The patient, identified by The Associated Press as Thomas Eric Duncan of Liberia, arrived in the U.S. on September 20th to visit family. When Duncan arrived in the U.S., he was not symptomatic. In other words, Duncan was asymptomatic, meaning that even though he was not actively manifesting symptoms, he was still contagious.
In addition to local health authorities, the CDC has rushed 10 specialists to Dallas to assist in the assessment, treatment and quarantine of Duncan. The CDC is pulling out the stops in order to give the illusion that they are on top of the problem and nobody has anything to worry about. There are reports coming in from around the country which strongly suggest that the public’s health is not a priority with the CDC and Ebola potentially threatens to spread far and wide because of the CDC’s and the Obama administration’s inactivity in this matter.
Why Isn’t the CDC Helping In Payson, Arizona?
Payson is just over an hour’s drive from the Phoenix area.
His name is Alan Mann and for the next 18 days, Mr. Mann is potentially a health risk to his community in Payson, Arizona. Mr. Mann is a servant of God and he was carrying out his Christian duty by preaching in Liberia, where there are Ebola outbreaks.
Mr. Mann boarded a plane and flew, without restriction, to Brussels. From Brussels he flew to Phoenix and nobody in an official capacity has checked to see if Mr. Mann is a carrier of the Ebola virus. After what has just happened in Dallas, this is the ultimate in governmental irresponsibility.
According to one of Mr. Mann’s neighbors who contacted me, Mr. Mann has placed himself in a self-imposed 21 day quarantine. Where are the local health officials and the accompanying CDC personnel? How can the people of Payson and the entire state of Arizona be certain that this missionary is able to fully carry out the proper protocols of a quarantine, without risking the lives of others, and that he also has the proper equipment to do so? The fact is, that nobody can be sure.
Before you feel sorry for Mr. Mann and think that I have unfairly violated his privacy. Mr. Mann details his travels and his relevant Liberian experiences on his blog. Here is an excerpt.
It was a little overcast on our way into Phoenix so we were bumped around a little. But now I’m on the ground here in Phoenix, waiting to complete the taxi to our gate. My wife and kids are waiting in the cell phone lot and I can’t wait to see them!
Thank you all for your prayers for these last two weeks I was in Liberia. Thank you also for remembering to include my family in your prayers. God is good and God is faithful to his children.
We still have a couple of hours until we are actually home. Please pray for safety as we travel wet roads.
God bless!”
Also from Mr. Mann’s blog he tells the following story as he was part of a team delivering health care supplies to potential Ebola victims, who happened to be children.
Excerpts from Mann’s Website
“On another note, we were finally freed up on time to deliver the remaining fifty sanitation kits and de-worm medication to a community quite difficult to get to by pickup. It was certainly possible but I’m sure my head hit the ceiling several times due to the poor road conditions. It was raining so we had to keep moving or we would have gotten stuck.
I sat on the tailgate of the pickup (all small trucks are called pickups here; I’m used to calling them “trucks”). Our volunteer health worker from our previous bucket delivery stood in the community center and and with a megaphone, called the community to hear the Word of God and to receive some aid. I watched from the tailgate as the community quickly began to gather in their community building. Some carried plastic chairs on their heads and others carried small babies. Older children began to gather at the back of the pickup and stare at the “white guy.”
Captivated by the “white guy”
Once everyone was gathered under the roof, it began to pour rain. It was so loud on the tin roof, even the man with the megaphone could not be heard. As the rain calmed a bit and the people settled in one place, the town leaders began to explain who we were and what our intentions were. Following this, Isaac stood and spoke about the buckets and how to mix the hand washing formula and then he explained about the children’s medicine. Once Isaac finished, he invited me to first speak to them from God’s Word before they would receive their bucket gift.
Megaphone Health Volunteer.
Reminding them how important it was to keep clean on the outside to help reduce the spreading of the Ebola virus (emphasis added), I also reminded them that there is nothing we can do to wash away our sin. Only Jesus’ death and resurrection and one’s trust in that payment will purify us from our sin. The buckets will not last long, but the forgiveness of sin through Jesus’ death and resurrection lasts for eternity. Again, many, many put their trust in Christ alone!”
Clearly, the above excerpt demonstrates Mr. Mann’s state of mind that these children are potentially at risk for contracting Ebola.
One of Mr. Mann’s neighbors contacted me by email and the following contain excerpts from this email communication which I received on October 1, 2014, two days after Mr. Mann’s arrival back to Payson.
Hi Dave,
I’m writing to you to report something that is happening in Payson, AZ in my neighborhood. … however because you are in Arizona I know this will be of special concern to you. I hope you can pass this on to your listeners, just don’t use my name.
My neighbor is a Christian Missionary who just returned from Liberia two days ago. He is doing a “self-imposed quarantine” in his home for 21 days.
