HazMat Suits, Ebola, and 100% Safe Air to Breathe
Remnant Review
First, we read this in a British newspaper.
The longer the Ebola epidemic continues infecting people unabated, the higher the chances it will mutate and become airborne, the UN's Ebola response chief has warned.Anthony Banbury, the Secretary General's Special Representative, has said there is a 'nightmare' prospect the deadly disease will become airborne if it continues infecting new hosts.
His comments come as organisations battling the crisis in West Africa warned the international community has just four weeks to stop its spread before it spirals 'completely out of control'.
This would be a game-changer. This is what American officials refuse to mention.
Pandemics are always officially "over there." Officials do not want to create panic. Therefore, there will never officially be a pandemic "over here."
Mr Banbury told the Telegraph that aid workers were fighting a race against time amid fears the disease will begin to mutate.He said: 'The longer it moves around in human hosts in the virulent melting pot that is West Africa, the more chances increase that it could mutate.
So, the possibility exists of airborne transmission. It is not here yet. Officially.
As news of the disease continues to be front-page news, this is creating the conditions for a panic. The United States has not seen one in the past, not even in 1918's flu. This would be uncharted territory.
I do not see how a quarantine or lock-down could work in an urban nation. There are insufficient police resources to enforce it. If this were self-policed -- a refusal to enter closed spaces -- the West's economy would shut down: office buildings, subways, and schools. We have never seen this.
So we sit and wait.
If Ebola ever goes airborne, will local officials admit this? I doubt it. Over there, yes. Never over here.
HAZMAT SUITS
Second, an American firm has announced that the industry is now producing 160,000 HazMat suits, which are for sale for $1,200 each. These are very expensive suits. A company can charge a great deal of money for them, because the company is able to advertise that it has special ways to seal off any contamination. I certainly understand. If I were coming in contact with someone with Ebola, I would like a suit like this.
There is no way that the State Department is buying these suits for West African medical workers. There are not 160,000 medical workers in West Africa. These suits are being purchased for domestic consumption. By having the State Department buy them, the federal government is disguising their ultimate destination.
Let's think about this purchase for a moment. There is always the possibility that seeing is not believing. Here is what I am seeing. Every time I see a photograph of medical personnel dealing with somebody who is suspected of having Ebola, I find that the photograph reveals someone who is dressed in one of these suits. We do not see photos of medical care personnel dealing with Ebola victims who are not wearing these suits.
I am also informed by the CDC and other official agencies that there is nothing to worry about. There is no threat of an Ebola outbreak here. We should not worry that someone from Liberia flew across the Atlantic Ocean in a sealed compartment with perhaps another hundred people. He was in no way a threat to those people. We are assured this by officials. But, when we see other officials dealing with Ebola victims, they are always dressed in HazMat suits.
What is HazMat? It is an acronym for hazardous materials. It appears that people who have Ebola are to be regarded in much the same way as radioactive substances. You have to have a suit specially designed to deal with radioactive substances, and you also have to have a similar suit in order to deal with people who have contracted Ebola.
Third, when I see these images, and then I hear the official assurances, I sense a disconnect. If an Ebola victim can fly across the ocean in a sealed container called a commercial jetliner, and if he can go into a hospital or any other sealed area, and he is no threat to anybody, then why are the experts who understand the threat always dressed in a hazardous materials suit?
I also wonder about the waste generated by somebody with Ebola. If this waste should only be dealt with by somebody who is in a hazardous materials suit, why is it okay to flush this waste down the toilet? We are assured that the processes that make hazardous waste of other kinds safe will work just as well on the waste generated by somebody with Ebola. The problem is this: in order to get that waste from a container that has been carried by somebody dressed in a hazardous materials suit across the room to a toilet, a hospital has to hire specialized professionals who are willing to take risks of fatal contamination. So, walking across a room with these wastes puts you at risk of death, but once into the toilet and flushed away, the toilet is completely safe, and so is the pipe system that gets this waste to the water treatment facility. Apparently, this waste is deadly while crossing a room, but completely safe when dumped down the toilet and flushed down pipes.
