The Slammer Case Study

There has been an acute worry roaming about the United States concerning the Ebola Outbreak. Originally, Ebola had never touched the United States until September of 2014. (4) The disease was originated from and named after a river in the Democratic of Congo. Since discovered, there have been known cases in Africa. There have been many very deadly cases of Ebola - the fatality rate is estimated to from about fifty to ninety percent. (2) To the United States, there had never been any worry about the disease until September twentieth of 2014. A man by the name of Thomas Eric Duncan boarded flight 822 from Liberia to Dallas, Texas. Flight 822 was where it all began. Nobody had any

In 2014 the United States was hit with a force far more deadly and dangerous than many threats received. The ebola virus took the world by storm after it was carried to the United States and spread by people who had visited West Africa. This virus was all the more deadly as it often took hours for any symptoms to occur. In this time the Center for Disease Control spent much time and many resources looking for answers to the many questions they had. Under the time constraint and scrutinizing public, they had to determine what ebola was, what it did and its effects on the general public.

The average fatality rate of patients infected with Ebola is around 50% according to the World Health Organization. The nonfiction book titled The Hot Zone by Richard Preston takes readers through true events pertaining to an outbreak of Ebola in the late 1980’s at a monkey testing facility in Reston, Virginia. The author heavily emphasizes the danger surrounding ignorance and uncertainty in regard to the viral and morbid Ebola at the conclusion of the book. While Preston makes this point evident countless times, three particular quotes give a clear example of Preston’s intention.

Although it was a nonfiction book, it was quite scary to think about how such a small thing like a virus can infiltrate a human being and cause such destruction and damage to possibly wipe out an entire community, city, country or even the world. Ebola could spread in multiple ways, through the air, blood or any openings on the body. It’s one of the deadliest known viruses in the world and it can mutate and change forms into many things and easily kill any organism on the planet. So much about the virus is unknown which makes it more horrifying. There are seven proteins in Ebola and only four of them are known. It is unknown what the others could do. If all of the seven proteins were known, there could be a cure. The way it moves through the body is alarming, it cripples the immune system then destroys the vascular system. There are many unknowns in nature, some dangerous and some not and there is no way to tell until they emerge just like Ebola. Nature is a wonderful thing full of different surprises that sometimes end up being

This is showing one of the main characters thinking about what made people hopeful and courageous people. He thinks that people who know what could happen to them later on don't stop and try to live on hoping everything will get better. Then in the article it says “ Guinea, where the epidemic started, has had at least 2,806 cases and 1,814 deaths”(paragraph 15). This show there being many people infected with ebola but even though they know they can end up dead they still try their best to keep living. All these people are trying to get through and have hope that everything will get better so they are courageous people.

Since the Ebola virus essentially liquefies the insides of the human body, once the brain begins to hemorrhage, the virus alters the personality of the victim (Preston, 1995, p. 39). The reader may draw the conclusion that depersonalization of Ebola victims is a terrifying reality. Ebola provides no awareness or memory to the victim when death arrives, as the plethora of effects “obliterate the person beneath them” (Preston, 1995, p. 4). Essentially, the virus is stealing the humanity away from the victim. Preston (1995) also adds “[t]he more one contemplates the hot viruses, the less they look like parasites and the more the begin to look like predators” (p. 136). The reader may wonder whether or not this virus is living or dead, and whether or not the virus is looking to destroy the human or feed on the

According to Kelley Beaucar Vlahos (2014), it was in 1995, with the release of Richard Preston’s novel The Hot Zone that Ebola’s infamy was came into the minds of the western public, the book is experiencing a resurgence. Preston chronicled how monkeys, which were shipping to the United States from Philippines, began to die in their cages. The book shaped a basic sense about Ebola and the concept of Ebola was present for the first time, additional, author’s opinion effects abounded in later report. In Adam Nossiter (2014) article, one woman lay curled in a fetal position, eyes shut, precariously balanced on cardboard sheets next to an open gutter in front of locked storefronts. From a wary distance, she had a high fever. Michael T. Osterholm (2014) also writes that the Ebola have been caused 4,300 cases and 2,300 deaths over past six months, and in 2012, a research team from Canada proved that the Ebola virus could be transmitted by the route from pigs to monkeys, whose lungs of both are very similar to those of humans. No doubt, this kind of scene did little to allay the fears of the public, even though the Ebola have not yet infected humans in American. Those three logical facts show the severe situation, Ebola has transformed into a completely killer virus, which influences and threatens people in the world. Media’s function in earliest representation is to let public know what the Ebola is, why should public focus on

