I'm getting an awful lot out of this discussion and your wonderful posts, even tho I am swamped and not able to contribute anything. That will change I hope tomorrow when I have a free day to read the next 3 chapters.
But on the previous thoughts, Pearson, that's just amazing, your son in Africa! And I did not know that Bruce had been in the Peace Corps there, too. Does Africa have the hold on Bruce it seems to have on everybody else? Has he been back? I can see Will is very happy there. Is he there on business or a service corps, or?
When you first said would we be worried if he were our son, my first thought was he's more likely to get it in the Newark Airport than where he is, and then I read all your posts, saw the monkeys, paid attention to hysteria's post and after reading the link put here about the replacement of fluids, I'd say I was wrong there.
The splitting of the disease from Ebola Zaire (which apparently authorities disagree on as the latest version, as late as last month, some say it's not Zaire, this latest one, some say it's a new strain, some say it IS Zaire). You can seemingly find experts to say both.
Do we think it's this replacement of fluids, golly moses what volumes given per patient, that makes the difference? They would be most unlikely to have that in Africa unless helped.
When I read the Flame Trees of Thika and saw the film I understood vicariously the hold Africa has, I'd love to see it. But MONKEYS? Everybody has something they are...afraid of? Dislike? I'm not sure what the word is. I hate monkeys, just hate them. Nasty nasty things. Can't look at them in zoos. Wouldn't want one anywhere near me and look at them in the photos there behind Will!! I'd rather walk thru 100 caves with bats than be anywhere near a monkey.
Would I be worried if my son were over there? Are you kidding? Heck yes. Even IF it is a gigantic country nobody has told the monkeys. Preston says with the advent of air travel... "All of the earth's cities are connected by airline routes. The web is a network. Once a virus hits the net, it can shoot anywhere in a day-- Paris, Tokyo, New York, Los Angeles, wherever planes fly."
But he doesn't mean it's airborne... (My doctor has the same notice up, hysteria)... You are not going to get it standing in line in Newark for 2 hours trying to get thru Customs, with the people around you coughing, or does he mean that? He means these infected people can then infect others, right? With bodily fluids. Except coughing being a bodily fluid? Coughing in your hand, putting your unprotected hand on one of those posts and leaving... and then? Right behind you comes a child. He puts his hand on the posts, it's still wet, he rubs his eyes, is he then infected? Which bodily fluids, do they know?
Entire villages wiped off the map around the shores of Lake Victoria, because this virus has moved from those disgusting monkeys to humans. The host.
Love the photos of Lake Victoria and the sunset, thank you Ella, I had no idea the thing was so huge!!!
Looks like a sea rather than a lake.
Pedln, I"m glad to see you here, I've missed talking to you in book discussions. Good point on Mr. Jones and his guilt. I think some people have an overdeveloped sense of guilt about things really beyond their control. Did anybody here think he was to blame? Or not? I may have missed that discussion. I hope not.
Anyway, this discussion, your links, Pat H, and what you're saying, Joan K, are very helpful and calming, to me!
Back when I've read the next three chapters, I am enjoying the book.