What concerns me is that he doesn’t seem worried about potentially exposing his own family or his hometown. Yes, he is in this “quarantine” with his wife and children…
… he stated that there was no restriction on his air travel from Liberia to Brussels and to the U.S. He feels called by the Lord to do his missionary work and I’m sure feels he has divine protection. I moved to Payson to avoid things like this…but now ebola may be on my doorstep. (emphasis added)
Do you believe that 21 days is an adequate quarantine? Could he transmit the virus to his children without being symptomatic himself? Should I wait for a second 21 days to allow my kids to play over there? (I think I will regardless). It appears that ebola is not widely studied and may mutate, so how can I trust what I am hearing on the news? They may withhold information to prevent panic. I’m sure he and his family will be at the local grocery store and WalMart soon and this small town could be at risk. If it happens here, it can happen anywhere, not just in the cities.
If I had only received an email about Mr. Mann’s status, I would never have published this information. However, Mr. Mann has made his own name and circumstances public as he has identified himself as having been in Liberia and published the same. Mr. Mann also announced his arrival back to his hometown on September 28, 2014. He shared with at least one of his neighbors that his health status was never challenged or questioned as he flew from Liberia to Brussels and then on to Phoenix, and we are supposed to trust the fact that Mr. Mann possess the knowledge and capacity to carry out a self-imposed quarantine? And in the same vein, are are supposed to trust the fact that Texas health officials and the CDC have the Ebola outbreak in Dallas under control when we have a case like this in Arizona? If I can find this case in Arizona, then why cannot the CDC who has far more tools at their disposal? There can be no question that with up to two million people quarantined in Liberia, everyone leaving Liberia needs to be screened for this deadly virus and not leave it up to the good judgment of individuals to quarantine themselves, or not.
Conclusion
I applaud Mr. Mann’s concern for others by having the good sense to quarantine himself in order to protect his neighbors in the best way that he knows how. However, we pay taxes to the CDC to protect us from these situations and to provide aid to the afflicted. The CDC should already be on the scene in Payson to provide every assistance to Mr. Mann and his family, in fulfillment of their mandate to protect the public’s health. This case is proof positive that the CDC is failing in its fiduciary duty to the health and welfare of the people in this country.
Why are our airports and borders wide open for cases like these? In late May, when prominent Arizona physician, Dr. Jane Orient, and myself, both publicly stated it was a case of “when” and not “if” Ebola was going to surface in America, we were both branded as “fear mongers”. Interestingly, those once loud voices, have grown quiet.
How many Mr. Mann’s are there in the United States who are unwittingly serving as a ticking time bomb for their community? With the aforementioned information published on his blog, I cannot explain why the CDC has not moved to assist Mr. Mann in his efforts to protect his community?
President Obama has no problem having the TSA presume everyone at the airport is a terrorist and the flying public are treated according through the groping “pat-downs” at the security checkpoints. Subsequently, we have to ask ourselves how an individual can fly from Ebola-afflicted Liberia and end up in the United States without undergoing any health screenings at these same airports?
We need to raise our voices as one and demand accountability from our government officials in their efforts to protect the public health.
Soon, we will all forget about Mr. Mann because I have received similar information, yesterday, from a health care worker in Portland and a person with an Ebola transmission story from New York City.
Yesterday, The Common Sense Show was also contacted by Sherry Edwards, the research director for The Institute of BioAcoustic Biology & Sound Health. Ms. Edwards stated in the email regarding the Ebola outbreak:
“…I think your audience needs to hear this and become involved. We tested people today in NH, CA, TX, Ohio and several from Africa. We are being exposed some way – all the same across the country this looks very man-made…”
Now that a man in the United States has been diagnosed with Ebola, some are asking why we haven't stopped allowing people traveling from West Africa into our airports. Thomas Eric Duncan, the patient currently being treated in the Dallas area, boarded a flight from Liberia on Sept. 19 and arrived in Texas on Sept. 20.United Airlines said Wednesday that it was told by the CDC that Duncan had used the airline to travel from Brussels to Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C., before flying from Dulles to Dallas-Fort Worth. Authorities have said repeatedly that there is no danger of anyone getting sick from flying with Duncan because was not symptomatic at the time. With every connecting flight carrying passengers who have recently been in the Ebola-ravaged countries of Sierra Leone, Guinea or Liberia, the chances of another exportation increase. So should there be restrictions on who can fly into the United States? Several African nations have restricted or banned air travel from Ebola-stricken countries, and airlines including Kenya Airways, British Airways, Air Cote D’Ivoire and Nigeria's Arik Air have suspended flights from the countries. Front Page Africa reported on Wednesday, though, that Kenya Airways and Air Cote D’Ivoire are expected to resume some of their so-called "Ebola flights" this month. Others airlines have greatly reduced air travel in the region. Some of that is a natural consequence of the fact that few people, save for aid workers and government officials, are traveling in and out of the region. But other suspensions reflect a widespread fear that a person sick with Ebola could get on a plane and potentially infect other passengers and airline crew members. More travel restrictions, though, aren't going to make the world safer when it comes to Ebola, according to several global public health organizations. In fact, they might make the situation worse. Air travel restrictions ignore the way Ebola is transmitted: Ebola can only be contracted through direct contact with a sick person's bodily fluids. That means saliva, feces, urine, blood, vomit or semen. It isn't transmitted through the air, so you are more likely to catch a cold on a flight than Ebola. “It is not an optimal measure for controlling the import of Ebola virus disease,” said chief United Nations spokesperson Stephane Dujarric. “The measure does not reflect what is known about the way in which the virus passes between people."
