24 October 2014 by Published in: Uncategorized 23 comments

Five days ago, on October 18th, I posted a controversial blog that expressed my alarm at the way the U.S. was approaching Ebola. This was right after the contagion in Dallas was really hitting its stride. I resisted as long as I was able, because I try to avoid discussing religious or politically charged topics – they never go anywhere good.

I got a lot of comments on Facebook along the lines that a travel ban for travelers from West Africa could never work, well, you know, because the President, who lied about the likelihood of Ebola hitting American shores, said it would never work. Because, well, it just wouldn’t, you know?

Tonight, a physician who was treating Ebola patients in West Africa and who returned to the U.S. about the mid-point of the average incubation period was diagnosed with the disease in New York, after presenting with a 103 fever this morning. Two days ago he began feeling sluggish and unwell, but not so much that he didn’t go to restaurants, use the subways, go bowling (bowling?!?), take taxis, etc.

Now, let me be the first to commend him for his altruism in going to unfortunate places and devoting his time, and yes, risking his life, to treat others suffering from a modern plague with a 70% mortality rate in those countries.

Let me also be the first to condemn his idiotic behavior in putting his fellow citizens at risk by traveling around more than I do on a three day binge, after returning to New York from Africa, knowing with his medical training that he was well within the incubation period of the disease, and could not only have it, but spread it. To call it irresponsible is to be charitable.

If I wrote this in a novel I’d get terrible reviews, because nobody would believe that a doctor could willfully expose people as this one did. Three people have been immediately quarantined. How many more come down with Ebola from this exposure is anyone’s guess at this moment.

But it highlights one glaring fact. Actually, two. First is that if this is what a well-trained healthcare professional would do after returning from a plague area where an incurable disease is spreading like wildfire, what can we honestly expect from laymen? And yet the US’ approach has been to allow West African travelers to enter its borders, and relied on “screening” and “self-monitoring.” How’s that going so far? That looks like 0 for 2 to me. And now the most important city in the US (the financial system is situated there) is an Ebola hot zone. But we “shouldn’t worry” per the authorities. You know, because Science! And we’re ready for this! And if we stop consuming the terrorists, er, the virus, wins!

Um, really? We won’t know how much more spread we have from Dallas for another couple of weeks, in spite of the hyperbole from the media. And we’re just getting started on this one. Tomorrow there’s nothing preventing another one of these horror stories. And another, and another, and another. Because the administration thinks it’s a good idea to bring potential carriers of this nightmare plague into the nation’s borders. You know, because otherwise the sky will fall, or people will think we’re racist hatemongers.

The doctor in New York is a white male. I’m not being racist. Death knows no color or creed, and the risk to fellow humans is the same regardless of skin color, eye shape, hair texture, etc. I’m also not a trained medical professional. But I do know that if people are traveling from the place where everyone’s dying of the incurable disease? Might be a bad idea to say, “come on in, make sure you behave responsibly, you little dickens, and if you don’t, well, you’re still not going to be blamed for the deaths you cause and the countless millions that are spent trying to clean up after you and stop the spread before the US becomes the first world version of Mad Max.” Because to me it’s a bad idea. How about, “You can’t come in until you prove you’re not Typhoid Mary?” Is that too much of a stretch?

What will the financial cost of this be? How likely are people to be to want to get on a plane when the person who sat in the seat before them could have been another altruistic physician returning from Liberia, or flying to visit someone after feeling sluggish and tired? How many of these outbreaks do we have to see before we figure it out? Let’s take Dallas as an example. The hospital there will probably go BK. Patients are canceling their surgeries, avoiding the place. This is one of the most revered hospitals in Dallas, and it’s going to likely be a casualty of Mr. Thompson’s decision to lie on his questionnaire after being exposed to Ebola and fly to Texas. And there’s the cost of tracking hundreds, or thousands, of the exposed. The cost to people when their health insurance goes through the roof as insurers back away. The cost of treating the afflicted. The cost to the airlines, Dallas hotels, restaurants, etc. It’s a big number, and that’s from only one patient slipping in. Multiply that by however many more you think likely as travelers pour in from the hot zones. It’s not pretty.

And how about the guy who touched the good doctor’s fork and knife and napkin at the restaurant? Because he or she undoubtedly is cringing right now. How about the cab driver? You know who has the highest mortality rate in Africa, after those caring for Ebola victims? Cab drivers. Because they invariably get stuck driving the victim to the hospital. I could go on and on, but then this blog would be a novella, not a blog.