I am a mere layman. I am not supposed to make connections like this. I am not supposed to look at somebody dressed in a hazardous materials suit, who is in charge of transferring waste that comes out of the body of somebody with Ebola, as he carries the waste across a room, to be dumped into a toilet, and then flushed down pipes. We are assured that the treatment facilities that make other kinds of waste completely safe will work just as well on waste generated by somebody with Ebola. I am willing to accept this. But I do have a problem with the idea that a toilet and pipes leading to a waste treatment facility are as safe as water produced by the waste treatment facility. If waste treatment in a hospital requires somebody in a hazardous materials suit to take the waste across the room and dump it into a toilet, I have certain concerns about that toilet.
If there is a problem with the toilet, then there is a problem with every hospital facility that has been used to house a victim of Ebola. Officials assure me that there is no concern, but whenever I see officials dealing with victims of this disease, they are not giving assurances into a microphone. The reason for this is clear: they have a face shield in between their mouths and a microphone. They do not give interviews. They do not give assurances. They do not breathe the air that is in the hospital room. We do not see their faces. Their faces are concealed behind face shields.
Level A suits have separate air supplies. Level B do not. Here is a Level A suit.
We know what the CDC requires for hospitals: Infection Prevention and Control Recommendations for Hospitalized Patients with Known or Suspected Ebola Hemorrhagic Fever in U.S. Hospitals.
Conduct the procedures in a private room and ideally in an Airborne Infection Isolation Room (AIIR) when feasible. Room doors should be kept closed during the procedure except when entering or leaving the room, and entry and exit should be minimized during and shortly after the procedure.HCP should wear gloves, a gown, disposable shoe covers, and either a face shield that fully covers the front and sides of the face or goggles, and respiratory protection that is at least as protective as a NIOSH certified fit-tested N95 filtering facepiece respirator or higher (e.g., powered air purifying respiratory or elastomeric respirator) during aerosol generating procedures.
This is Level A.
Has the State Department ordered Level A or Level B suits? The reporters need to ask.
Here is a photo of crew members who are cleaning up the apartment where the Ebola victim stayed in Dallas. They are wearing Level A suits.
Why must hospital workers wear Level A face shields? When they take waste from a bed in which a victim of this disease is lying, and they transport the waste across the room to a toilet, they do not breathe the air in that room. Yet we are assured that there is no problem with this disease in terms of anything that can be breathed in the air. Then why do they wear these suits?
I think this is a legitimate question. But reporters never seem to get around to asking this question. The people who give the public assurances about the complete safety of the environment are never dressed in the hazardous materials suits. There is a reason for this. They are not personally anywhere near somebody who suffers from this disease. They do not go into the rooms of people who are suffering from this disease. I do not blame them. I do not intend to go into one of those rooms.
BIG BLACK LIES
My concern is this: public health officials have to lie. At some point, they absolutely have to lie. They are paid to lie. They are paid to prevent panic. I am not aware of where the line is in between truth and falsehood with respect to this disease. I am not in a position to know the point at which a public health official will begin to lie. I only know this: there is such a line, and when he crosses it, he will begin to lie.
I want to hear a reporter ask this question: "Why is everybody who was in contact with this person wearing a hazardous materials suit?" I think the answer is obvious. The people wearing the suits are afraid of dying. But why are they afraid of dying? What is it that they do in their suits, with the face shields, that the rest of the community does not do, and therefore does not have to wear suits with face shields? Exactly what is it that requires a face shield inside a hospital room, but does not require a face shield on a commercial jetliner?
I know this is a reasonable question. I do not hear any reporter asking it. I do not expect to hear any reporter asking it. If any reporter asks it, I do not expect it to be on the prime-time evening news. I do not expect to see an account of it in a newspaper. That is because everybody in the media will be afraid not to lie.
We do not know when the lies will begin. We know only this: the lies will surely begin. If this disease becomes a pandemic, we will be given nothing except lies from officials.