Ebola news 11/19

[Buster's Uncle]

Celeb-filled, stirring ad confronts world leaders' slow response to Ebola crisis in West Africa
Yahoo News
By Michael Walsh  2 hours ago



American actor Morgan Freeman participated in the PSA.



Sometimes silence speaks louder than words.

A new PSA featuring some of today’s brightest stars does not feature their acting abilities — it just shows them sitting still.

“This is what waiting looks like,” the clip’s text reads. “Talk is cheap. It’s time to take action on Ebola.”

African musicians Fally Ipupa, Angélique Kidjo, American actors Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, German soccer player Per Mertesacker and others lent their famous faces to the video produced by ONE, an international advocacy group dedicated to ending extreme poverty and preventable disease — particularly in Africa.

 
“We thought of something silent to cut through the noise and to let it speak for itself,” ONE’s chief marketing officer, Roxy Philson, told Yahoo News. “The world waited far too long to respond. While our leaders waited, many people paid with their lives."

Philson created the concept for the video that will form the centerpiece of ONE’s new multimedia campaign, launching Wednesday.

“It stemmed from the thought that there’s been plenty of talk, but not enough action. We didn’t want to go down a conventional route,” she said.

ONE, which called the world’s initial response to the outbreak a slow and uncoordinated failure, is demanding that world leaders do more to combat the Ebola epidemic in West Africa and help bolster its health care systems so that this tragedy is not repeated in the future.

“Some countries have now stepped up to lead in a big way — with traditional donors like the U.S., U.K., France and Germany all making meaningful contributions — but this is a global crisis, and it demands a global response,” ONE President and CEO Michael Elliott said in a statement.

ONE, co-founded by Bono of U2, works closely with African activists and political leaders to fight disease, increase investments in nutrition and agriculture, and demand transparency, so that citizens can hold their governments accountable, among other things.

In 1976, the first outbreaks of Ebola occurred in rural villages in Central Africa close to tropical rainforests, but the most recent outbreak in West Africa has affected rural and urban communities, according to the World Health Organization.

The fatality rate among Ebola victims is about 50 percent.

The countries most severely affected by the recent crisis are Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, which have recently suffered from violent conflicts and lack the medical infrastructure necessary to eradicate the deadly virus.

This is partly why disease and poverty so often go hand in hand, and why fighting one requires dealing with the other.

One says that indigence has been cut in half in the past 20 years and can be practically eliminated within the next 15 years — but only if action is taken now.

“It’s not just bad news all the time," Philson said. "We have it in our power to change this. We’ve done it before, and we can do it again."

To learn more, go to One.org.


http://news.yahoo.com/one-ebola-psa-west-africa-epidemic-220218185.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Cuba says doctor catches Ebola in Sierra Leone
Associated Press
By MICHAEL WEISSENSTEIN  8 hours ago



In this Sept. 24, 201, file photo, nurse Dalila Martinez, trainer of the Cuban medical team to travel to Sierra Leone, washes her gloved hands during a practice drill at a training camp, in Havana, Cuba. Cuba's health ministry is sending more than 160 health workers to help stop the raging Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone in early October. Cuba says a member of the 165-member medical team it sent to fight Ebola in Sierra Leone has been diagnosed with the disease. (AP Photo/Ladyrene Perez, Cubadebate,File)



HAVANA (AP) — A member of the 165-member medical team Cuba sent to fight Ebola in Sierra Leone has been diagnosed with the disease, state media reported Tuesday.

Dr. Felix Baez Sarria is being treated by British doctors in Africa but he will be transferred to a special unit in Geneva at the recommendation of the World Health Organization, state media said, citing the Cuban Ministry of Public Health.

Cuba won global praise for sending at least 256 medical workers to Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea to help treat Ebola patients. State officials have emphasized the medics' high state of readiness for the mission, saying the doctors, nurses and support staff received weeks of instruction in protective measures and equipment.

Once in Africa, the Cubans got two to three weeks of additional training before heading into the field. They were to be quarantined in Africa for weeks at the end of their six-month mission before returning to Cuba.

State media said that Baez, an internal medicine specialist, came down with a fever of more than 100 degrees on Sunday and was diagnosed with Ebola the following day.

Cuban officials did not immediately release any other information about the case, the first reported among the health workers the island sent to Africa as part of a half-century-old strategy that puts doctors on the front lines of the country's foreign policy.

