]

6. It is fine advice.

[BlindTiresias]

18. The hell?

How is that fine advice?

[morningfog]

25. I'll prove it in a few weeks.

[cherokeeprogressive]

42. IOW you'll wait and see? n/t

[Man from Pickens]

24. and you get a free rainbow with every unicorn

[riderinthestorm]

7. Yup and this is why Frieden needs to lose his job.

The rest I can sorta understand it, but this?

No freaking way.

[In_The_Wind]

10. imo: Anyone who was in contact with an Ebola patient shouldn't be traveling for 42 days.

But what do I know.

[riderinthestorm]

12. Agreed. My experience is with animal quarantines which are almost always 60 days nt

[magical thyme]

23. I can't even sorta understand the rest.

1. Why was Frieden's first response, right out of the gate, to assume "protocol was breached?" Why did he not consider the possibility that protocol is inadequate?

2. Why are years of training, assistants to dress and undress, biosuits complete with hoods and filtered air respirators, followed by bleach showers, along with facilities specifically laid out and designed to minimize opportunities for contact and enable healthcare workers to safely undress considered necessary at the 4 BSL-4 hospital facilities?

But only droplet/contact precautions with lower legs and feet not fully protected and neck fully exposed -- or wrapped in effing tape -- considered perfectly fine for regular hospital staff?

I've said from the beginning that the CDC protocol was insufficient. I've yet to see the above questions answered in a reasonable way, probably because there isn't a reasonable answer.

3. Emory Hospital discovered with Brantly that they had no way to remove the hazardous waste. They dispatched workers to Home Depot to bring in large outside trash cans to temporarily and safely store it until arrangements were made with the CDC down the road to autoclave it prior to disposal.

How did the CDC prepare Dallas Presbyterian for the mountain of hazardous waste that a single Ebola patient generates? Apparently they didn't, which is how it ended up being pile up "to the ceiling" according to the anonymous nurses.

4. Why does the CDC say that more than 2 pairs of gloves is unsafe because it will take too long to take off the 3rd pair of gloves, when MSF, WHO and local African health care workers wear 3 and even 4 pairs of gloves?

5. CDC guidelines say to wash your hands immediately after removing the gloves. I can only speak for the rooms at the small hospital where I work. The sinks are not in the doorway; they are inside the room by the patient's bed. You cannot undress in the doorway and wash your hands immediately. You either use the pump by the door -- which is *not* as clean as washing your hands -- or you have to undress by the patient's bed to wash your hands immediately, leaving you exposed to unannounced projectile vomit.

6. Has Frieden actually ever worked in a regular hospital? And if so, in which century?

His performance to me has been nothing but hubris and bombast, followed by finger-pointing, followed by "oopsie" maybe we better rethink this.

Honestly, I can't understand why Duncan wasn't immediately shipped to one of the 4 hospitals equipped and staffed by specially trained people to deal with this.

If it hadn't been allowed to spread, it would be a single case. Now it's 3 cases. Who knows what tomorrow will bring.

[customerserviceguy]

51. You've nailed the points well

Around here, we poke fun at the "nothing to see here, move on along" kind of attitude. I can't see that the CDC's done anything different from that.

[snagglepuss]

9. But she didn't question the advice. I once called a telehealth line because

I was violently ill for several days with serious diahearrea. I thought I might have had food poisoning. The nurse went through a list and said I couldn't have food poisoning because I didn't have a fever. I'm not in medicine but that seemed absurd so several days later I saw my doctor who did a test and discovered I had campoblactyer. Days later I found out that campoblactyer doesn't even cause fever.

Why I bring this up is that the nurse wasn't suspicious of the info she was given. It seems that the nurse lacked the understanding the ebola is extremely serious so she simply shrugged off her intuitions.

[Yo_Mama]

13. What, the nurse should ignore the medical authority?

That's ridiculous. CDC IS THE MEDICAL AUTHORITY IN THE US.

If the poor lady had gotten sick where she was and then another hospital had been locked down and contaminated with more infected HCW, you probably would be blaming her for NOT following CDC advice.

