[Nicodimas]

That Doctor tested Postive for Ebola in NYC.. guess they are stating he was Bowling that night and another case of no self quarantine. The self quarantine seems like an easy doable fix.

As a heads up this doctor was doc without borders..

*Sixteen staff members of Docs Without Borders have been infected with ebola and 9 of them are dead.

^Holy shit

This post has been edited by Nicodimas: 24 October 2014 - 01:06 AM

[Nicodimas]

Upon Reflection if we just take this and say cases get going in a few cities. This would be a total disaster when FLU season gets running..

Could you imagine every person getting the FLU, going to the hospital thinking it could be Ebola?

And then we have Doctors, who actively work with Ebola Victims and not self isolating. /gah

Lots of good information-->
http://www.dailymail...walk-leave.html

[Nicodimas]

Haha ..his neighbors must love him.

http://bigstory.ap.o...-inspired-ebola

[cerveza_fiesta]

Nicodimas, on 24 October 2014 - 10:29 PM, said:

Haha ..his neighbors must love him.

http://bigstory.ap.o...-inspired-ebola

Yeah, I agree with the "too soon" sentiment mentioned by the newswriter. Maybe "not ever".

It's one thing to do a fantasy biohazard thing referring to zombies or whatever. "Having fun" with legitimate fears over a real and very deadly disease is a bit assholish -- let alone the fact that a guy in your city died from it and the family might still be a little sensitive about the subject...twat.

It's like somebody littering their lawn with fake needles and junkie dummies and calling it the "careful you don't get AIDS!" zone. HAHA hilarious !!! [/sarcasm]

EDIT

sorry, in a bit of a combative mood this morning.

Also," twat" refers to the dude in the article, not Nico...just to be clear.

This post has been edited by cerveza_fiesta: 28 October 2014 - 02:02 PM

[Gorefest]

Too soon?

[cerveza_fiesta]

In the article linked by nico, quoted in my post.

As in too soon after Dallas had a scary encounter with Ebola. People are legitimately afraid of it and this guy is making light of a very serious situation when he probably shouldn't be.

This post has been edited by cerveza_fiesta: 28 October 2014 - 04:37 PM

[Nicodimas]

When I saw this article..It totally had that image of that guy on that block thats the Ahole, or there is some serious hate between neighbors...for sure.

[D'iversify]

The outbreak in Liberia, the worst affected country, is apparently slowing down, which could show that efforts to limit the spread of Ebola are having sime effect: http://www.bbc.co.uk...africa-29822303

Also this story, which I thought was pretty outrageous: http://www.bbc.co.uk...canada-29820594 (Connecticut school is sued by father after his daughter was barred from attending until November on the spurious claim she might have been at risk from exposure when she visited Nigeria earlier this month [there have been no new cases in Nigeria since August]).

This post has been edited by D'iversify: 30 October 2014 - 12:39 PM

[Mezla PigDog]

There is a side issue involved in swine flu that is also happening with Ebola that I find a little bit worrying. It is the erosion of ethical issues and standards set for clinical trials of new drugs and vaccines. With Ebola they are speeding up clinical trials for vaccines and I have heard/read reports of people suggesting that there is an ethical case for removing some of the clinical trial methodologies that are usually required to approve drugs.

Amongst many many other things drugs usually require a double blind trial where some patients with the disease are given the experimental drug and some patients are given the usual treatment. In the case of Ebola where there is no usual treatment then some patients would receive no treatment at all (apart from treatment of symptoms) in such a trial. It was suggested that with Ebola it is UNETHICAL to withhold treatment, however experimental assuming that treatment does not cause immediate obvious harm. I wouldn't necessarily disagree with this but I would be keen to have a full disclosure of the financial and academic ties to drug manufacturers of anybody suggesting such a thing.

With the ebola vaccine trials they have also speeded up the trials before the usual amount of data has been produced to progress into human experiments.