This island of 11 million people is one of the largest global contributors of medical workers to the fight against Ebola, a commitment that has drawn rare praise from the U.S. and focused worldwide attention on Cuba's unique program of medical diplomacy, which deploys armies of doctors to win friends abroad and earn billions a year in desperately needed foreign exchange.

Cuba has more than 50,000 medical workers in more than 60 countries, many in nations like Brazil that pay hundreds of millions a year for their services. Others are on humanitarian missions that generate good will abroad.

Despite a recent set of pay raises, most Cuban doctors' salaries don't top $75 a month, less than many workers in tourism or other sectors that bring in money from abroad. The foreign missions almost uniformly offer the chance to earn extra pay, in many cases enough to buy a bigger home or new car.

Critics of Cuba's communist government have accused it in the past of exploiting the doctors by giving them only a small portion of the money paid for their services and keeping the rest.


http://news.yahoo.com/cuba-says-doctor-catches-ebola-sierra-leone-043008598.html

[Buster's Uncle]

New York health officials test person's remains for Ebola
Reuters  3 hours ago



A transmission electron micrograph shows Ebola virus particles in this undated handout image released by the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) in Fredrick, Maryland. REUTERS/USAMRIID/Handout



(Reuters) - New York City health officials said they will test the remains of a person who died of an apparent heart attack on Tuesday for Ebola as the person had recently come to the United States from West Africa.

The person, who was not identified, had been in one of the countries hardest hit by the outbreak just 18 days earlier, the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene said in a statement.

"Before death, this individual showed no symptoms of Ebola. However due to travel history within the 21-day incubation period and an abundance of caution, an Ebola test will be performed on this individual's remains," the department said.

The department said results were expected on Wednesday morning.

The New York Times reported that the individual was a woman and that she was pronounced dead at a Brooklyn hair salon at around 2:30 p.m. local time.

Last Tuesday, Dr. Craig Spencer, who worked with Ebola patients in Guinea, was discharged from a New York City hospital after recovering from Ebola following his Oct. 23 diagnosis.

Medical experts say Ebola can be transmitted only through the bodily fluids of a sick person with symptoms.

The World Health Organization on Friday said the Ebola outbreak, which is the deadliest on record, has resulted in 5,177 deaths out of 14,413 cases, mostly in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

(Reporting by Curtis Skinner in San Francisco; Editing by Susan Fenton)


http://news.yahoo.com/york-health-officials-test-persons-remains-ebola-104035603.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Study will test survivors' blood to treat Ebola
Associated Press
By MARILYNN MARCHIONE  11 hours ago


A coalition of companies and aid groups announced plans Tuesday to test experimental drugs and collect blood plasma from Ebola survivors to treat new victims of the disease in West Africa.

Plasma from survivors contains antibodies, substances the immune system makes to fight the virus. Several Ebola patients have received survivor plasma and recovered, but doctors say there is no way to know whether it really helps without a study like the one they are about to start within a month.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is giving $5.7 million to scale up production of the treatments for the project in Guinea and other Ebola-affected countries in Africa. More than a dozen companies, universities and others are contributing supplies, staff and cash, and are working with the countries and the World Health Organization on specific procedures and locations.

Besides helping Ebola patients now, plasma "could be a tool for a future epidemic as well" from different viruses, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates said in an interview with The Associated Press.

"You might not have drugs and vaccines for some new thing" and it would be good to have capabilities in place to collect and give plasma to fill the gap until those other tools can be developed, he said.

There are no drugs or vaccines approved now for Ebola, which has killed about 5,000 people this year in West Africa, most of them in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. Doctors Without Borders last week also said it would host studies of experimental treatments and plasma at three of its West Africa treatment centers.

The drugs to be tested by both groups include brincidofovir, an antiviral medicine that has been tried in a few Ebola cases so far. Its maker, North Carolina-based Chimerix Inc., developed it to treat other types of viruses and lab tests suggest it might fight Ebola.

"We said to them, 'well, if money was no constraint, how much could you make?' and they gave us a number," Gates said. "So we said, 'OK, we'll take the risk that maybe nobody will ever buy this from you. So we'll help you scale up the manufacturing.'"

Making plasma available is a complex task. Plasma is the clear part of blood, and the part that contains antibodies. In Africa, donors' blood will be filtered through a machine to remove small amounts of plasma and return the rest of the blood to the donor — a process that allows someone to donate as often as every two weeks.

One of the first patients successfully treated for Ebola in the U.S. — aid worker Dr. Kent Brantly — received plasma from a 14-year-old boy he treated in Africa, where he was infected. Brantly has donated plasma several times to Ebola patients in the U.S.

