Sunday, April 13, 2014

From Pandemic to Epidemic

I'm writing this article because I just learned yesterday that my brother has meningitis. He is doing good so far and the infectious disease doctor believes it is bacterial meningitis. The doctors believe they caught it in time but not sure until they see how the treatment goes. He apparently had strep throat last week and it got worse from there so he wound up in the hospital where they found out about the meningitis. Hopefully he gets better soon.

My question to you is: How long do you think it will take for a local pandemic to become a worldwide pandemic?

My answer to the question I just posed is one week or less. The reason I say this is because of the way we live today. Yes we have better sanitation that in decades past but our modes of  and speed of our transportation systems can spread a disease worldwide within 1 week or less

Right now we have Ebola flaring back up in Africa and the WHO (World Health Organization) is having a tough time containing it. That disease may spread to the U.S.

Depending on the disease contracted and the person first contracting a particular disease several people could become infected by the original carrier and non of them, original carrier included, may be showing signs of the infection before enough people have been infected to cause the disease to spread from pandemic to epidemic proportions. Again this depends on the diseases incubation period and each persons reaction to that disease after contracting it.

In the case of my brother everyone he has come in contact with in the past week needs to be treated just in case they may be carrying Meningitis. If just one person refuses to be treated and is infected they can cause the meningitis to keep spreading even though they are not showing any signs of the disease.

I didn't write this to cause a panic but to let people know that diseases can spread around the world very fast. If you feel sick and it doesn't go away after 2 or 3 days seek medical attention. This could at the very least save your life but could very well save someone else's life.

1 comment:

  1. I hear & agree with what your saying ... In years past (when my kids was around) I believed and did keep excellent health coverage.

    But today .... Should we rely on Obama care?... For our coverage? We're trying to "homestead" and anything to be honest who has the money for that?.....
    I joke "just throw me in a ditch when I kick off"(to Heaven mind you)... It's to expensive to even get planted now days / last year my father passed away and lucky him he prepaid the 10 thousand ... That's no flowers or fancy box (just the cheapest box available)
    Going to the dr's may get everything taken away (judgments / lawsuits / collection agents)
    For me I'll just trust God won't let anything bad happen (cutting fingers off with the chainsaws etc...) I can't afford even social programs ...???

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