Calchas

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-29604184

This begins at T1 tomorrow, and will be extended to other terminals shortly.

UK Border Force officers will identify passengers to be screened. So expect additional questions about your activities and probably therefore delays.

layz

Begins at T1? Guess they're bored and needed something to do.

Silver Fox

I would rather they screen them at the point of departure. In fact, they can just close the borders until they find a cure.

sapper188

I am with you on this one.

Calchas

Exit screenings are already in effect in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea. I am not sure it is economically or politically feasible to close those borders, particularly the land ones. Unfortunately, diseases do not know borders.

There is a drug called "ZMapp" that appears effective in treating early stage patients, with several but not all patients being completely cured apparently by it. This was the drug used successfully to treat the two US citizens and the UK nurse who were infected much earlier in the year.

However, manufacturing ZMapp is a time consuming process. I believe that the next batch will be ready in December.

csutter

Read a bit too much of the Daily Mail lately?

There was a good post debunking all this Ebola panic nonsense on PPRuNe recently but the whole thread seems to have been deleted. Maybe it was too level headed

HighLife

Unless it was your family stuck there, I suppose?

Silver Fox

No, I would first make sure they had ebola, upgrade them on a 2-4-1 voucher and bring them back. Jeez.

bugsy

With such a limited test group (there were only a few does of the various drugs available as they are all still in preclinical stages of development) it's hard to say for sure if the drug had anything to do with the recovery of those being treated.

My understanding is that the mortality rate isn't as high as some previous outbreaks (figures I've seen put it at around 50-60% but ofc those are official figures and the real toll could be much higher), however with so many more infected the death toll is higher than previous outbreaks, even if the mortality rate is indeed lower. When you also add in the fact that most (if not all) of those receiving the drugs are also being treated in world class facilities outside of west africa, it's entirely possible that they would have recovered even without the drugs.

Also wasn't that the guy in Texas that died being treated with ZMapp plus I'm sure I read somewhere that one of the other patients who died outside of West Africa (in europe maybe) was also being treated with another of the drugs under devlopment.

All that being said, the development of such drugs can only be a good thing, even if it's likely such research will be completed too late for the majority affected by the current outbreak.

I read an article stating that the WHO believes that in order for this outbreak to be checked, at least 70% of those infected are being treated and quarantined in treatment centres however, currently only around 20% of those infected are in such facilities, with many more being turned away due to lack of beds...a situation that won't improve without assistance from outside the region.

Calchas

I agree, just bringing to light the fact that a cure is under active development.

Nature's editorial this week (subscription required) also states that isolation of the affected countries will not suppress the outbreak and as resources grow thin that policy would likely become very counterproductive.

Roger

Simon Calder on the phone to LBC said that the only flights of interest were those connecting on the same airline with flights from the affected areas. At T1 this morning, that meant a single flight: Brussels Airlines from, er, Brussels.

However, having sussed that out, journalists were prevented by 'security' (HAL?) from pursuing this and reporting.

Good to have a 'free' press.

paulwuk

It's a political stunt, to appease the rabid readers of certain papers, nothing more nothing less.

Apparently eurostar will also have screening.

So aside from the waste of money, the question is, how much time will it add to the immigration process when it's in full swing?

catandmouse

In theory none, at least if they did it whilst people were standing in line waiting.

LupineChemist

From an FT perspective, are they going to be implementing this across the board? I have a trip to the UK soon and I'm hoping it doesn't inconvenience me too much. Flying from MAD, but I don't have an EU passport.

Calchas

Yes, at major airports.