cmrivers's comments

Update, this comment refers to the original blog post submission, which pulled out forecasted numbers with no context. The Telegraph article is better.

Then it's a scenario model, which asks what-if questions usually for planning purposes (e.g., what's the most hospital beds we might need?). Scenario models can have longer time horizons than forecasts, but 6 months is still quite long.

The outbreak in Uganda is troubling, but a forecast that goes out 6+ months is silly. No professional infectious disease modeler will forecast out more than a few weeks because the trajectory of the outbreak changes in response to interventions and behaviors.

All city high schools are assigned by choice/match. I think with middle schools it varies. https://www.baltimorecityschools.org/high-school-choice

I live in Baltimore City and have to agree that it's troubled. Another thing that makes it difficult for the city to thrive is the abysmal schools. Middle schools and high schools are not assigned by neighborhood, but instead by a match system. In theory this offers opportunities for children in low-income neighborhoods that would otherwise have a too-small tax base for their local schools. In practice, it means nearly all city schools are horrible. "One-third of Baltimore High Schools in 2016 had zero students proficient in math. [0]" and "In fourth- and eighth-grade reading, only 13 percent of city students are considered proficient or advanced. In fourth-grade math, 14 percent were proficient and in eighth-grade math 11 percent met the mark. [1]"

Even living in the nicer, lower-crime neighborhoods isn't enough for families if the school options are untenable.

[0] https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/readersrespond/bs-...

[1] https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/education/k-12/bs...

For what it's worth, I maintain a data repository for this outbreak (https://github.com/cmrivers/ebola_drc) and the 2014-2015 outbreak in West Africa (https://github.com/cmrivers/ebola).

My guess is that human enhancement for military use will be subject to international negotiations in the coming decades, but will probably not be considered under the Biological Weapons Convention.

For further reading, the Atlantic published an article a few years ago on this topic: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/01/could...

This is a risky strategy - your paper can end up back in the hands of the same reviewers from round one.

That's very close to what the SMART program is. I'm a SMART scholar (PhD level), it's been a good experience so far. http://smart.asee.org/

Here is an alternate link on usaid.gov: http://www.usaid.gov/grandchallenges/

I think this challenge has the potential to be useful. We launched a similar effort last week geared more as a hackathon [0], and we have some really interesting projects in the works. Even just simple visualization and analysis of the data hasn't really been done yet, but there are a lot of insights that can be pulled out [1, 2]. Similar civic hacking projects were launched during Hurricane Sandy, and some useful things came out of it [3].

This outbreak really is one of the greatest public health disasters of modern times. I encourage you to think about how you might help, beyond donating money.

[0] https://www.hackerleague.org/hackathons/computing-for-ebola-...

[1] Data available for download: https://github.com/cmrivers/ebola

[2] Examples of ebola analyses: http://www.caitlinrivers.com/blog/category/ebola

[3] https://civic.mit.edu/blog/hidenise/hurricanehackers-project...

My suggestion is just based on the findings reported in the NEJM paper I linked, which has an incubation of 11 days and a long infectious period.

The 'tool' used to generate these results is available for download as an excel spreadsheet here: http://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/24900.

Today parameter estimates were published in the NEJM [0] that conflict with the model's default settings. The Eichner incubation distribution, and an infectious duration of maybe 11 days are better inputs, in my opinion.

[0] http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1411100?query=fea...

The WHO is now reporting on Twitter that the species in DRC is not the same as the one causing the West Africa outbreak [0]. In other words, this is a separate emergence event. [0] https://twitter.com/WHO/status/503673397990395904

But why have we never seen an outbreak in a city before? It's not just good luck. We've had (at least) seven imported cases of Lassa hemorrhagic fever in the US [0], and at least one imported case of Marburg [1]. Both have a similar clinical presentation and epidemiology as Ebola, and both resulted in no secondary transmission inside the US.

SARS was estimated to have a similar basic reproduction number as Ebola (~2), and it was successfully contained globally.

[0] http://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2014/p0404-lassa-fever.htm... [1] http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5849a2.htm

I agree wholeheartedly with your last sentence - stopping transmission in West Africa and improving health systems is key.

I don't agree with your other points though. Ebola patients are only infectious while symptomatic, so accidentally bumping into someone on the subway is not the kind of direct contact needed for transmission. And although the virus can be present in sweat, it's mostly blood, fecal matter, etc. that transmit.

If there were a case introduced in the United States, it's not entirely out of the question that there would be a secondary case or two. Not probable, but not impossible, either. However, I truly believe there would be no more than one secondary generation (two at the absolute max). Western countries can mobilize effective isolation, quarantine, and contact tracing in ways that overburdened West African countries cannot.

You're right, I revisited the article that gave me that impression [0], and it's very clear that staffing is the resource that is exhausted. Nonetheless, it's an excellent organization and a worthy cause in my opinion.

[0] http://www.msf.org.uk/article/ebola-official-msf-response-wh...

Medecins Sans Frontiers (Doctors Without Borders) is an excellent choice. They have been integral to controlling several past Ebola outbreaks, and have been fighting this one since the beginning. They are almost entirely tapped out right now. http://www.msf.org

I can't vouch for them, but the Liberian Ministry of Health also has donation instructions: http://www.mohsw.gov.lr

The measles vaccine is live attenuated, so in the rare case it does cause disease, it's less severe than wild type.

Measles is one of the most infectious diseases known to man. In a fully susceptible population, one infected person can expect to infect 14 other people. The reason only "the few hundred people" get infected annually now is because of widespread vaccination campaigns.

Measles used to be all but inevitable, infecting literally millions, and killing hundreds each year in the US. The only reason we have come to fear vaccines is because we as a society no longer remember fearing these diseases.

http://www.cdc.gov/measles/vaccination.html

If I ever read another long, rambling screed about the failings of millennials, it will be too soon.