"Ultimately, we are all connected by the air we breathe." - CDC Director Tom Frieden, Press conference on the first diagnosed case of Ebola in the US on September 30, 2014.
The quote above by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Tom Frieden, seen at the 4:28 minute mark in the video below, was brought to my attention by my partner Stefan aka Live Free or Die, and when heard in the context of the statement Frieden was giving about the first diagnosed Ebola patient in the Dallas, Texas, it seemed out of context within the confines of the speech he was giving in order to allay the fears of the public in regards to Ebola being in the US.
Keep that statement in mind as we go through what we know about this patient, from when he entered the US to when he became infectious, the questions of how many people he came into contact with before ultimately being admitted into Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas, and the time line of when we can expect to see further Ebola cases across America.
According to CBS-DFW, the Ebola patient arrived in the US on September 20, 2014 and became symptomatic on the 24th or 25th of September. USA Today reports "The patient became sick Sept. 24, and he sought care two days later. He was sent home...." - Keep THAT in mind also, he was sent home after becoming infectious, this goes directly to the point that we have been warned by doctors and nurses about, being that the US, nor it's hospitals, are not prepared for an Ebola outbreak.
The bottom line is that the Dallas Ebola patient was infectious for 4 to 5 days before being admitted into the hospital The CDC states they will attempt to track who he was in contact with, but while friends, neighbors, relatives, co-workers, etc.... may be easy to track, what about the the people he came in contact with just going about his everyday life? Did he go to the store? A movie? Get gas? Etc ..... There is no way to track every single person this man came in contact with.
TIME LINE OF POTENTIAL SPREAD ACROSS THE US
As was explained in a prior ANP article, according to government reports, it takes one drop of aerosolized Ebola infected blood to infect 500,000 (half a million people) and using the disturbingly fast spread of the EV 68 virus hitting children in America as an example where since mid-August it is now in 41 states according to the CDC website, we get a good idea of fast and how far any infectious virus can spread.
It can take up to three weeks, 21 days, before an Ebola infected person(s) starts to show symptoms and becomes infectious according to the CDC, so the time line of when to expect to see more cases throughout the United States, so by October 15th, anyone that Patient Zero came into contact with while infectious should be showing signs of infection and be contagious. At that time, anyone they come into contact with before being quarantined or hospitalized, will simply go about their business, not knowing that they too could be infected. By November the next wave, and then comes the holiday season where people travel all across the country to be with family or friends anD airports have no effective means to "screen" for Ebola before allowing people to travel across the country.
Now we come back full circle to CDC Director Tom Frieden's ominous statement "Ultimately, we are all connected by the air we breathe."
Here is a question to ponder as you go about your day... why did Frieden refuse to directly answer whether US Patient Zero was a US citizen when asked at his press conference and would only say "He is visiting family who live in this country. Do we have any other questions in the room?"