For everyone who is going to say, “but he self-monitored, so that works,” I’d say, really? The professionals who are treating this are dying like flies, so they aren’t that sure their protocols are all that great (I still don’t see how a BSL-4 pathogen, which requires a closed breathing system and pretty much a full on hazmat suit, can be safely handled with some tape on gloves, some goggles, and hope – but then again, I’m not one of the 400+ who have given their lives to discover that may not be a great idea). And nobody’s sure exactly at what point in the incubation the patient becomes aggressively contagious – the viral load in his sweat, saliva, other bodily fluids builds to critical mass and he goes full blown, but at what point is he close enough to full blown to infect? One hour before he takes his temperature and goes, holy shit? Three? Six? Twelve? Twenty? Nobody’s sure. Everyone’s making educated, and in some cases, fatally incorrect, guesses.

Politicians and administration mouthpieces who aren’t doctors are saying he posed almost no risk to those he was around on the subway, but they have no idea. Just as nobody really knows whether the new CDC protocols are adequate to keep it from spreading to healthcare workers. I mean, again, politicians and people with no medical training are saying they are, but they aren’t donning their little CDC protocol suits and going in to wipe an Ebola patient’s ass, so to them it’s another, “mistakes were made” oops if they’re wrong, or another “mysterious breach of protocols” when the nurses start dropping. Anyone see the moral hazard here? It’s pretty much the same as letting Congressmen have different insurance and financial plans than those they mandate for the population. Huge moral hazard because they aren’t at personal risk. In business, you’d say they have no skin in the game. And that’s always a bad thing.

In Africa, the average Ebola carrier infects two more. And those two infect two more. And so on. The WHO estimates have the total infection at 1.5 million or so by the end of January, the number doubling every 12 days. How is that not scary as shit for a virus that is deadlier than bubonic plague (bubonic plague is 60%, Ebola 70%, although in these early cases it’s lower in the U.S. – but it’s still extremely early in the curve to be able to know what it actually will turn out to be here, because not everyone’s going to have the same immune response, the same level of care, the same overall health when it started, and, yes, the same luck)?

Now, I know this is going to be unpopular, but I’ve even seen some articles trumpeting that the Dallas carrier’s family has been cleared, with no contagion. But you know my bet? He knew he’d been exposed, lied about it, and then when he started to present with it, told his family to avoid all contact with him, because he’d seen what it does. That’s about the only explanation I can come up with that makes sense. They avoided him, so they’re alive. Good for them. But that doesn’t mean it’s not all that contagious, because about 5K dead in Africa would beg to differ, as would every doctor on the planet, as would 400+ medical workers. Of course it’s contagious enough you should worry. It’s worse than the frigging plague.

And yet we’re being told not to give in to “hysteria.” Not to panic. Okay. I’m not panicked at all. I’m 1000 miles from the U.S. Couldn’t be calmer. Here’s a truth: It’s not panic or hysteria when you do a risk calculation that says things are doomed to get far worse at this rate. It’s being realistic. Sure, there have “only” been four cases of Ebola here so far, so it’s statistically irrelevant. But it’s also only the first few minutes of the first inning. And we’re dealing with a BSL-4 pathogen for which there’s no cure. If you don’t find that worrisome, you aren’t paying attention.

I get kind of testy when I see the mainstream media trying to spin Ebola as worse than a cold, but certainly not something Americans shouldn’t expect to walk away from, based on the stats so far from a tiny sampling. There’s simply no basis for that conviction. If there are 1000 cases here, and the death toll is “only” 200, well, then we can extrapolate and say it’s “only” a 20% mortality rate in a first world country. But with eight and God knows how many more to come (the US is processing 150 expedited visas a day from West Africa, so you can expect more – a lot more), we’ll all get to find out.

The other part of this I’m offended by is that the U.S. is putting the entire continent at risk, because if and when this spreads into clusters of outbreaks, if and when it spreads to Mexico and points south, they don’t have hundreds of millions to throw at cleaning up for the administration’s decision to keep the U.S. as destination number one for Ebola-exposed carriers. So you can expect the mortality rates in those countries to be more in line with good ol 70%. And for the spread to be much more severe.

I know the flu kills 250K to 500K a year. But how many billions are exposed to it a year and contract it? Or put simply, how many Americans have to die before the U.S. figures out it might not be a good decision to refuse a travel ban? My fear is that it will soon be a moot point, because it can all turn sideways on us pretty quickly.

I’ll make some predictions. If this doesn’t get handled competently over the next few weeks the market will be a smoking crater, there will be new horror stories on a daily basis, and the U.S. will be a pariah to all its neighbors. The dollar will suffer and the government will have a difficult time borrowing to fund the debt-based lifestyle it enjoys but can’t afford, industries like tourism, airlines, restaurants, health care will go into the toilet, and the financial impact of this decision to keep the borders open will be one of the most costly in American history.

For once I’m so upset I don’t even care if you buy my crap or not. I mean, I’d hope you would to show solidarity, but if you don’t I’ll understand.

