Pre-Panic At The Times

Times editors have a pre-panic about the possibility of Ebola making its way to India:

India's Public Health Crisis

An infected person travels from West Africa to India and seeks treatment at an underfinanced and overwhelmed public hospital. There, substandard treatment unleashes an Ebola pandemic. It’s the nightmare scenario set out by Peter Piot, the British microbiologist who first identified the Ebola virus. About 45,000 Indians live in West Africa, and Indian trade with Nigeria, particularly in medical services and pharmaceuticals, has boomed.

However, India’s most troubling threat is not abroad, but at home: the crippled public health system. The nation spends less than 1 percent of its gross domestic product on public health care. There are only nine hospital beds per 10,000 in India, compared with 41 per 10,000 in China, and doctors, nurses and lab technicians are critically lacking.

The Indian government has already shown itself incapable of dealing with lethal viral diseases. As many as 80 percent of the 30 million Indians infected with dengue fever every year never seek medical care or are turned away from hospitals whose beds are full. Ebola would quickly overwhelm such strained hospitals. 

Given the lead times in health care reform I think India needs prevention and prayer. They can't deal with Ebola now and they won't be able to change that in the next six months.

Comments

[JiB]

Early bird meet worm.

Just drinking the water in India can give you the same symptoms as Ebola.

[anonamom]

cross post---ftr, 5:58 Jib ;-)

We all remember that horrible racist cop in Ferguson who killed that poor unarmed black youth, right?

NYT says "never mind."

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/18/us/ferguson-case-officer-is-said-to-cite-struggle.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&smid=tw-nytimes&_r=1

I guess he was a 300 pound thug intent on killing the officer after all.

[anonamom]

David Horowitz needs to run the RNC.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/frontpagemag-com/the-democrats-war-against-the-war-on-terror-and-the-battle-plan-for-defeating-the-left/

[jimmyk on iPad]

Guess I'll cross-post too.

'NYT says "never mind."'

If only. The article is still thumping the "contradictory" witness statements, and the laughable notion that he was surrendering with his hands up when shot. Oh, and of course the puzzlement that he was shot six times.

[anonamom]

jimmy k is correct--they are giving cover further down than I bothered to read

[henry]

Call centers hardest hit.

[Skoot]

MM mentioned on prior thread. Stinging defeat for Obama. SCOTUS won't interfere with Texas voter ID law. Ginsberg Soto and Kagan dissent.

Scotusblog

[Miss Marple]

Skoot,

Thanks for bringing that over and finding a link. I am sure there is gnashing of teeth in the White House this morning.

[sbw]

From Narciso: bugus ethics complaint on the previous^2 thread

“Bugus” instead of bogus works perfectly. The complaint was not only false, it was filed as an electoral distraction designed to fog the media and drive down the vote. Bug us.

[jimmyk]

SCOTUS won't interfere with Texas voter ID law.

Texas isn't really in play. We needed SCOTUS not to interfere in Wisconsin.

[Steve]

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1 - “Return to District 12” -- Trailer

http://commoncts.blogspot.com/2014/10/trailer-hunger-games-mockingjay-part-1.html

[Jane on Ipad]

The Horowitz speech is spectacular.

[Janet]

Yes, Jane.
2003 was when I "got up off the couch".
It was like the radical left tripped the switch to "ON" & their 60's anti-war glory days were resurrected in full force.

[narciso]

yes it was a typo, sbw, but the point still applies.

[sbw]

Narciso, absolutely a typo and one that needed to be elevated and supported because, as you say, the point still applies.

I applaud your typo. :-)

[Black Hat]

The Times is only a couple of days behind Yuval Levin on this. Not bad.

[RickB]

"They can't deal with Ebola now and they won't be able to change that in the next six months."

If Senegal and Nigeria can deal with Ebola, then India has at least the potential to do so. Containment has nothing to do with hospital beds and everything to do with isolation, quarantine and contact tracking. It's true that India cannot afford the heroic idiocy practiced by our credentialed moronacracy but it remains to be seen whether it will be guided by Global Village Idiots or common sense.

[Cat]

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