The U.S. has similarly spurned travel restrictions in the face of a more infectious, though less deadly, disease like Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) for similar reasons, even when sick passengers were coming to the U.S. The State Department has warned U.S. citizens against non-essential travel to Liberia and Sierra Leone, but there are currently no plans to alter the travel warning in the wake of diagnosis, a State Department official told The Post on Wednesday. The restrictions are also redundant: If someone isn't exhibiting symptoms of Ebola, that person is not infectious. And one of the first symptoms of Ebola is a fever. In airports in all of the affected regions and across the world, passengers coming from flights from West Africa are being screened for elevated temperatures. If a passenger is sick or has a fever, they won't fly. According to the CDC, "a U.S. Department of Transportation rule permits airlines to deny boarding to air travelers with serious contagious diseases that could spread during flight, including travelers with possible Ebola symptoms. This rule applies to all flights of U.S. airlines, and to direct flights (no change of planes) to or from the United States by foreign airlines."
Post by CDC. Despite the fact that an infected passenger flew from Liberia to Dallas this month, that passenger, Duncan, was not sick -- and was therefore not contagious -- while he was traveling. And once people become symptomatic, they become very sick, very quickly. In this case, it is unlikely that a sick person could go 10 days without seeking medical care, CDC Director Tom Frieden said on Tuesday. "At this point, there is zero risk of transmission on the flight," Frieden said. "The illness of Ebola would not have gone on for 10 days before diagnosis. He was checked for fever before getting on the flight, and there's no reason to think that anyone on the flight that he was on would be at risk." As the worst Ebola outbreak in history unfolds in West Africa, The Post's Joel Achenbach explains how the deadly virus wreaks havoc on the human body. (Davin Coburn/The Washington Post) Travel restrictions make fighting Ebola much harder: Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone are already economically isolated because this epidemic has spread far wider and lasted much longer than any other Ebola outbreak in history. What those countries need most now is assistance from the world. More flight restrictions will only make it more difficult for life-saving aid and medical professionals to reach West Africa. The restrictions already in place have proved so problematic that U.S. military forces are building an "air bridge" to get health workers and medical supplies to affected areas. "Any discontinuation of transport will affect humanitarian aid, doctors, nurses and human resources entering the country, the transfer of biological sampling and equipment for hospitals," Daniel Menucci, a representative for the World Health Organization Travel and Transport Task Force, said in August. “All of this needs international transporting, international airlines. This will create more problems in helping the countries most affected.” In Liberia alone, according to the WHO, more than 1,400 people have died after contracting Ebola, more than any other country. And with only one doctor for every 100,000 people in a country of 4.4 million, the country relies on health care workers from across the globe to help control the epidemic there. Controlling the outbreak in West Africa is the only way to make the rest of the world safer: Researchers who have modeled the risk of the international spread of the Ebola virus have been clear that the longer the outbreak goes on and the bigger it is, the more likely Ebola is to spread beyond West Africa to the rest of the world. "If the epidemic continues at this growth rate and produces more and more cases, obviously the probably increases with time," said Alessandro Vespignani, a Northeastern University professor whose team has been updating its model of the chance of global exportation of Ebola cases. "That means that in October, it would be 20 percent or more, and then it will grow. The probability is increasing." It is also the reason the U.S. has mobilized military and medical resources to aid in the fight. "The best way to protect the U.S. is to stop the outbreak in West Africa," Beth Bell, Director of the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases at the CDC, said in testimony before Congress last month. Restricting air travel will make West Africa's humanitarian crisis worse: Ebola has made access to basic resources like food, clean water and basic medical care for other ailments difficult, if not impossible to obtain. Travel restrictions, according to the World Health Organization, will only make that problem worse. “If you try to shut down air travel and sea travel, you risk affecting to a huge extent the economy, people’s livelihoods and their ability to get around without stopping the virus from traveling,” said Gregory Hartl, a WHO spokesman. “You can’t ship goods in. Sometimes these goods are basic staples people need to survive — food and fuel.” And in the aftermath of Ebola, the long term consequences of economic and health collapse in Liberia will be the world's burden. "If the outbreak is not stopped now, we could be looking at hundreds of thousands of people infected, with profound political and economic and security implications for all of us," President Obama said last month. "That has profound effects on all of us, even if we are not directly contracting the disease." Credit to Washington Post