With swine flu the British government (and I assume the US) stockpiled Tamiflu which has since been suggested to not be effective against influenza and there is an ongoing dispute about Roche (the manufacturer) withholding various bits of negative data but it gets no airtime because nobody is worried about a flu pandemic at the moment. The absence of this data would have been known at the time governments were stockpiling but they turned a blind eye because everybody wanted to hear that there was a treatment for swine flu. I'd be interested to see how much of Roche' profits were related to that drug because they must have sold shed loads in 2009.

I don't have any proof but I would take a guess that the people lobbying for removal of ethical barriers and fast tracking of drug/vaccine trials are people with vested interests in the pharmaceutical industry. I don't necessarily hold to the idea that the pharmaceutical industry is a global big bad - they absolutely are not angels (price fixing, anti-competition, making the worlds drug development meet capital demands rather than clinical ones) but they are a product of the society that tolerates them and laws they have to abide by. I have some sympathy with the high prices they charge because of the number of candidate drugs that never make it to market. I am also inclined to sympathise with the amount of red tape that drug companies have to cut through in order to get something on to the market but I don't necessarily have any alternatives to offer because the public needs to be protected from a capitalism driven pharmaceutical and medical device industry - someone has to independently check such things are safe. I also know a lot of people in the British pharma industry and you can imagine the usual stories of how dysfunctional friends places of work can be are magnified when there is so much cash on the line. So I definitely have an issue with people suggesting that standards are dropped when there is what could be described as a global panic going on. We all know that is a recipe for a disaster.

I don't have an answer here and I don't even have any evidence to say there is definitely a problem but I think each time we have a threat of an epidemic/pandemic then we will hear these voices pushing for standards to be lowered - they won't use that terminology of course. It's something I'm interested in and keep an eye and ear open to find out about especially when you think of the growing snowball of media fuelled hysteria that will then mean the public sleepwalks into a lowering of standards because the world wants to hear the good news of "Ebola vaccine ready to go" and then will not ask any questions after they don't get Ebola. It is a tall order to expect that governments will take a step back when the dust has cleared and put in place robust contingency plans for fast tracking drugs and vaccines in such cases because governance is a knee jerk reaction to the topic du jour.

So erm yeah. No conclusion here, just a brain dump. I'm not saying this is a conspiracy either, it's just the way the world works these days and we should keep a beady eye on which standards we are willing to reform and when in the pursuit of the bottom line.

This post has been edited by Mezla PigDog: 30 October 2014 - 01:54 PM

[cerveza_fiesta]

Big news story in my neck of the woods

http://www.cbc.ca/ne...again-1.2817927

Nurse returns from Africa, totally asymptomatic. She is self monitoring per WHO/CDC guidelines. The State of Maine is trying to enforce a 21-day quarantine when they have no scientific basis for doing so, and want a judge to grant them the ability to forcibly confine the woman because she refuses to comply.

This story exemplifies everything that's wrong with the N. American discussion RE Ebola (not the CBC story in and of itself -- the subject of news article ). Instead of educating the public on what they should and shouldn't fear in a calm and scientific manner, the State is going all-in and creating this massive, sensational, polarizing debate over NOTHING.

It's hard to watch.


EDITED -- more thoughts added.

This post has been edited by cerveza_fiesta: 30 October 2014 - 04:56 PM

[Gorefest]

http://www.eboladeeply.org/ , a new website launched by the guys behind http://www.syriadeeply.org.

Weird case map, though. According to that map, in Nigeria there were: 0 Ebola cases, 8 deaths, 0% fatality rate. Hmmmm.

This post has been edited by Gorefest: 03 November 2014 - 11:27 AM

[Nicodimas]

Quote

0 Ebola cases, 8 deaths, 0% fatality rate. Hmmmm.

Did the people travel from the other countries and die in their hospitals maybe?

[Gorefest]

Nope. According to the reports I can find, they had one infected man from Liberia come in to the country, which subsequently led to 19 confirmed cases. Nigeria managed to clamp down efficiently (which is quite impressive actually, considering their proximity to the affected areas and shows what difference a good infrastructure makes) and has now been officially declared Ebola free by the WHO. So 20 cases instead of 0. Can't seem to find how many of them (if any) died.

[edit]Oh, 8 of the 20 people died, so that figure at least is correct.

