2014 Ebola Epidemic in Guinea and the United States Amy Riddell Kaplan University HS311 Unit:1 Assignment Professor Daniel Gilmore November 16, 2015 Ebola, previously known as Ebola hemorrhagic fever, is an exceptional and fatal disease caused by an infection with one of the Ebola virus strands that claimed an estimated 2,482 lives in Guinea, Africa alone in 2014 (Johnston, 2015). It made its first recorded appearance in 1976 near the Ebola River, which is now known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The symptoms, similar to the well-known flu, consists of fever, severe headache, body aches, loss of physical strength, lethargy, diarrhea, vomiting, stomach pain, and unexplained hemorrhaging. These symptoms can appear anywhere from…
Unfortunately, the efforts of the doctors and helpers seem futile because the rate of infection versus the available room and staff needed are on opposite ends of the spectrum. The reality is that there is lot of need but not enough help. Resources are limited and the people are dying rapidly. The Frontline documentary brings awareness to how fatal the virus is, how the virus is contracted, and how severe the Ebola outbreak is. The main intent however is to bring light to the necessity of more resources in order to effectively treat…
Dr. Fiona’s claim that that the quarantine protocols for returning health workers are not justifiable is arbitrary. The health protocols regardless of the situation are very important especially for the health workers who must provide care for others. In case of Ms. Hichkox, since she was in-contact with patients suffering from a highly contagious virus such as Ebola, it was reasonable to follow a quarantine protocol initially. The fact that Ebola virus is only diagnosed after the development of symptoms and had no effective cure at the time, ignoring the possibility of Ms. Hickhox being infected was too great of risk to take for the health of public. Let’s assume for a minute that after the initial screening Ms. Hickhox was released but few…
When the CDC is involved with something major you know its serious and not a game, but for this instance this type of Ebola wasn’t harmful to humans. Overall this book gives us knowledge of Ebola and what to look out for and what is being done to stop it from spreading and…
The Ebola outbreak that began in 2014 was one of the deadliest and fast-moving epidemics the world has seen. Outbreaks mainly began in West Africa and quickly spread worldwide, affecting well over tens of thousands of people. It was not long before much of the world became familiar with the disease through personal connections or hearing about it from the extensive news coverage. Richard Preston, an American author, is very familiar with infectious diseases, and dives into all aspects of Eebola, including explaining its origins, its deadly symptoms, and how it spread in his book The Hot Zone. He has mastered the knowledge of infectious diseases through his extensive research.…
Because of this, reaction to Ebola was very slow and people died before the CDC (Center of Disease Control) and the Doctors without Borders got involved. When they got here they noticed that Ebola is transmittable by bodily fluids, for example, blood, saliva, or even just simple touching someone that is effected can transfer Ebola. Which made is infect many since in their tradition when someone dies they wash, touch and kiss the body of the deceased. After contamination of Ebola, victims’ acquire a fever, then muscle or joint pain, then a skin rash and finally vomiting blood and bloody diarrhea. In the documentary, Frontline: Ebola Outbreak, a camera group travels to Sierra Leone, the country at the heart of the Ebola outbreak.…
Preventing the Spread of Infectious Disease: The spread of infectious diseases in hospitals and health care organizations has been one of the major factors contributing to the loss of lives in the health care industry. As a result, there have been numerous efforts by the health care facilities and workers towards the prevention of the spread of infectious diseases within the facilities. Most of these health care organizations have developed and implemented comprehensive policies and procedures that guide the actions of their health workers in relation to prevent the spread of such diseases. An example of a health care organization with such policies and procedures is Martin Health System (MHS), which is based in Stuart, Florida.…
Before the Ebola outbreak in Liberian society, Liberia had no public health infrastructure or any role in the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare and lacked medical doctors and trained professionals. Most of their health organizations come from foreign aid, such as the Médecins Sans Frontiéres who had malaria projects in Liberia during the first outbreaks of Ebola in late 2013. With the global concern of Ebola spreading beyond West Africa the World Health Organization began to send more aid to Liberia. Additionally, the United States aided $76.3 million to Liberia and 3,000 personnel to build and staff portable hospitals. Together with the aid of the Center of Disease Control, the World Health Organization, and the United States in October 2014, the cases of Ebola in Liberia began to decline and by May 2015, it was declared Ebola-free.…