And please, save the “Ebola has only hit a few people, it’s not a big deal” comments. Just because you can’t do exponential math or predict accurately past the end of your nose, kindly don’t parade that defect with pride. I can count. I know at the start of all epidemics in history it’s been only a few cases. I get it. But let’s all agree you know about as much about how many cases there will be in the U.S. within sixty days as you know what the price of Amazon will be in sixty days, which is to say, not at all, so any argument from that position is simply your unfounded opinion. It’s okay to have those, as I’ve just expressed mine, but if you think I’m in error, go write your own blog about why I’m way off base. I can write it for you. “Don’t panic. The Titanic’s engineers assure us that it’s unsinkable. The engineers of the mortgage backed securities markets assure us that the real estate market can never crash so badly as to take the whole world right to the brink. And right now a whole bunch of non-scientist, non-doctor politicians and their mouthpieces are saying you don’t have to worry about Ebola.”

See, the problem is that’s like saying, “the odds of dying of Ebola in the U.S. are less than you being attacked by a tiger, walking out your front door!” Which I get. I also get that if  you have hundreds, or thousands, of people flying into the country with tigers every week, that glib assurance goes out the window pretty fast.

To me that always sounds like, “Don’t worry, I’ve driven for years without a safety belt – you don’t need em!”

Until you do, Sweetie, until you do.

But by then it’s always too late.

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Comments

  1. Teri Babcock
    Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 2:42 am

    Funny that I had to find out about a new Ebola case on a writing blog – with the shootings in Ottawa this week, Ebola got bumped in Canadian News.

    I found a nice article that explained how its okay, really, that the doctor took the subway, and bowled, and ate in a restaurant, because Ebola isn’t really that contagious and the taxi driver isn’t at risk, though his friends have quarantined themselves. Which would have been a smart thing for the good doctor to do in the first place.

    I can’t wait for the Doctor’s Without Borders to do their next fundraising kick. In fact, I might not wait to give them a piece of my mind. These medical staff are at the highest risk, and it would be pretty bad optics for Doctor’s Without Borders if once of their medical staff brought Ebola over and, instead of being caught in time, it wasn’t contained.

    Doctors Without Borders could put policy in place to require staff to quarantine themselves for the full incubation period before they get on a plane. If they thought thought hundreds of thousands of people were going to stop donating because they are putting those people at risk, I bet they’d change their policy.

    Reply
  2. Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 3:24 am

    Let’s not forget the confirmed case of ebola in Mali. is on a trade route to CAR (lovely coup and civil war they’re having this time of the year) and Nigeria.

    Not southern Nigeria where there’s some infrastructure and enough wherewithal to tamp out the last outbreak, Boko Haram Nigeria. Think any health workers will get into that area? An ebola outbreak will go unreported or undetected in northern Nigeria until it is way too late.

    I can’t fathom why the NY doctor didn’t send up a red star cluster two days ago when he started feeling “sluggish”. Instead, he went bowling and took an Uber around town. I wonder how many people touched that same door handle.

    Forgive the panic mongering. Worst case scenarios are what I did for a living.

    Reply
    • Mel  –  Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 6:43 am

      Nah Richard, let’s be honest, when it’s about life or death, it’s not panic mongering. You make a mistake, you die or cause other people to die — that deserves a hefty weight put on it, in my opinion.

      That doctor is a damn idiot.

      Reply
  3. andy holloman
    Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 8:39 am

    russell – very well stated….I had not thought about it from your perspective but it makes tremendous sense to slam down really really hard on this thing…you swayed me….hi5

    Reply
  4. Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 9:58 am

    This is getting ridiculous. There are so many logic gaps in the way this is being handled, that my head has started to spin. Here’s my favorite: They’ve quarantined three people Dr. Spencer had been in close contact with since he reported symptoms, but no thought was originally given to quarantine for Dr. Spencer…after he returned from treating Ebola patients for a month. Among many other things that Russell pointed out, this utter failure to take matters seriously will kill people. But don’t worry. Ebola will only infect two people on average per infected patient…just hope your not #1 or #2.

    Reply
    • Russell Blake  –  Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 11:46 am

      Yes, when a two year old dies of exposure, or a pregnant woman, perhaps that will get everyone’s attention. I don’t know. It seems as though the American leadership is almost hell bent on getting Ebola into the country, or just couldn’t give a rat’s ass how much of it comes into its borders. Either case is frightening. Economically it has the capacity to destroy whole industries, and that’s assuming it doesn’t spread. If it does, it’s a whole nother level of ugly.

      Meanwhile, it’s business as usual in Washington. Which should come as no surprise. Obama was reelected on the platform that he’d get US troops out of frivolous wars in the Middle East, and yet he’s not not only doubling down in Iraq and Afghanistan, but has ground troops going to Africa (presumably to shoot at the virus), is doing strikes in Syria, is saber rattling in the Ukraine, has destabilized Libya to the point it’s a disaster area, and is now bringing Ebola to American shores by refusing a travel ban that would virtually eliminate the virus’ travel here.