This post has been edited by Gorefest: 04 November 2014 - 10:16 AM

[Imperial Historian]

Mezla PigDog, on 30 October 2014 - 01:50 PM, said:

There is a side issue involved in swine flu that is also happening with Ebola that I find a little bit worrying. It is the erosion of ethical issues and standards set for clinical trials of new drugs and vaccines. With Ebola they are speeding up clinical trials for vaccines and I have heard/read reports of people suggesting that there is an ethical case for removing some of the clinical trial methodologies that are usually required to approve drugs.

Amongst many many other things drugs usually require a double blind trial where some patients with the disease are given the experimental drug and some patients are given the usual treatment. In the case of Ebola where there is no usual treatment then some patients would receive no treatment at all (apart from treatment of symptoms) in such a trial. It was suggested that with Ebola it is UNETHICAL to withhold treatment, however experimental assuming that treatment does not cause immediate obvious harm. I wouldn't necessarily disagree with this but I would be keen to have a full disclosure of the financial and academic ties to drug manufacturers of anybody suggesting such a thing.

With the ebola vaccine trials they have also speeded up the trials before the usual amount of data has been produced to progress into human experiments.

With swine flu the British government (and I assume the US) stockpiled Tamiflu which has since been suggested to not be effective against influenza and there is an ongoing dispute about Roche (the manufacturer) withholding various bits of negative data but it gets no airtime because nobody is worried about a flu pandemic at the moment. The absence of this data would have been known at the time governments were stockpiling but they turned a blind eye because everybody wanted to hear that there was a treatment for swine flu. I'd be interested to see how much of Roche' profits were related to that drug because they must have sold shed loads in 2009.

I don't have any proof but I would take a guess that the people lobbying for removal of ethical barriers and fast tracking of drug/vaccine trials are people with vested interests in the pharmaceutical industry. I don't necessarily hold to the idea that the pharmaceutical industry is a global big bad - they absolutely are not angels (price fixing, anti-competition, making the worlds drug development meet capital demands rather than clinical ones) but they are a product of the society that tolerates them and laws they have to abide by. I have some sympathy with the high prices they charge because of the number of candidate drugs that never make it to market. I am also inclined to sympathise with the amount of red tape that drug companies have to cut through in order to get something on to the market but I don't necessarily have any alternatives to offer because the public needs to be protected from a capitalism driven pharmaceutical and medical device industry - someone has to independently check such things are safe. I also know a lot of people in the British pharma industry and you can imagine the usual stories of how dysfunctional friends places of work can be are magnified when there is so much cash on the line. So I definitely have an issue with people suggesting that standards are dropped when there is what could be described as a global panic going on. We all know that is a recipe for a disaster.

I don't have an answer here and I don't even have any evidence to say there is definitely a problem but I think each time we have a threat of an epidemic/pandemic then we will hear these voices pushing for standards to be lowered - they won't use that terminology of course. It's something I'm interested in and keep an eye and ear open to find out about especially when you think of the growing snowball of media fuelled hysteria that will then mean the public sleepwalks into a lowering of standards because the world wants to hear the good news of "Ebola vaccine ready to go" and then will not ask any questions after they don't get Ebola. It is a tall order to expect that governments will take a step back when the dust has cleared and put in place robust contingency plans for fast tracking drugs and vaccines in such cases because governance is a knee jerk reaction to the topic du jour.

So erm yeah. No conclusion here, just a brain dump. I'm not saying this is a conspiracy either, it's just the way the world works these days and we should keep a beady eye on which standards we are willing to reform and when in the pursuit of the bottom line.

This worries me significantly more than ebola, or similar diseases. I don't see how you can authorise any medicine without some form of large double blind trial, otherwise you are just selling snake oil as you have no idea that it actually works. I already think it's shocking that drug companies can still legally get away with withholding testing data. I'm sure the vast majority of scientific studies are conducted in good faith, but selective reporting is the bane of modern day science.

[Nicodimas]

Quote

I'm sure the vast majority of scientific studies are conducted in good faith, but selective reporting is the bane of modern day science.