A plasma recipient must have a compatible blood type as the donor. Survivors who give plasma also must be tested to make sure they are cured of Ebola and don't have other diseases such as hepatitis, syphilis or HIV. The Africa study will take an added step — use of an experimental system by Cerus Corp. for inactivating viruses in blood.

Dr. Ada Igonoh, a doctor in Nigeria who got Ebola from a patient and recovered, expects to donate plasma and recruit others for the study.

"Survivors will be willing if they understand the goal," she said.

She and Brantly met with Gates to discuss the project earlier this month at an American Society of Tropical Medicine & Hygiene conference in New Orleans.

Dr. Luciana Borio, who is leading the Food and Drug Administration's Ebola response, spoke at the conference about plasma. Even though it seemed to help in some cases, "The bottom line is that we don't really know if it helps and to what degree it might help," she said.

"We would love to not be in the same situation in the future," and a study is the only way to know for sure, she said.

Clinical Research Management Inc., a Northeast Ohio company that contracts with sponsors to run clinical trials, will lead the plasma study in Africa. Plasma will be collected through three bloodmobiles donated by another Microsoft co-founder, Paul G. Allen, and the Greenbaum Foundation. The bloodmobiles have been flown to Africa.

The U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) will provide Ebola testing for the study. Several universities will help, as will the Blood Centers of America and the Safe Blood for Africa Foundation. About a dozen companies donated equipment and supplies.

__

Online:

WHO on plasma: http://tinyurl.com/lec7z4e

___


http://news.yahoo.com/study-test-survivors-blood-treat-ebola-030251681--finance.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Cuban doctor in Sierra Leone tests positive for Ebola
Reuters
By Daniel Trotta  8 hours ago



HAVANA (Reuters) - A Cuban doctor treating Ebola patients in Sierra Leone has tested positive for the disease and was being sent to Geneva for treatment, officials said, the first Cuban known to have contracted the potentially deadly hemorrhagic fever.

The doctor, identified by Cuba's official website Cubadebate on Tuesday as Felix Baez, is one of 165 Cuban doctors and nurses treating Ebola patients in Sierra Leone. They have been there since early October.

They are part of a Cuban team of 256 medical professionals sent to West Africa to treat patients in the worst Ebola outbreak on record that has killed more than 5,000 people.

Baez, a specialist in internal medicine, had a fever on Sunday and tested positive on Monday after being taken to the capital Freetown, Cubadebate reported, citing a Health Ministry statement. He has not shown complications and is "hemodynamically stable," the statement said.

"Our collaborator is being tended to by a team of British professionals with experience in treating patients who have displayed the disease and they have maintained constant communication with our brigade," the statement said.

At the urging of the World Health Organization (WHO) it was decided to send him to a university hospital in Geneva, where he would be treated by experts in infectious diseases, the ministry statement said. His whereabouts in Sierra Leone early on Wednesday were unclear.

The Cuban commitment to treating Ebola patients in West Africa has won international praise as more substantial than contributions from many wealthy countries. Among those recognizing Cuba has been the United States, its political adversary for the past 55 years.

Some Cuban 165 doctors and nurses have gone to Sierra Leone for a six-month mission, with another 53 in Liberia and 38 in Guinea.

Another 205 have undergone three weeks of training, with extensive practice in using protective full-body suits, and are ready to receive an Ebola assignment.

The Communist-run island has practiced medical diplomacy since Fidel Castro came to power in a 1959 revolution.

While Cuba provides disaster relief around the world free of charge, it also exchanges doctors for cash or goods on more routine missions. The island receives an estimated 100,000 barrels of oil per day from Venezuela, where some 30,000 Cuban medical professionals are posted.

In all, there are more than 50,000 health workers in 67 countries.

The latest WHO tally on Nov. 14 reported 5,177 Ebola deaths out of 14,133 cases, mostly in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

(Reporting by Daniel Trotta; Editing by Paul Tait)


http://news.yahoo.com/cuban-doctor-sierra-leone-tests-positive-ebola-041607646.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Ebola Update: Vaccines in Tests, Spike in Mali, Dips in Liberia
LiveScience.com
By Laura Geggel  3 hours ago



A student in Sierra Leone at an infection control workshop led by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.



No cases of Ebola remain in the United States at the moment, but researchers are busy working on vaccines as the virus continues to spread in West Africa. In a few areas in Liberia, cases may be on the decline, new reports find.