      Basically, if the system says up, you can bet it’s going down. If it says nothing to worry about, pucker up. If it says you should be scared of something (like ISIS) you can almost bet there’s not much reason to be. It’s a reliable contra-indicator. Like my friend who always picks stocks that then drop like a rock. You could get rich just shorting the ones he thinks are a good deal.

      Head desk. Thump thump thump.

      Reply
  5. Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 10:24 am

    Russell, I agree with you 100%. Well stated.

    When will our government wake up and take this seriously? Perhaps after the election…after everyone quits flying…after everyone stops taking taxis..after everyone stops eating out…after everyone locks themselves up in their homes, afraid to go out…after mass panic…

    Yet, we could so easily avoid all this…by not being stupid.

    Reply
  6. Walter
    Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 10:57 am

    Well said! You have backbone and that’s what is missing in D. C. We have gutless politicians! Frankly I am concerned with the situation in my country. We have no intelligent leadership and the president is either dumb as a stick or he hates my country. I doubt he is dumb. Any president that would on purpose put my country at risk needs to stand and be judged by Judge Roy Bean!

    Reply
  7. Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 11:47 am

    How could a doctor who has just come back from treating ebola patients not quarantine himself and be on the safe side before going outdoors? If anyone should know better, it’s him.
    How come we’re still letting these people come to the US?
    I just heard on the news the other night that two passengers from Liberia were on a flight that landed at Chicago O’hare and one vomited on the plane and the other complained of diarrhea. But since they didn’t have a fever it was deemed unnecessary to test them for ebola. That’s just crazy. It’s like they want the disease to spread or something.
    The conspiracy shows claim the spread of ebola is planned to tank the economy so they can bring in the New World Order. And one of the goals of this supposed New World Order is to seriously thin the population so it’s easier to control. Seeing a photo online of all those rows of coffins they’ve been stockpiling in advance doesn’t make me feel very warm and fuzzy.
    I feel like I’m living in one of your books. It’s scary!

    Reply
    • Russell Blake  –  Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 12:31 pm

      One conspiracy motive would be to create enough concern in the U.S. population so it’s literally begging for a cure or vaccine at any price – for a virus it largely didn’t even know existed a month ago. It’s not a joke when I say that the CDC holds the patent on Ebola – they patented a strain that’s different than Zaire, but if Zaire is 70% or greater similarity, it would also cover Zaire. So the CDC would directly financially benefit from a deci-billion dollar vaccine drive to save the world. Google CDC Ebola patent if you don’t believe me. I’m not saying that’s what’s going on. Rather, I’m saying when people ask me where I come up with book ideas, I say I actually have to turn off the news not to have at least one per day. And the first rule of any conspiracy is to establish a credible motive – namely to follow the money. Who benefits? That’s usually a pretty good place to start.

      Very strange times we live in.

      Reply
  8. Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 12:02 pm

    As an Australian( living in the US ) I checked to see what Australia had/was doing & I noted that my country has been ‘slammed’ by ‘Doctor’s Without Border’ because we didn’t/haven’t provided medical staff to the affected countries. Australia did donate 7 million dollars but they refused it ????
    I hope Australia keeps its strong position & refuses to send medical staff to the hotspots but I haven’t seen any info on plane flights from Africa lets hope they do more than self screening .

    CM

    Reply
  9. cinisajoy
    Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 12:48 pm

    Hi! I just finished reading your two blogs on Ebola. I decided just for fun to look at all the markets. Can we say roller coaster? It’s up, it’s down and going round and round. I hope you are wrong but the last time the markets did this (with the exception of cotton), the bottom pretty much fell out.
    In all honesty, the Ebola outbreak scares me. Note that I am about 300 miles west of Dallas. I am in the area of the oil boom. This means we are getting an influx of new people every day from all over the country. At the last census we were at almost 100,000 people (just before the boom). As of right now just our town has grown to approximately 150,000 with no signs of slowing down. We won’t get into logistics on that type of growth.
    So yes there is a good chance all pathogens will arrive here.

    Reply
    • Russell Blake  –  Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 1:38 pm

      Well, it’s a little early to be that worried, but if I’m correct and we continue to see outbreaks as more travelers present with the virus, it’s only a matter of time until one of the outbreaks gets away from them. One only has to watch the new video of the New York cops disposing of their gloves in a public trash can to appreciate how unprepared the average person is for this. With that sort of idiocy it’s not a matter of whether it will spread, it’s a matter of when, and how far. As to the markets, the U.S. government manipulates them with its Plunge Protection Team, which basically buys shares when it starts to tunnel, masking the signals its sending. When a market is mostly sellers who want out of a sector like airlines, the government can go in and prop them up to preserve the illusion that all’s well. But that only works for so long and goes so far. If we see further spread in NY or Dallas? Look out below. And there will be more cases elsewhere. It’s an inevitable consequence of the administration’s refusal to enact a travel ban.