Anyone care to explain this one in a little bit more detail...always been curiuous to how this works.ya know?

Quote

View PostMezla PigDog, on 30 October 2014 - 01:50 PM, said:

Wait... do we trust anything those companies do as they are for profit??

Always wonder about big pharma...never be too certain on what they do and why.

This post has been edited by Nicodimas: 06 November 2014 - 01:12 AM

[Macros]

I'm sceptical of most medical studies, its very easy for someone with money to apply pressure to even an independent study.

[Gorefest]

Nicodimas, on 06 November 2014 - 01:09 AM, said:

Quote

I'm sure the vast majority of scientific studies are conducted in good faith, but selective reporting is the bane of modern day science.

Anyone care to explain this one in a little bit more detail...always been curiuous to how this works.ya know?

Quote

View PostMezla PigDog, on 30 October 2014 - 01:50 PM, said:

Wait... do we trust anything those companies do as they are for profit??

Always wonder about big pharma...never be too certain on what they do and why.

It is a genuine concern indeed. The problem is actually more profound and widespread than just big pharma, although with big pharma there is not seldom intent behind it. And it's not really one problem, it is a range of them. First off there is the openness of data issue, for at the moment there is no international obligation to publish or make publicly available all the raw data from research studies and clinical patient trials. This means that pharmaceutical companies can either withhold data that puts their product in an unfavourable light and only publish that which makes the product look good, or they can cherry pick the positive aspects of the data and put emphasis on those, while downplaying or outright discarding the negatives.

Beside cherry picking, there is also the choice of controls in the study that can be manipulated. It is nice that a drug shows an effect compared to no drug, but if there are already 5 other drugs in the market treating the same disease, it is far more interesting to know whether your drug actually outperforms the others. Often however such comparisons are neglected.

A compounding factor is the way in which scientific journals choose their output. If you have 5 random scientists each sending in a manuscript describing tests on the same drug, and one of those publications shows really cool effects whereas the other four show little to no effect whatsoever, three guesses as to which publication the journal will run with. Although the lack of any statistical difference in itself is a scientifically valid result, as it tells you something about the behaviour of the experimental sample as compared to a placebo, many journals will consider it uninteresting and will instead opt for something that sounds exciting. So there already is an inherent bias in scientific publications even without any potentially malicious manipulation from pharmaceutical companies or unethical scientists. That in a way is even more worrying than the 'nasty pharma guys hiding evidence' part, as it seems to be an ingrained problem in all science. Our brains seem to be wired to respond favourably to changes from the norm, even though there is a reason that the norm is as it is. So experiments that tell us that something does not cause a significant effect is often erroneously interpreted as a lack of result. Obviously it is a result, but as it doesn't show you something cool or different, it is dismissed in favour of something that does do something neat.

In the past years, there has been a big drive from the international scientific community to tackle these issues. One of the things that is campaigned for is complete openness of all clinical trial data. This means that for every clinical trial that is being registered, at the end of the trial all the raw data needs to be accessible to the scientific community as a whole for scrutiny. It is actually quite bizarre to think that that has not already been the case in the past, but pharma has (obviously) been very reluctant to give such access. They are also trying to retrospectively retrieve clinical trial data for products that are already on the market. Another mode of action is the Cochrane reviews. You may have already heard of these, but if not, they are basically large meta-studies of the available literature. Again, it seems very obvious when you mention it, but up until a few years ago it was never done in a structured fashion. Basically, what the Cochrane reviews do is collect all the available publications on a particular drug or treatment method, then scrutinise these publications on scientific rigour, discard all those that have flaws in the experimental design or statistical approach, and use the combined results of all the remaining publications to determine the overall treatment effect. So suddenly they can find (and have found) that a treatment that was hailed as groundbreaking in a paper in a leading journal, was found to be largely ineffective or even underperforming compared to other treatments according to 4 or 5 papers in smaller, lower impact (and often largely ignored) journals.

I can definitely recommend reading some of Ben Goldacre's books on this, 'Bad science' and 'Bad pharma'. He explains these problems and their potential solutions (and the reasons why those solutions are not being implemented as we speak) in a very accessible way. He also has a website: www.badscience.net.