Researchers working on a vaccine against the Zaire strain of Ebola virus, which is causing the current outbreak, say that nearly 200 people have now received an experimental vaccine that was developed by the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) and GlaxoSmithKline. The trial is a Phase I trial, meaning its goal is to test the vaccine's safety (as opposed to looking at how effectively it may work).

The trial's participants include people in the United States, Mali, Switzerland and England, the researchers said in a statement on Monday (Nov. 17). So far, data is showing promising results, indicating that the vaccine will likely move into a Phase II trial, they said, which would continue to evaluate the vaccine's safety as well as look at its effectiveness.

The vaccine contains a cold virus that infects chimpanzees, along with a single gene from the Ebola virus, which the researchers hope will prompt the body to develop an immune response to Ebola. It does not contain infectious material, and people cannot catch Ebola from the vaccine, experts said.

The researchers want to look at how the immune response of the Malian health care workers in the trial compares with that of people in England and Switzerland, by the end of this year.

"If this vaccine is proven to work, it could help alter the dynamic of this epidemic by interrupting transmission to the health care workers who are most at risk," Dr. Myron Levine, director of the Center for Vaccine Development at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, said in the statement.

Another Ebola vaccine, developed by NewLink Genetics, is also being tested in a human clinical trial. Doctors are monitoring the immune systems of about 40 people to see how they react to an Ebola protein in the vaccine, the company said in a statement.

Other treatments, including plasma from people who have recovered from Ebola, and the experimental drug ZMapp, are slated for testing by the end of 2014, the World Health Organization (WHO) said in a recent report.

"We don't know if the vaccines are going to work, and how well, and what the side effects will be, but we will get some information as we get into the New Year," said Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious-disease specialist at Vanderbilt Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee, who is not involved with the trials.


Liberian cases drop

As for the outbreak itself, the virus continues to spread in Sierra Leone and Guinea, which had 1,166 and 1,187 deaths from Ebola as of Nov. 14, respectively, according to the CDC.

However, cases may be dropping in some areas in Liberia. Reports released last week by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) suggested the number of new Ebola cases is now declining in two of Liberia's 15 counties.

For example, in Lofa County, where Liberia's outbreak began, Ebola cases decreased from a peak of 153 new cases a week in August, to four new cases during the week that ended Nov. 1, a CDC report found.

Since September, Liberia's Montserrado County, home to about 1.5 million people, has seen a 73 percent decline in admissions to Ebola treatment units, a 58 percent decline in blood samples testing positive for Ebola and a 53 percent decline in the number of bodies collected, the CDC found.

An increase in Ebola treatment units, safe burials and public education may have helped stem the virus' spread in these counties, researchers said.

People in these areas are still coming down with the disease, and the virus is also spreading to rural areas in Liberia, which are hard for medical personnel to reach. In the past few weeks, doctors have reported one new cluster of cases per day in these regions, the CDC said.

Still, the declines in the two Liberian counties suggest that medical and humanitarian help are slowing the epidemic, officials said.

"The recent decrease in cases suggested by these reports shows how important it is to continue to intensify our Ebola response," CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden said in a statement. "We have to keep our guard up. In Guinea, cases have increased and decreased in waves; we can’t stop until we stop the last chain of transmission."


Mali spike

In Mali, 28 health care workers are now under observation after they had contact with a patient who died of Ebola at their hospital. 

This is Mali's second wave of Ebola. On Oct. 24, a 2-year-old girl who had come to Mali from Guinea died of the disease. In a separate case at about the same time, an ill 70-year-old man traveled from Guinea to Mali's capital Bamako to receive treatment, the WHO reported.

The man had acute kidney failure, a complication common in late-stage Ebola virus, but the clinic did not test him for the disease. He died on Oct. 27, according to the WHO.

A nurse who had cared for the man died of Ebola virus on Nov. 11, and several of his family members have also tested positive for Ebola, and some have died.

"The Malians previously, with CDC guidance, jumped on the previous introductions and prevented spread," Schaffner said. "They'll have to do this again this time, and if they do it right, they ought to be able to limit spread. It's all very important because the last thing the people in Mali want is for Ebola to be established in their country."


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-vaccines-tests-spike-mali-dips-liberia-152106342.html

[Buster's Uncle]

To Stop Ebola, Trust in Health Care Workers Is Crucial
LiveScience.com
By Rachael Rettner  4 hours ago



NEW ORLEANS — To stop the current Ebola outbreak and prevent future ones from becoming so large, it's crucial for health care volunteers to build trust in the communities where the disease can spread, well before a crisis starts, experts say.