      Reply
      • cinisajoy  –  Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 3:57 pm

        Here is the thing. It would be so easy to stop this. NO INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL in or out of the country. Now I have a scenario for a book.
        Did the patient handle any money? How many others have touched the same money?
        Ok I just scared myself even worse thinking how many different viruses could be on a one dollar bill.

        Also if one is sick, why would they want to be out and about anyway. Perhaps the “good” doctor wants to infect others to get more awareness.
        I just hate wait and sees from anyone.

        Reply
        • Russell Blake  –  Sat 25th Oct 2014 at 11:23 am

          I wouldn’t worry about money, Cin. It’s not a likely scenario.

          Reply
  10. Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 3:48 pm

    Part of the issue is that everyone is treating ebola as just a “trending social media” topic. It’s not scary… it’s just something that’s trending on Facebook and Twitter. It doesn’t affect ME though. You know when I knew that this wasn’t being taken very seriously? Every time a new ebola related story hits, Plague Inc. (the game where you kill the world through a mutating virus or pathogen) breaks into the top 10 in Apple’s App Store.

    Reply
  11. cinisajoy
    Fri 24th Oct 2014 at 3:57 pm

    Not to mention I have a ton of relatives in the Dallas area.

    Reply
  12. lenard
    Sat 25th Oct 2014 at 1:36 am

    I’m heartsick, afraid and so disappointed in the USA because of the official stance taken on the Ebola problem. Closing our borders to flights from those stricken countries is only one step that I feel should have been implemented from the time Dr Brantley was diagnosed. Mandatory isolation for the 21 days of the assumed incubation period at the point if contact before flying anywhere would seem to be in order. Of course neither of those options will be implemented. Some doctors, nurses and other caregivers of Ebola patients are behaving as if this disease is no worse than a case of chickenpox or mumps once they have returned to the US. They should face some sort of sanction or reprimand.

    Reply
  13. Sat 25th Oct 2014 at 8:51 am

    News Headline Today:
    “Nina Pham walked out of the hospital and into the White House…A short time later, she was in the Oval Office with President Barack Obama, who hugged her.”

    Heroic or fool-hardy? Of course, another “break in protocol” could be the answer to many Americans’ hopes…

    Reply
  14. Sat 25th Oct 2014 at 9:12 pm

    Russel, allow me to rob you of some sleep.

    Flu season is coming. How do you know you have the flu? Fever, sweating, chills, nausea, aching, etc. What are the symptoms of ebola? Fever, sweating, chills, nausea, aching, etc. Nearly everyone who contracted ebola at that time of year would think it was the flu until they started bleeding from their eyes. They’d go to the doctor, the doctor would take their temperature and look in their ears and throat and say go home, drink plenty of fluids. Once people are sure they have ebola (blood leaking from places that don’t usually leak blood) they’ll have long been infectious.

    Customs is useless at preventing the spread of disease. I’ve been through it many, many times, and you basically have to self-declare if you have fruits or meats or whatever else they’re “screening” for. Same goes with symptoms. You fill out a little card where you check the boxes next to the symptoms you have. No one takes your temperature. The excellent public servants of surpassing caliber who man the customs desk barely even glance at you. Then you’re through. Anyone who thought they had ebola would want to get to the US to get treatment, and all they’d have to do is lie.

    Talking about the financial fallout of a disease outbreak, one of the first things that would happen would be the collapse of insurance companies. Either that or they’d claim their policies don’t cover epidemics. Regardless, that would leave patients responsible but unable to pay. Hospitals are left with huge unpaid accounts. How good do you think healthcare will be after that happens?

    Collapse isn’t an impossibility. It’s a reasonably possible scenario at this point.

    Reply
    • Jim Self  –  Sat 25th Oct 2014 at 9:18 pm

      Addendum: insurance companies have a racket going on. After hurricane Katrina, several insurance companies went bankrupt and vanished. Big name companies. Thing is, they only vanished from Louisiana. Because of really well thought-out federal regulations, insurance companies don’t compete across state lines. State Farm of Louisiana isn’t liable for damages in Mississippi, and vice versa.

      It’s not only possible for major insurance companies to collapse in a state, it’s history.

      Reply
      • Russell Blake  –  Sun 26th Oct 2014 at 1:17 am

        Oh, you really want to lose sleep? Read this. Especially the interview with the guy who drafted the anti-biological warfare treaties. Sounds plausible. See the end of my post for links and a reprint under fair use, with attribution.

        So here are the scenarios: A) The current strain of Ebola was an illegal testing campaign wherein a “vaccine” was required to be injected twice, a fortnight apart. First “Vaccine” was weaponized Ebola. Second Vaccine was supposed to be the monoclonal antibodies that they were testing, but the weaponized strain didn’t wait the expected 18-20 days to start making folks sick, it worked faster, which nobody could have predicted. So at day 8-12, folks started getting sick, and many didn’t make it back for their second shot. And it spread.