Fuck, that just takes the cake. Go ahead and alert on this post, but I am outraged. Apparently there is nothing that an HCW can do to satisfy your high moral perspective but NOT GET EBOLA and inconvenience the nation. Who is going to take care of the patients if this is the attitude? Saints or insane people? Maybe you'd need to be in both categories?

I'm revolted by your attitude to this woman, who now is in danger of her life for doing her job and trying to care for a desperately ill person, and gets to be abused by a grateful nation for the opportunity.

[KingCharlemagne]

29. I wish I could recommend your post. She called the CDC multiple times (acc. to CBS)

and was given clearance each time she called. I mean, really, how much due diligence would satisfy these people?

It's bad enough to place your life at risk caring for someone with a deadly illness, but to be vilified for it?

Allow me to join you in saying "FUCK THIS SHIT!"

[lunasun]

31. +1 just shows how ugly JQPublic is gonna get with the victims here

[Crunchy Frog]

16. Or she was excessively trusting of authority figures.

I do not believe that I would have gone along with this advice, but then I don't believe that the CDC are always right about everything.

[snagglepuss]

36. Thank you. Excessive trust placed in authority is troubling.

I can't believe the hostility this point has generated. One of the very few comments I have made on this topic was on another thread defending the nurse saying that nurses are taught to obey, not question.

There is a real problem in our society, authority is either completely revered (CDC) or completely dismissed (climate scientists).

[TexasMommaWithAHat]

56. NOT TRUE. Nurses "question" all the time.

If they give a patient a wrong dosage as written by the attending physician , they can lose their license.

Twelve hour shifts of taking care of patients and covering doctors' asses. Or cowering and tossing coins over who is going to call the attending physician at 2 a.m. because he is going to chew your ass off. No, most physicians are NOT like that, but nurses have no recourse against the ones who are.

[lunasun]

30. She called them several times

[mackerel]

43. I'm not sure about the exact advice they gave

her but she herself knew she was under quarantine.

[dumbcat]

45. She was not under quarantine.

She was being monitored.

[mackerel]

57. Ooooh my bad.

Go ahead and fly then, Im sure you will be fine.

[TexasMommaWithAHat]

55. Good grief! She's a Kent State Graduate

I don't think she's dumb. She called the CDC more than once about traveling back because she wanted desparated to believe that she didn't have ebola.

She's human. This is why doctors are not supposed to treat themselves or family.

DENIAL is not just a river in Egypt, ya' know.

And just for the record...SHE'S NOT FROM TEXAS!

These nurses were assured again and again that ebola was not easily transmitted.

No, I don't think she should have gone to Ohio, but this is what happens when the CDC drops the ball.

[Big Blue Marble]

2. You have missed the news.

She called the CDC several times prior to boarding and was told it was perfectly safe.

[Aerows]

3. Didn't you hear?

It's perfectly safe to ride public transportation, you can't contact it that way. If you suspect you might have been exposed to ebola, you shouldn't ride public transportation because you might infect someone.

That's the wisdom being doled out by the CDC's Frieden.

[uponit7771]

4. She called the CDC and was cleared by the CDC to fly

[Puzzledtraveller]

8. No

[Yo_Mama]

11. CDC has learned a sublime indifference to fact, that's for sure.

I believe you should feel ashamed of yourself for this post.

The lady followed the instructions she was given - EXACTLY. She called the number she was given for medical reporting and was told to get on that plane.

You people are all blaming the hospital and now individuals who were in fact following CDC instructions at the time.

This latest - that Frieden has held this lady up to scorn, when he should be lecturing himself in the mirror - makes the final case for his resignation.

I am not a nurse, but I am revolted and disgusted and outraged at the way these individuals - who were doing their job as they were told and following the instructions they were given - are now being scapegoated.

[snagglepuss]

38. Your response my OP is outrageous. I never dissed the nurse.

Where the fuck have I blamed anyone. What I brought up is the fact that she accepted without questioning what she was told. In another thread prior to my writing the OP I defended her on the grounds that nurse are taught to obey.


