Let me circle back on what I wrote about on Sunday: good news on Ebola.
As predicted, virtually all the Texas quarantines and monitorings of possible exposed people ended yesterday – including for the family members of the late Thomas Eric Duncan, who had closest contact with him just before he was hospitalized on September 28th. This is not only good news for the people involved. In particular, it shows that we may be on the receding end of the current scare. And more generally it tends to confirm what we know about Ebola: that prior to its end stage, it is not that easy to contract. And because of that, outbreaks can be contained.
Also notable is that we are at 13 days since Duncan died. The quarantine period for Ebola is 21 days. But symptoms appear for most victims after 8-10 days. That suggests it is increasingly unlikely that more health care workers will come down with Ebola from exposure to Duncan, though we won’t know that for sure until the middle of next week.
As the epidemiologists have warned from the start, we’re not really safe here as long as the epidemic is raging out of control in West Africa. But here, the news is good.