        B) Bio-weapons development labs in West Africa, working on behalf of the U.S. and England, develop nightmare viruses for bio-weapons use, and do so there because Liberia and Sierra Leon never signed the bio-weapons anti-proliferation treaties. So it’s a handy loophole. They first develop the infectious agent (because without that, there’s no “defensive purpose”), and then work on the vaccine. Somehow it leaked. We know the labs are there, with names like the CDC and WHO behind them. So the question is, what precisely are they working on?

        C) Do we really need a C? Well, okay, here’s one: A vaccine was already created by the DOD in 2004 for Ebola. When Russia asked for information on test results for that vaccine recently because, oh, nothing, just a plague is spreading through Africa and preparing to spread across the globe, the Obama administration refused to share any of the info on it, because it would violate U.S. patent law, and national security. Think it’s odd? Go look at the CDC patent for Ebola. Google it.

        I’d say any of these is scary as shit.

        The one thing nobody’s been able to explain, and this seriously reminds me of how, in 1978, when HIV surfaced, nobody was able to explain how a virus that had never before been seen in humans spontaneously appeared in the five cities where gay men were inoculated with the experimental Hep B vaccine shortly before (and three years before the epidemic of a completely different heterosexual strain surfaced in Africa, which via a time machine is now blamed for starting the one in gay men across the globe that is a different strain), is how an Ebola virus in Africa traveled 3500 KM to create a new outbreak after disappearing in 2005. Never mind it’s a physical impossibility. I mean, our recent history is filled with Americans believing physical impossibilities as gospel from their government.

        And we mock how the German people bought into Nazi idiocy, or the Russians bought into communism? (And here’s a bonus quiz: What fringe political lunacy loosely based on the philosophy of Karl Marx was supported by the international banking cabal after the Russian Orthodox Church under the Czar Nicholas refused to create a central bank in Russia because usury was a sin? That’s right. Communism. At the top of the 20th Century the major banking families were pissy because there were two massive markets they had failed to gain a foothold in via a central bank, that were enormously prosperous and had tremendous natural resources, even as Europe, their usual playground, was winding down as the seat of global power: The U.S., and Russia. In 1913 the Federal Reserve Act was passed creating the U.S. central bank (private, for profit, owned by those families although all that denied until about a decade ago). In 1917 the Russian revolution took place – funded by…whom? Same families. Shortly thereafter the Church disappeared in Russia and they got their central bank. I can’t make history up. It’s truly stranger than fiction.)

        And now for the links. The final article is the one I’m referring to – I’ve only skimmed the others. To me it’s extremely compelling given how plausible it is and especially given the source. Read the man’s CV at the end of this interview (prof of Intl Law at U of Illinois, drafted the bio-terrorism and anti-proliferation agreements, etc.), given in Greece and translated here:

        http://sttpml.org/liberian-scientist-claims-u-s-responsible-for-ebola-outbreak-in-west-africa/

        The US Bio-warfare Laboratories in West Africa Are the ORIGIN of Ebola Epidemic

        Post Categories: Canada
        Francis A. Boyle / Aggeliki Dimopoulou | Tuesday, October 21, 2014, 5:33 Beijing

        Could Ebola Have Escaped From US Bio-warfare Labs? American law professor Francis A. Boyle, answers questions for tvxs.gr and reveals that USA have been using West Africa as an offshore to circumvent the Convention on Biological Weapons and do bio-warfare work.

        Is Ebola just a result of health crisis in Africa – because of the large gaps in personnel, equipment and medicines – as some experts suggest?

        That isn’t true at all. This is just propaganda being put out by everyone. It seems to me, that what we are dealing with here is a biological warfare work that was conducted at the bio-warfare laboratories set up by the USA on the west coast of Africa. And if you look at a map produced by the Center of Disease Control you can see where these laboratories are located. And they are across the heart of Ebola epidemic, at the west coast of Africa. So, I think these laboratories, one or more of them, are the origins of the Ebola epidemic.

        US government agencies are supposed to do defensive biological warfare research in these labs. Is there any information about what are they working on?

        Well, that’s what they tell you. But if you study what the CDC and the Pentagon do… They say it is defensive, but this is just for public relation purposes than anything. It’s a trick. What it means is what they decide at these bio-warfare labs. They say, “well we have to develop a vaccine”, so that’s their defensive argument.

        Then what they do is to develop the bio-warfare agent itself. Usually by means of DNA genetic engineering. And then they say, “well to get the vaccine we have to develop the bio-warfare agent” – usually by DNA genetic engineering – and then they try to work on the vaccine.

        So it’s two uses type of work. I haven’t read all these bio-warfare contracts but that’s typical of the way the Pentagon CDC has been doing this since at least the 1980’s. I have absolute proof from a Pentagon document that the Center of Disease Control was doing bio-warfare work for the Pentagon in Sierra Leone, the heart of the outbreak, as early as 1988.

