Ebola: 'The Only Thing Like This Has Been AIDS', Says CDC Director
(Atlanta) -- According to fresh reports about the widening Ebola epidemic, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said is reminiscent of the health threat caused by AIDS , urging action so Ebola "is not the world's next AIDS."
"In the 30 years I've been working in public health, the only thing like this has been AIDS," CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden said at a World Bank and International Monetary Fund annual meeting in Washington, D.C., where many countries pledged funds and services to try to stem the virus ravaging West Africa. "And we have to work now so that this is not the world's next AIDS."
AIDS also started in Africa, and experts agree it spread to cause a global pandemic because the world was slow to recognize it and fight it. Many leaders denied the virus caused the disease, and others blamed the patients for catching it.
Frieden spoke a day after Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person diagnosed with Ebola in the United States, died in a Dallas hospital. Meanwhile, in West Africa, 8,033 people have been diagnosed with Ebola and 3,879 have died, the World Health Organization said Wednesday, adding that the true numbers were almost definitely higher.
AIDS has killed 36 million people since it started a pandemic in the 1980s. The human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS currently infects about 35 million people. Like Ebola, HIV is spread through bodily fluids.
The CDC unveiled new screening procedures Wednesday following the death of the first Ebola patient diagnosed in the United States. Thomas Duncan carried tDuncan carried the deadly virus with him from his home in Liberia, though he showed no signs when he left for the United States. He arrived in Dallas Sept. 20 and fell sick a few days later.he deadly virus with him from his home in Liberia, though he showed no signs when he left for the United States. He arrived in Dallas Sept. 20 and fell sick a few days later.
The Department of Homeland Security unveiled enhanced procedures to screen travelers for Ebola. The screenings will happen at JFK, Dulles, Newark, Chicago-O'Hare and Atlanta-Hartfield airports, which the CDC said are the airports about 95 percent of travelers from West Africa come through. The new questionnaire and a temperature check.
Others in Dallas still are under scrutiny as health officials try to contain the virus that has ravaged West Africa, with more than 3,400 people reported dead. They also trying to tamp down anxiety among residents frightened of contracting Ebola, though the disease is spread only through direct contact with the bodily fluids of an already sick person.
Health officials have identified 10 people, including seven health workers, who had direct contact with Duncan while he was contagious. Another 38 people also may have come into contact with him.
Everyone who potentially had contact with Thomas Duncan who died from Ebola infection will be monitored for 21 days, the normal incubation period for the disease."We know he didn't have direct contact with the patient (Duncan) and he doesn't have a fever, and in a situation like that there is no risk of Ebola," said Chris Van Deusen, spokesman for the Texas Department of State Health Services in a KKTV.com .