Julia went to the next town (Gerber) that was closer than her and when she entered she saw people were whipping their backs. She had figured that the illness came here and they didn’t want to catch it so they were wiping their backs and telling god that they had enough pain and wouldn’t deserve that illness. There was a group of kids and they were playing a game the a ring around the rosie and they all fell down of weakness (Selection 2). Julia knew that the illness was spreading everywhere. Julia had wanted to find a cure for this illness.

In his article, Charles Blow writes about how since the Ebola outbreak, our country has not been battling a virus but a mania created through politicians and the media, who both profit from public anxiety. Instead of putting our focus on finding scientific advancements, we have been led astray by such silliness. In order to prevent Ebola, we need to stop it at its source. The virus is taking heavy toll on

The author mentioned “And the whole seizure, progress and termination of the disease, were the incidents of half an hour” sounds more like a threat because the “Red Death” just comes through quickly and vanished through many people’s lives without any hesitation. This disease has killed half of the country and it keeps on permeating throughout the rest of the other countries. This disease is similar to cancer, ebola,

The main concern regarding the safety of public stated in this case was Hickox treating patients with Ebola in West Africa, so therefore, there was a chance of her getting infected and bringing it back into the United States. Another concern is people whom are exposed to this virus needed to be quarantined for 21 days for the symptoms to develop after coming back from the area infected by the virus.

Fear and ignorance was also widespread in the 1980’s during the HIV/AIDS epidemic even after its modes of transmission were correctly identified. AIDS victims suffered for social as well as medical reasons. Look for stories of mass hysteria and you’ll find example after example. At the time of this writing fear has spread throughout the world of the Ebola virus currently ravaging the West Coast of Africa. Even though the method of transmission and incubation periods are explained to the general public, many mistrust the

As you can tell from this sections title, a panic started once Ebola was found in the USA. This would seem unlikely due to the fact that Ebola was first talked about spreading in Africa months before it was brought here. Americans didn’t seem to care as much until it as on their doorstep. Otherwise it is just another story that they hear about on the news, like terrorist jacking planes oversee, Ukraine being invaded by Russians, or any other sad or bad coverage you can see cover. It seems like we as a people don’t care until it becomes our problem, or until we go stick our noses into someone else’s business. This isn’t as simple as Americans don’t care, but it is more about how sensationalized we are to a lot of news. Most very horrible stories or bad news just doesn’t affect people as much anymore as it used too. Unless it sounds like an apocalyptic event or horrible disease people don’t care as much. Americans see so many bad things in movies and everyday in the news most just are not affected by it. As the famous writer Susan D. Moeller wrote in her Book Compassion Fatigue: How the Media sell Disease, Famine, War and Death,

It's easy to be frightened of Ebola, especially considering the fact that it's highly contagious in its later stages. It's best to be informed about such topics, so we're here to bring you some facts you didn't know about the deadly disease.

SECOND POINT: Although an outbreak in America is highly unlikely, the fact that Ebola has been diagnosed on American soil brings fear to all. Because of its infectiousness and long incubation period, and the banality of early symptoms, it can be difficult to track and contain. We also do not have a cure for this disease, sure we have experimental drugs, but nothing official. The spread has been much quicker in this outbreak than others, affecting both urban and rural areas. Usual protective measures to prevent the spread appear to be less effective in this epidemic. What ebola does to the human body defies reason and is something like out of a horror movie, not a text book. Americans feel hopeless and vulnerable because Ebola is here. The victim who flew from Liberia to Dallas, Texas on September 30th of this year did expose others and there is a risk of it spreading. The Ebola virus is the most terrifying and least-understood virus known to man. We are witnessing the onset of a deadly mutation anticipated and feared for almost four decades. Americans have watched fully informed and trained health care workers contract Ebola.