        And indeed it was probably before then because they would have had to construct the lab and that would have taken some time. So we know that Fort Detrick and the Center for Disease Control are over there, Tulane University, which is a well-known bio-warfare center here in USA – I would say notorious for it – is there. They all have been over there.

        In addition, USA government made sure that Liberia, a former colony of the USA, never became a party to the Biological Weapons Convention, so they were able to do bio – warfare work over there – going back to 1980’s – the USA government, in order to circumvent the Biological Weapons Convention.

        Likewise, Guinea the third state affected here – and there is an increase now – didn’t even sign the Biological Weapons Convention. So, it seems to me, that the different agencies of the US government have been always there try to circumvent the Biological Weapons Convention and engage bio-warfare work. Indeed, we had one of these two lab bio-warriors admit in the NY Times that they were not over there for the purpose of either screening or treating people.

        That’s not what these labs are about. These labs are there in my opinion to do bio-warfare work for different agencies of the US government. Indeed, many of them were set up by USAID. And everyone knows that USAID is penetrated all up and down by the CIA and CIA has been involved in bio-warfare work as well.

        Are we being told the truth about Ebola? Is that big outbreak began all of a sudden? How does it spread so quickly?

        The whole outbreak that we see in the west coast of Africa, this is Zaire/Ebola. The most dangerous of five subtypes of Ebola. Zaire/Ebola originated 3500 km from the west coast of Africa. There is absolutely no way that it could have been transmitted 3500 km. And if you read the recently published Harvard study on the DNA analysis of the west Africas’ Zaire/Ebola there is no explanation about how the virus moved there.

        And indeed, it’s been reported in the NY Times that the Zaire/Ebola was found there in 1976, and then WHO ordered to be set to Porton Down in Britain, which is the British equivalent to Fort Detrick, where they manufacture all the biological weapons for Britain. And then Britain sent it to the US Center for Disease Control. And we know for a fact that the Center for Disease Control has been involved in biological warfare work.

        And then it appears, at least from whatever I’ve been able to put together in a public record, that the CDC and several others US bio-warriors exported Zaire/Ebola to west Africa, to their labs there, where they were doing bio-warfare work on it. So, I believe this is the origins of the Zaire/Ebola pandemic we are seeing now in west Africa.

        Why would they do that?

        Why would they do that? As I suggested to try to circumvent the Biological Weapons Convention to which the US government is a party. So, always bio-warriors do use offensive and defensive bio-warfare work, violating the Biological Weapons Convention. So effectively they try to offshore it into west Africa where Liberia is not a party and Guinea is not a party. Sierra Leone is a party. But in Sierra Leone and Liberia there were disturbances which kept the world from really paying attention of what was going on in these labs.

        USA sent troops to «fight» Ebola. What do you think about that move?

        The US military just invaded Liberia. They send in the 101st Airborne Division to Liberia. That’s an elite division of combat and they have no training to provide medical treatment to anyone. They are there to establish a military base in Liberia. And the British are doing the same in Sierra Leone. The French are already in Mali and Senegal. So, they’re not sending military people there to treat these people. No, I’m sorry.

        Weren’t they afraid Ebola’s going to go out of control even in the USA or EU in a massive way?

        It’s already gone into the USA and the European Union. So, there it is. Which raises the question: Was this Zaire/Ebola weaponized at any of these labs? I don’t have an answer to that question. I am trying to get an answer. And therefore it is much more dangerous than the WHO and the CDC are telling everyone. The WHO and the CDC are up to their eyeballs in this. They know all about what ‘s going on. It was the WHO that ordered the original Zaire/Ebola in 1976 to be sent to Porton Down for biological warfare purposes. So this could be more dangerous than the WHO and the CDC are saying.

        And you can’t believe anything they telling you because they are involved in that. But certainly I can’t say it has been weaponized. I don’t know that yet for sure. I have the Harvard genetic analysis of it. When I was in college I had very good courses in genetics, and biochemistry and population biology but I am not a professor of genetics. I have a friend who is a professor of genetics and he is going to take a look at this and try to figure out if there’s been DNA genetic engineering perpetrated or performed on the Zaire/Ebola.

        Is there a genetically modified organism at work, a GMO? I don’t know. But if a GMO is at work that’s a pretty good sign it’s been weaponized. But in anyway, it is far more dangerous than the CDC and the WHO are telling anyone, because it’s clearly transmitted for a certain distance – we don’t know how far – by air. Breathing and coughing and sneezing. So, anyone treating people, seems to me, are going to need not only a protective suit but probably a breathing apparatus, at minimum.

