Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/07/18/ebola-outbreak-declared-a-publ.html
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For what it is worth, the folks on the ground need map data, which does not exist.
You can help trace satellite imagery for the responders on the ground.
I work with MSF daily and they direct where the mapping needs to be completed, you trace sat imagery, lives get saved.
There is no way, short of travelling to DRC and (a country to be named in the coming days), to help folks on the ground suffering and combating this outbreak more directly than mapping. You trace, they use the map data (as imperfect as it will be) literally the next day.
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No, let’s not. Let’s actually DO something about the problems that the world faces instead of allowing thousands of people to die because of our own internalized nihilism.
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The powers that be don’t seem to be too concerned about this. It’s buried in the news. And certainly under its present leadership the US doesn’t seem poised to jump in and help out too much either. And so it goes.
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I hope it’s meant in less the “do nothing” sense, and more in the “what are our world leaders and governments going to do?” sense.
Right now there are problems everywhere we turn. It’s almost a coin toss as to which one is going to do us in. THIS one, I could see doing a huge amount of damage because of the rise in racism and nationalism. But until it touches the lives of the “special” ones, I expect them to treat it as background noise.
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I’m going to look into this. Thank you for the heads up.
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Yes, in no way was I suggesting we all just sit back and do nothing, but that seems to be standard operating procedure for our top leadership in this country now.
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To bring in some good news: Uganda successfully managed the outbreak by ring vaccination. Also, all kinds of gouvernment agencies and private pharmaceutical companies co-operated to get the the vaccine to the ground. I somewhere read a Swiss researcher’s quote that she never before even heard about doing the process from experimental treatment in the animal model system over human trials to admission in such a short time. Volunteers to test the vaccination did their part, too.
The sad part is that the globally available amount of vaccine is still not sufficient, and the second vaccine which now is admissible needs a different strategy of vaccination - which lead to (DRC’s? Can’t remember!) government to reject it’s inclusion in the vaccination program. However, apparently the dosage applied in DRC is twice as high as has been tested effective in West Africa - so cutting it by half doubles the number of available shots.
The whole campaign is highly impeded by the ongoing civil war in eastern DRC. As far as I know, the finances for this still come from our electronic devices: rare earths are fueling the conflict.
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Doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be…
Okay… just so you know, it can be read that way… could just be me, but…
Not just here, I’m afraid.
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Yep
“Trump and his national security adviser, John Bolton, a year ago signaled they didn’t consider epidemics a national security priority when they bounced Rear Admiral Tim Ziemer from his post as head of global health security on the White House’s National Security Council and eliminated the position.”
The best response is no response according to the trump admin.
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This topic is temporarily closed for at least 4 hours due to a large number of community flags.
This is exhibit A why posts with nothing but images (especially ”reaction gifs”) are unwise. Annotate your gifs with further detail to avoid them being misconstrued.
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Just kidding, I agree 
OT: I started reading a comment which thankfully was flagged while I was reading. They didn’t get hidden, but dimmed, but had the usual CN underneath. Looked weird, and I don’t mean the content.
I had to to something else, so I came back here to read the content, fully expecting some weird shit after the opener, but it was gone.
All the better, maybe. Ken and the community flags are a bit like our own MSF squad: going where no-one else wants to go, looking in the abyss of the human soul. Which reminds me that I wanted to donate to MSF at one point when I earned money.
“It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing.”
– Macbeth
Idiot in this usage being of the royal “we”, or “you” or whatever.
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Yep. Point taken.
This topic was automatically closed after 5 days. New replies are no longer allowed.