Without such trust, it is hard to get people within those communities to accept and follow public health advice, which can allow an outbreak to spiral out of control, according to a recent study.

"It's not a simple, easy thing to tell a mother that she can't touch her sick child if [the child] has a fever," said Timothy Roberton, of the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, who conducted the research and presented it here on Monday (Nov. 17) at the American Public Health Association Meeting. "We've got to remember that what we're asking people to do has profound implications."

"The more we can appreciate the reasons for their actions, the more successful we're going to be at bringing this outbreak to an end," Roberton said.

In the study, researchers interviewed Red Cross volunteers in Guinea during a two-week period in July. They found that part of the reason why the Ebola outbreak escalated so dramatically is because people in the some parts of the country were reluctant to adhere to advice from health care workers regarding how to stop the disease's spread.

For example, people in some villages did not believe that an Ebola outbreak existed, and some were hostile to volunteer health care workers, Roberton said, during his presentation. Some people believed that the Ebola outbreak was a hoax, and a way for the government to raise money. There were also rumors that the Red Cross volunteers had made up the disease to steal body parts.

The recommendations to prevent Ebola also interfered with the local customs of preparing the body for burial, so some villagers would not allow Red Cross volunteers to safely bury the bodies of the dead, Roberton said.

To overcome resistance from villagers, Red Cross volunteers contacted community leaders, such as regional and political leaders, to get everyone on the same page as to what needed to be done to stop the spread of Ebola, Roberton said.

In addition, when someone died from Ebola, the Red Cross volunteers began allowing family members to put on protective equipment and watch the burial, and pray over the body from a distance, Roberton said.

It's important for volunteers to work to build trust, even when there isn't an ongoing crisis such as an Ebola outbreak, Roberton said. "If we want to convince families [to follow public health messages] we need to build trust, and that takes time."


http://news.yahoo.com/stop-ebola-trust-health-care-workers-crucial-151007821.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Liberia has upper hand over Ebola but support must continue: president
Reuters
By Emma Farge  2 hours ago



Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf speaks during an interview with Reuters in Brussels November 25, 2013. REUTERS/Francois Lenoir



DAKAR (Reuters) - Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said on Wednesday that her government has the upper hand in the fight against Ebola, but warned against complacency or any reduction in international support.

Liberia's death toll from the worst Ebola outbreak on record is higher than any other country at more than 2,800. But the World Health Organization said last week the number of new cases there is slowing. The United States has also trimmed its military force being sent there.

Adding to signs of improvement, Liberia said it is not extending its state of emergency imposed to fight the disease and set a national target of no new Ebola cases by Christmas.

"The sustaining of anti-Ebola measures over the last two months has meant that in Liberia we now have the upper hand," Sirleaf said in a statement.

"But our government remains concerned that progress in this battle will lead to complacency on the part of the international community," she added. "We must not interpret gains as an outright victory - nothing could be more dangerous."

More than 5,000 people have died from the hemorrhagic fever in the three hardest hit countries, Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, since it was first reported in Guinea in March.

Despite positive news out of Liberia, U.N. officials say the virus is still spreading rapidly in Sierra Leone, where 421 infections were reported in the week to Nov. 9. Mali is also facing a new wave of cases imported from Guinea.

Sirleaf said her government planned a series of discussions with foreign governments and aid agencies "to refocus their efforts on intensifying the anti-Ebola campaign with us" and referred to "hotspots" of the disease in rural areas.

Communications Minister Lewis Brown said her statement followed talk of a "possible diversion of resources" from Liberia, without giving any further details.

The U.S. military has led the international Ebola response in Liberia while the British military has deployed hundreds of soldiers to tackle the crisis in Sierra Leone.

The World Bank Group said on Wednesday that nearly half of Liberia's workforce had stopped work by November. It urged more relief for those suffering the indirect consequences of the virus, such as high food prices.

(Editing by David Lewis and Angus MacSwan)


http://news.yahoo.com/liberia-upper-hand-over-ebola-support-must-continue-150750837--business.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Cuba says doctor catches Ebola in Sierra Leone
Associated Press
By MICHAEL WEISSENSTEIN  16 hours ago



In this Sept. 24, 201, file photo, nurse Dalila Martinez, trainer of the Cuban medical team to travel to Sierra Leone, washes her gloved hands during a practice drill at a training camp, in Havana, Cuba. Cuba's health ministry is sending more than 160 health workers to help stop the raging Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone in early October. Cuba says a member of the 165-member medical team it sent to fight Ebola in Sierra Leone has been diagnosed with the disease. (AP Photo/Ladyrene Perez, Cubadebate,File)



HAVANA (AP) — A member of the 165-member medical team Cuba sent to fight Ebola in Sierra Leone has been diagnosed with the disease, according to state media.