        And you saw what happened to that Spanish nurse and that Spanish priest that were brought in, infected with Ebola. So right now the WHO and the CDC are telling healthcare workers that in addition to suits they need breathing apparatuses. So, again, I don’t believe you can trust anything the WHO or the CDC are telling you. And I really don’t know about the European Health Agency… If they‘re believing the WHO and the CDC then, in my opinion, they ‘re not properly protecting the health of the European people.

        And it’s simply bizarre that the CDC and WHO are relegating the screenings to the people in west Africa. It’s just bizarre. They need to be protecting health of their own people and they aren’t doing that. I read some of the European press but I’m not sure precisely what the European Health Agency is recommending but they certainly can’t rely upon the WHO and the CDC. As for Greece, I know you have your own Health Ministry there and they cannot rely upon them at all, as well.

        Some experts told recently the Forbes magazine that even ISIS could use Ebola as a biological weapon. I would like to have your comment on that.

        This is total propaganda. These people are trying to distract public opinion from the fact. My opinion is that the origins of the current pandemic came out of the USA bio-warfare labs in west Africa. That’s what is going on here. ISIS has nothing to do with this. That’s just propaganda which is trying to scare and distract public attention away of what really is going on here. They doing the same thing here in USA. That’s what we need to concentrate on. Number one.

        And number two? We have to find out: was this Zaire/Ebola GMOed by either Porton Down or CDC or these US bio-warfare labs? It is far more dangerous than it currently appears. That’s the real issue. And I don’t have an answer to that question. It was the US government labs that research here. I’m not saying that Ebola was released deliberately by these labs. I have no evidence to that. It could have escaped. But this is really what we need to be focusing on. Not ISIS. It’s ridiculous, it’s preposterous.

        What do you think should be done?

        I would encourage the Greek government to convene an emergency meeting of your top health science people and to look into this on comprehensive bases and figure out what to do under these circumstances to protect the health of people of Greece. In particular they must not believe anything they are being told by the WHO and CDC. There is a need of open objective minds here about what is really going on. I think this needs to be done.

        Back in 1985, I was down in Nicaragua investigating atrocities of the Contras there and all of a sudden the country was hit with an outbreak of a hemorrhaging Dengue Fever which is similar to Ebola. And it seemed pretty suspicious to me. So I met with some of the highest level officials of the Nicaraguan government and said: “you know, this very well could be US bio-warfare against Nicaragua. They did the same thing to Cuba.

        And my advice is you convene health care medical experts, not politicians, to look into this. And if you agree with me and that’s the result, file a complaint with the UN Security Council for violation of the Biological Weapons Convention against the USA”. And eventually that is what they did. Here I am not recommending the Greek authorities to file a complaint against the USA. What I am recommending is the same thing I did to the Nicaraguans. That you need to convene some of your top experts geneticists, doctors, etc.

        And don’t get anyone in this group who has ever done any type of research for any agency of the US government. They are completely unreliable. Get Greeks experts completely independent of the US government or the British government. It’s funny here in the USA when the media want to get experts on this, all the experts they talk to are people who have done biological warfare work for the USA. And they are up to their eyeballs on this Ebola. And doing research on this Ebola.

        Of course they’re not going to give you proper advice. So, find this experts and make sure they never done any research for USA or Britain on any of this stuff but are qualified and can give you a qualified opinion of what is really going on and how dangerous this stuff is. And then aim to protect the health of Greek people. You definitely don’t have to wait for the European Union in Brussels to do it for you. I’m not telling Greece what to do. I’m just telling you how to do it. And this should be done immediately. It should have been done already. But ok, better late than ever.

        Prof. Francis A. Boyle is a leading American professor, practitioner and advocate of international law. He was responsible for drafting the Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989, the American implementing legislation for the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention. He served on the Board of Directors of Amnesty International (1988-1992), and represented Bosnia – Herzegovina at the World Court. Professor Boyle teaches international law at the University of Illinois, Champagne. He holds a Doctor of Law Magna Cum Laude as well as a Ph.D. in Political Science, both from Harvard University.

        He is also the author of “Biowarfare and Terrorism”. The book outlines how and why the United States government initiated, sustained and then dramatically expanded an illegal biological arms buildup.

        Reply
        • Jim Self  –  Mon 27th Oct 2014 at 6:14 pm

          Did my best to go through all of that. I don’t believe the administration or the CDC, but a lot of what I read here was conjecture. Lines like “There is absolutely no way that it could have been transmitted 3500 km” are used as proof that the strain of ebola was spread artificially. Well, we have ebola in Dallas and NYC, and those are about 7000 km apart.

          Why do we have “defensive” bio research labs in Africa? Don’t know. Sounds a lot like why we have a terrorist prison at Gitmo. I can’t explain why the 101st (or any soldiers) got sent to “fight a disease.” And I do think our government does things secretly that it oughtn’t. But I don’t see any evidence, and that’s what it takes to make a case.

          Governments foster this kind of suspicion when they’re not trustworthy, and ours is definitely not trustworthy.

          Reply

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