Dear Editor,
The government could take a page out of Medecins Sans Frontiers (MSF) procedures book. (As reported by the BBC.) They have been operating in the hot zone continuously from the start of the Ebola epidemic and very few of their doctors and nurses have contracted the disease, even after thousands of contact hours. They use three sets of gloves, multiple suits, aprons, face masks, boots, and a lot of tape to tape off the joints of the gloves, boots, etc and then they have a second similarly suited-up persons to work with and monitor the putting on and removal of the protective gear.
I hear that they also use showers of bleach in the decontamination process. They work in pairs, after all, if one had a splash of blood on his back, or made a mistake, his partner would be able to see it. The poor nurse in Texas would probably not be infected if she followed the MSF procedures. What the ministry is putting out as information is virtually useless in a situation where one mistake is practically a death sentence. Would Jamaica survive one case of Ebola? I don't think so. Most likely it would spread as fast as CHIKV through the population.
Howard Chin, PE
Member
Jamaica Institution of Engineers
Ebola infection procedures
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The government could take a page out of Medecins Sans Frontiers (MSF) procedures book. (As reported by the BBC.) They have been operating in the hot zone continuously from the start of the Ebola epidemic and very few of their doctors and nurses have contracted the disease, even after thousands of contact hours. They use three sets of gloves, multiple suits, aprons, face masks, boots, and a lot of tape to tape off the joints of the gloves, boots, etc and then they have a second similarly suited-up persons to work with and monitor the putting on and removal of the protective gear.
I hear that they also use showers of bleach in the decontamination process. They work in pairs, after all, if one had a splash of blood on his back, or made a mistake, his partner would be able to see it. The poor nurse in Texas would probably not be infected if she followed the MSF procedures. What the ministry is putting out as information is virtually useless in a situation where one mistake is practically a death sentence. Would Jamaica survive one case of Ebola? I don't think so. Most likely it would spread as fast as CHIKV through the population.
Howard Chin, PE
Member
Jamaica Institution of Engineers
Ebola infection procedures
-->