ebola has 42-day incubation period!

Apparently the 21-day quarantine period for people exposed to ebola is not long enough. While 95% of people who are exposed and come down with the disease will show symptoms within the 21 days, there is 3% who may not show symptoms until after those 21 days. While the change of becoming symptomatic is not very great after 21 days, it seems organizations would chose to err on the safe side and quarantine people for at least the 42 days reported by W.H.O.

www.who.int...

Recent studies conducted in West Africa have demonstrated that 95% of confirmed cases have an incubation period in the range of 1 to 21 days; 98% have an incubation period that falls within the 1 to 42 day interval.

We'll be adding this to the LONG list of failures by the CDC.....great find!!

a reply to: AnnieMaine

This has less to do with Ebola's incubation period and more to do with the biological response of the 3% in question.

There are tons of factors regarding how and when you will contract, incubate and then show symptoms of any disease.

To say that Ebola has an incubation period of 42 days isn't technically correct based on the amount of samples taken and cases already discovered and analyzed.

~Tenth

a reply to: tothetenthpower

while it may be due to individual response, WHO says they do not consider an infected area to be free of ebola until the 42 days have passed.

originally posted by: AnnieMaine
a reply to: tothetenthpower

while it may be due to individual response, WHO says they do not consider an infected area to be free of ebola until the 42 days have passed.

Which is more likely due to the fact that an infected person beyond the 21 day threshold is more likely to infect others than somebody within the incubation period.

These standards are based on the quality of care/policies in force in those specific regions as well. I can see why the WHO would take extra precautions in Western Africa, as opposed the the UK or US.

ETA: From the source in the OP:

The period of 42 days, with active case-finding in place, is twice the maximum incubation period for Ebola virus disease and is considered by WHO as sufficient to generate confidence in a declaration that an Ebola outbreak has ended.

~Tenth

a reply to: AnnieMaine

Standard Ebola isn't that contagious. Unless we now have something different...

I read this yesterday and thought the same thing until l put it into context of what the entire article is about.

There two seperate periods or cycles being discussed. One is the 21 day incubation period for Ebola that's required in order to diagnose if the carrier is indeed infected.

The second as discussed, is a 42 day period that's required in order for the disease to be officially over.

What their alluding to in the quoted portion you've provided, is the 95% that fall in the 2-21 day incubation period are the same as the 98%.

What I mean is that 98% of the 95% fall outside or overlap the 42 day period required for the virus to be eradicated, therefore the pandemic is still ongoing.

Once day 22 hits and 98% percent of the 95% still have symptoms or are infected, the cycle starts over until 100% of the 95% have no symptoms or are infected for 42 days.

So l think the incubation period is the same , 2-21 days. I could be wrong.

This disease is going to be a problem because too many assumptions were made about it from the beginning. They weren't evaluating evidence right, their observations of the disease were flawed. That isn't real science.

No wonder they are so confident that this disease will spread so fast. They are looking at the mistakes they made and lies they spread and the belief of most hospitals that their substandard isolation units are secure. The patient walks into the hospital or gets hauled there by ambulance without precautions. I am going to try to stay away from these places as much as possible if the disease spreads up here.

a reply to: AnnieMaine

Nigeria will celebrate tmrw because the 42 days will be up.

It was managed to get stopped in Nigeria, so that is something. If they can stop it there, it can be stopped in the US.

They thought it would come to a stop in Liberia, Guinea & Sierra Leone but they thought wrong and acted too late... these Country's don't have the Procedures or Facility's in place to deal with it and it will spiral! I'm not even sure it can be 'contained' anymore in these 3 Country's.

What to do? Put a border up around those 3 Country's and let the disease do what it has to do? Bring all Medical Staff back before they get infected and die? Keep trying to fight it and beat it?

I know what I wrote sounds really cruel but it may be the only answer to stopping it now.

a reply to: TruthxIsxInxThexMist

I may be out in left field but that sure sounds like a good reason to put foreign troops on your own soil, those from the same country do not like to fire on thier own citizens.

Another site saying ebola may have a longer than 21-day quarantine period. This site says up to 12% of cases may go beyond the 21 days. They say 31 days would be better.

One thing that is scary for me is that ebola can live outside the body on objects for several days. Think how often money is handled and passed from person to person.

TextWhile the 21 day quarantine value currently used may have arose from reasonable interpretation of early outbreak data, this work suggests a reconsideration is in order and that 21 days may not be sufficiently protective to public health.

currents.plos.org...