NOTE: This post includes language not suitable for viewing at work or by the easily offended.
Dear Federal Government,
Not to put too fine a point on it, but you fucked up. Big time. You allowed a disease for which there is no known cure, only treatment, to come to our country, a place where it is not indigenous.
What the fuck?
Since you can't even keep the President safe, I can't trust you to keep me safe, and I'm far less valuable than the President. That said, let me dust off my Master's in Public Affairs from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University, (AKA The Degree I Never Use), concentration in Domestic Policy, and help y'all pull your heads out of your collective asses. It doesn't take a Princeton degree to do this.
Step One: Admit That You Don't Know How Ebola is Spread
The explanations for how Ebola is spread are not explanations -- they're theories. Y'all really don't know how it's spread, and until you admit that, we can't take the steps we need to take. First, everyone was saying that it's spread by contact with bodily fluids and not by airborne transmission. Now you have folks saying that if you're within three to four feet of someone with Ebola who sneezes, and the effluent gets in one of your mucous membranes, you might get it. And there are cases in which you're not quite sure how fully protected health care workers got it.
And then you have Dr. Anthony Fauci pontificating about how it's spread. Really? Isn't he the doctor who was first out of the gate saying that HIV/AIDS is spread by normal household contact? Despite all the work he's done since in HIV/AIDS research, I'm not willing to treat him as a credible source on the transmission of Ebola. I'd rather wait a few years after he's had a chance to study it. But we don't have a few years. We have a few weeks.
So, step one is to admit that you don't know how Ebola is spread so we can move on to step two.
Step Two: Ban All Travel To And From The Affected Countries, Except for Aid Missions
Yep, I said it. Ban all travel to and from Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone until this is under control in their countries. Why? Because they haven't contained Ebola where it started, and our only line of defense here is accepting people's travel histories on faith and taking temperatures at five airports. Really, Federal Government, that's the best you can do? For a disease for which there is no known cure and little if any experimental drugs available?
I call bullshit. You can't control what you can't contain.
Ban all travel except for aid missions, which leads to step three:
Step Three: Treat Affected Health Care Workers Where They Contract The Disease
Sorry, but if you leave America and get Ebola in West Africa while serving as a health care worker, you get to stay in West Africa and be treated. If you decided to join this battle, God bless you, but you knew what you were signing up for. You don't get to bring risk of the disease to the rest of us who didn't sign up for that risk here in America. Sad to say, but if more health care workers from America had to be treated where they contracted the disease, it would make step four move faster.
Step Four: Use Old Military Ships As Mobile Hospitals to Treat Ebola Patients in West Africa
Instead of trying to build MASH hospitals in the West African heat and humidity, use old military ships -- from all of the G-7 countries, not just us -- as mobile hospitals to treat Ebola patients in West Africa. Transport them out by helicopter. While the ships serve as mobile hospitals, build the land-based ones quickly. The key is to isolate the sick as soon as they are diagnosed, and as far from the rest of the population as possible. Nobody leaves the ships alive unless they are well. When it's all over, burn the ships and sink them.
Step Five: Quarantine Everyone Who Came to America From West Africa During the Outbreak
Yep, I said it. Quarantine every last one of them. And their pets, too. Sorry. Actually, no, I'm not sorry.
Step Six: Raise Money. Fast
Every one of the industrialized nations needs to do an EFT (Electronic Funds Transfer) to Doctors Without Borders like yesterday. Trust me, if Wal-Mart can demand same day payment for my past due credit card bill (I paid on time, just not the right amount), surely we have the means to transfer funds to the NGOs on the ground within hours, not days, so they can get all the life saving equipment they need.
Along those lines, where's the Ebola Telethon like we had for the tsunami victims in Japan and Thailand? Where's the Ebola fund raising anthem like "We Are The World"? Lionel Ritchie, you need to write a song quick, fast and in a hurry. Bono and Elton John, gather your celebrity friends and play Wembley Stadium. George Clooney and Don Cheadle, y'all need to run this shit. Madonna, wear a t-shirt that says, "Fight Ebola now" and try not to look anorexic while you're wearing it.
These six steps are a good start. Better than what the Federal Government is doing or is proposing to do.
You're welcome, Federal Government. Now, pull your heads out of your asses.