[Nicodimas]

Gorefest, on 06 November 2014 - 10:09 AM, said:

Nicodimas, on 06 November 2014 - 01:09 AM, said:

Quote

I'm sure the vast majority of scientific studies are conducted in good faith, but selective reporting is the bane of modern day science.

Anyone care to explain this one in a little bit more detail...always been curiuous to how this works.ya know?

Quote

View PostMezla PigDog, on 30 October 2014 - 01:50 PM, said:

Wait... do we trust anything those companies do as they are for profit??

Always wonder about big pharma...never be too certain on what they do and why.

It is a genuine concern indeed. The problem is actually more profound and widespread than just big pharma, although with big pharma there is not seldom intent behind it. And it's not really one problem, it is a range of them. First off there is the openness of data issue, for at the moment there is no international obligation to publish or make publicly available all the raw data from research studies and clinical patient trials. This means that pharmaceutical companies can either withhold data that puts their product in an unfavourable light and only publish that which makes the product look good, or they can cherry pick the positive aspects of the data and put emphasis on those, while downplaying or outright discarding the negatives.

Beside cherry picking, there is also the choice of controls in the study that can be manipulated. It is nice that a drug shows an effect compared to no drug, but if there are already 5 other drugs in the market treating the same disease, it is far more interesting to know whether your drug actually outperforms the others. Often however such comparisons are neglected.

A compounding factor is the way in which scientific journals choose their output. If you have 5 random scientists each sending in a manuscript describing tests on the same drug, and one of those publications shows really cool effects whereas the other four show little to no effect whatsoever, three guesses as to which publication the journal will run with. Although the lack of any statistical difference in itself is a scientifically valid result, as it tells you something about the behaviour of the experimental sample as compared to a placebo, many journals will consider it uninteresting and will instead opt for something that sounds exciting. So there already is an inherent bias in scientific publications even without any potentially malicious manipulation from pharmaceutical companies or unethical scientists. That in a way is even more worrying than the 'nasty pharma guys hiding evidence' part, as it seems to be an ingrained problem in all science. Our brains seem to be wired to respond favourably to changes from the norm, even though there is a reason that the norm is as it is. So experiments that tell us that something does not cause a significant effect is often erroneously interpreted as a lack of result. Obviously it is a result, but as it doesn't show you something cool or different, it is dismissed in favour of something that does do something neat.

In the past years, there has been a big drive from the international scientific community to tackle these issues. One of the things that is campaigned for is complete openness of all clinical trial data. This means that for every clinical trial that is being registered, at the end of the trial all the raw data needs to be accessible to the scientific community as a whole for scrutiny. It is actually quite bizarre to think that that has not already been the case in the past, but pharma has (obviously) been very reluctant to give such access. They are also trying to retrospectively retrieve clinical trial data for products that are already on the market. Another mode of action is the Cochrane reviews. You may have already heard of these, but if not, they are basically large meta-studies of the available literature. Again, it seems very obvious when you mention it, but up until a few years ago it was never done in a structured fashion. Basically, what the Cochrane reviews do is collect all the available publications on a particular drug or treatment method, then scrutinise these publications on scientific rigour, discard all those that have flaws in the experimental design or statistical approach, and use the combined results of all the remaining publications to determine the overall treatment effect. So suddenly they can find (and have found) that a treatment that was hailed as groundbreaking in a paper in a leading journal, was found to be largely ineffective or even underperforming compared to other treatments according to 4 or 5 papers in smaller, lower impact (and often largely ignored) journals.

I can definitely recommend reading some of Ben Goldacre's books on this, 'Bad science' and 'Bad pharma'. He explains these problems and their potential solutions (and the reasons why those solutions are not being implemented as we speak) in a very accessible way. He also has a website: www.badscience.net.

I will be sure to check this out...



This is some good data for reals.

[Mezla PigDog]

Yes, the Ben Goldacre stuff is really good - it might even satisfy Nico's desire for information!

All gone quiet on the Ebola front. I guess only poor people are dying from it at the moment.

[Gust Hubb]