Dr. Felix Baez Sarria is being treated by British doctors in Africa but he will be transferred to a special unit in Geneva at the recommendation of the World Health Organization, Cuban state media said, citing the island's Ministry of Public Health.

Cuba won global praise for sending at least 256 medical workers to Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea to help treat Ebola patients. State officials have emphasized the medics' high state of readiness for the mission, saying the doctors, nurses and support staff received weeks of instruction in protective measures and equipment.

Once in Africa, the Cubans got two to three weeks of additional training before heading into the field. They were to be quarantined in Africa for weeks at the end of their six-month mission before returning to Cuba.

State media said that Baez, an internal medicine specialist, came down with a fever of more than 100 degrees on Sunday and was diagnosed with Ebola the following day.

Cuban officials did not say how he caught the disease or immediately release any other information about the case, the first reported among the health workers the island sent to Africa.

Early symptoms of Ebola include fever, headache, body aches, cough, stomach pain, vomiting and diarrhea, and patients aren't contagious until those begin. The virus requires close contact with body fluids to spread so health care workers and family members caring for loved ones are most at risk.

Ebola has killed more than 5,000 people in the west African countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

Cuba is one of the largest global contributors of medical workers to the fight against Ebola, a commitment that has drawn rare praise from the U.S. and focused worldwide attention on the island's unique program of medical diplomacy, which deploys armies of doctors to win friends abroad and earn billions a year in desperately needed foreign exchange.

Cuba has more than 50,000 medical workers in more than 60 countries, many in nations like Brazil that pay hundreds of millions a year for their services. Others are on humanitarian missions that generate good will abroad.

Despite a recent set of pay raises, most Cuban doctors' salaries don't top $75 a month, less than many workers in tourism or other sectors that bring in money from abroad. The foreign missions almost uniformly offer the chance to earn extra pay, in many cases enough to buy a bigger home or new car.

Critics of Cuba's communist government have accused it in the past of exploiting the doctors by giving them only a small portion of the money paid for their services and keeping the rest.


http://news.yahoo.com/cuba-says-doctor-catches-ebola-sierra-leone-053138641.html

[Buster's Uncle]

CDC chief drops worst-case Ebola estimate
Associated Press
By MIKE STOBBE  2 hours ago



This Sept. 14, 2014, file photo shows a sign reading 'Kill Ebola Before Ebola Kill You', on a gate as part of the country's Ebola awareness campaign in the city of Freetown, Sierra Leone. The government's worst-case scenario forecast for the Ebola epidemic in West Africa won't happen, a U.S. health official said Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2014. (AP Photo/ Michael Duff, File)



NEW YORK (AP) — The government's worst-case scenario forecast for the Ebola epidemic in West Africa won't happen, a U.S. health official said Wednesday.

In September, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated the number of people sickened by the Ebola virus could explode to as many as 1.4 million by mid-January without more help.

Things have changed. On Wednesday, CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden said, "We don't think the projections from over the summer will come to pass."

Frieden did not provide new estimates. He was speaking in Washington at a U.S. Senate hearing on preparedness and response to public health threats.

The earlier projection was a worst-case scenario for reported and unreported illnesses in Liberia and Sierra Leone, based on conditions in late August — before an international surge in medical aid and supplies. That seems to have helped slow the epidemic in Liberia, one of the three hardest-hit countries. However, the epidemic has been fierce lately in Sierra Leone; it remains unpredictable in Guinea,

When he released the Ebola projections two months ago, Frieden said he was confident the most pessimistic numbers would not occur. Since then, "there has been very effective intervention with USAID, ourselves, the global community, and most importantly the countries and the communities most affected," he said Wednesday.

Since spring, there have been more than 14,000 Ebola cases and more than 5,100 deaths in the epidemic, according to World Health Organization figures.

Frieden said the CDC thinks that now between 1,000 and 2,000 new cases are occurring in West Africa each week. That seems to be in the neighborhood of the CDC's best-case estimates for the epidemic by mid-January.

Also on Wednesday, a Pentagon spokesman said the U.S. military is scaling back the size and number of Ebola treatment facilities it is building in Liberia from 17 to 10 centers.


http://news.yahoo.com/cdc-chief-drops-worst-case-ebola-estimate-174427173.html