In chapter 9 of Global Issues, Local Arguments, June Johnson explores the idea of a local disease developing in to an epidemic (affecting people on a local level) and then into a pandemic(affecting on a global level). Disease is spreading from local to global levels at an increasing rate and if it continues many people will suffer and or die. This occurrence is making it more necessary for the government, medical leaders, religious leaders and regular citizen attempt to prevent the spread as well as educate them over the diseases to prevent future damage. To demonstrate several views of the matter she includes “The Age of Pandemics (458-62)” by Larry Brilliant, Student Voice (454-56) by Mark Merlin and “The impact of Disparities in the Health…
One method of primary prevention identified in this outbreak was when the droplet precautions and contact precautions were initiated. The public was taught about the virus modes of transmission through radio and television and health official utilized droplet and contact precautions. These in preventative measures were effective in preventing Jory the stepdaughter of Emhoff from becoming infected as she wore a mask in public and did not make physical contact with others infected (Soderbergh et al., 2012). One noteworthy moment in the movie was when the nurses went on strike until protocols were in place as they were advocating for their safety (Soderbergh et al., 2012). It 's hard to determine the level of success these preventative measures had, as the highest level of prevention was the vaccine that was developed by Dr. Hextall (Soderbergh et al.,…
Outbreak Narrative in The Host and the Criticism of Korean Society behind It In “The Dangers of Biosecurity: The Host and the Geopolitics of Outbreak,” Hsuan L. Hsu insists that the monster film The Host shows how neoliberal economic reforms and the discourse of biosecurity imposed by international intervention on South Korea cause economical, biological and environmental harm to the nation and destruct the social reproduction of Korean society by revising the outbreak narrative. In the first page of the article, Hsu proposes the correlation between the monster’s origin and catastrophic effect of international intervention on South Korea. Defining that fictional creatures in monster films are originated from the concerns about the overall…
Sex among heterosexuals is the biggest, most common source of transmission among African Americans, followed by homosexual relations. According to John M. Karon, Patricia L. Fleming, Richard W. Steketee, and Kevin M. De Cock in the article titled HIV in the United States at the Turn of the Century: An Epidemic in Transition “Compared with diagnoses made during 1990, the proportion of all diagnoses made during 1999 was substantially smaller for Whites, MSM. and female IDUs; the proportion was substantially larger for African Americans, residents of the South, and both men and women infected through heterosexual contact.” (Karon, et al.…
I would be thrilled to having a ticket that would allow me to join the organization, Doctors Without Borders. Since I plan on becoming a doctor, this would mean I would have already been successful at medical school and have my medical license. The Doctors Without Borders headquarters are located in Geneva, Switzerland; therefore, I would find myself living in a whole different environment than what I am accustomed right now which is one of my lifetime goals. Doctors Without Borders is a non-government funded organization that hires doctors from all over the world in order to travel into third world countries and countries that are need of medical assistance in the greatest time of need such as epidemics,disease and natural disasters. Moreover, I learned about this organization when the 2010 earthquake struck Haiti.…
Introduction The movie ‘Outbreak’ came out in cinemas in 1995 shortly after the discovery of the Ebola HF virus in the late 1970s. This movie dramatizes the Ebola HF virus and portrays it as the fictional Motaba virus, it shows in a dramatic Hollywood way how the US would react to a deadly disease outbreak. Of course, being a Hollywood movie there are some facts and many fallacies in the finer, more scientific aspects of the disease. The biosecurity facilities used to control the spread of the disease are not accurately portrayed and the evolution of the disease is ridiculous and very inaccurate. Scientific Information Viruses In and Out of the Movie…
The response of the word to the Ebola epidemic was made by the world health organization UNICEF supported the training of social workers, a surveillance scheme has been set up for the next 2 years to search for the thwart a emergence of the deadly pathogen ,the deployment of over 4000 heath care workers by…