Every fucking person no matter who they are or what fucking position they hold has the responsibilty to QUESTION AUTHORITY.


I fact that she was doing exactly was she told, that she was doing exactly what she was taught to do which is to obey authority is the problem.


The hostility generated to my observation about someone obeying authority without question is actually illuminating though not the response I would have expected on DU.

[Yo_Mama]

39. CDC is in control of the scientific/medical guidelines.

Your title is completely dismissive of the nurse's thought process. I would be amazed if anyone did not see your title as a slam on the nurse.

[snagglepuss]

40. I asked a fucking question. What I see in society is a lot of people

either shrugging off expert opinion or treating expert opinion as god's word, never to be questioned.

[Rebl]

14. I would

think anyone with a little common sense would know they should have kept themselves isolated for a period of time. I don't care how many times she called the CDC, she should have known even if she had a slight fever, she might become worse and should NOT be flying possibly exposing others.

[kestrel91316]

15. ^^^^ THIS.

[Fumesucker]

17. No, just no

This whole OP is about science, the non-scientist called the scientists and they told her to do something that has a small but non-zero risk at this stage of the disease.

She called the scientists, the experts, the boffins.

And they fucked up.

And you want to ignore that to blame some poor woman with a terrible disease who may die from it.

[riderinthestorm]

19. + 1000 nt

[lunasun]

32. Plus they claim the victim may have shrugged off science !! And others claim she should not listen

To authorities
Looks like some of West Africa 's reactions to the disease may pale compared to what will happen here

[ecstatic]

21. She trusted the CDC, like many here. nt

[Fumesucker]

20. I lost a lot of respect for you because of this OP

It's cruel, mean spirited and an attempt to blame the little person instead of the experts, the big wheels, the scientists, the boffins, the government.

[Ilsa]

27. Yep. The little person was sick. yet DU expects

100% rationality from someone developing a fever. At least she called for someone else's opinion. Too bad they blew it.

[lunasun]

33. She called several times and if this and other posts here are any indication of general national

slants on this it is despicable

[snagglepuss]

48. I asked a fucking question.

[lunasun]

49. And I learnt you a reply !

[snagglepuss]

47. I asked a fucking QUESTION. A fucking question. Where the fuck do you get

off accusing me of blaming the "little person" which BTW is condescending in reference to anyone let alone a nurse.

[TBF]

22. Nice try - CDC does not

get a pass on this.

[elleng]

26. No, she contacted CDC and they didn't tell her not to fly.

[Maru Kitteh]

34. learnt?

I'll patiently accept an explanation before I just express my first thoughts. Nurses ARE scientists. Please explain your post.

[snagglepuss]

46. Thank you for asking for clarification.

There seems to be two ways many react to experts, one is to accept their statements as god's word, only to be obeyed never questioned or thanks to the likes of Fox news to be ignored unless they support their worldview.

My question (please note not a statement) was to start a discussion as to why she didn't question authority. To start off such a discussion was to wonder aloud whether she shrugged off the dangers of ebola as simply hype.

Its puzzling because her calling the CDC meant that she wondered whether flying with a slight fever after treating an ebola patient might not be a good idea but when she got the go ahead from the CDC she set those qualms aside.

[Major Hogwash]

35. Did she get ebola from flying on a plane?

I haven't heard anything about this, so I am totally in the dark about what is going on in this incident.

[Avalux]

37. Common sense seems to be severely lacking all the way around.

Maybe the nurse should have considered it wasn't a good idea to get on the plane with a low grade fever, KNOWING she might have ebola. I wouldn't have done it, no matter what the CDC told me.

[LanternWaste]

41. I too think it's more important to point fingers than to rationally discuss likely outcomes...

I too think it's more important to point fingers than to rationally discuss likely outcomes and solutions.

[snagglepuss]

44. I asked a effing question. The responses to a question staggers belief.

[WinkyDink]

50. I'd say it was because she had wedding plans to finalize, and that kind of task can override sense.

[seveneyes]

52. No. It was pure selfishness.

[Skittles]

58. she got on the plane because her wedding trumps all