Better Late than Never

I have been keeping an ear open for the response to the unprecedented Ebola outbreak in West Africa and the, until recently, the flaccid response to the deaths in the region.  Finally, it appears that the U.S. has recognized the scope of what is going on in the nations affected and how the infections in those nations could spread to many other regions of the world, including here in Canada.
And I wonder, again, if a similar outbreak had occurred in Switzerland or England whether it would have taken the U.S., Canada, and the other wealthier nations of the world, a full seven months to respond.  It still seems to me that 3000 U.S. troops, along with the other nations that have responded is inadequate.

Here's a visual timeline from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

On September 16, 2014, a full six months after Guinea announced the outbreak, U.S. President Barack Obama announced a ramped up response to the outbreak which had by September 10th taken more than 2300 lives, with more than 4849 infected people reported.  Both the Centre for Disease Control and the World Health Organization (WHO) have repeatedly said from the outset of the Ebola epidemic that all numbers are almost certainly under reported.

It appears that only after the arrival of Thomas Duncan in Dallas and his subsequent diagnosis with the Ebola virus did the U.S. and the West begin to take notice of the potential for the continuing spread of the virus beyond the initial 4 countries affected.

Ken Isaacs, Vice President of program and government relations at Samaritan's Purse stated that the number of Ebola patients doubled between August and September 16, 2014.  Predictions are for 100,000 people to be eventually affected.

The WHO had predicted in September that a total of 20,000 cases of Ebola could be expected by November, 2014.  The Centre for Disease Control has made several projections: The worst case scenario is an incredible 1.4 million people by January, 2015.  And the best case scenario predicts 550,000 cases by the end of January, 2015.

How the world has sat on the sidelines for so long with these kinds of numbers being put out by the CDC and WHO is beyond me.  How is it possible to believe that this is not our problem if even half the numbers of cases predicted comes true is also hard to fathom.  Some people will surely travel, undocumented from these regions to escape the virus.  And some of these people migrating will certainly bring the virus to the shores of Europe.

Africa may seem far from North America but it is only days air travel away.  Consider that the distance between Africa (Tangier, Morocco) and Europe (Taifa in Spain) is a mere 32 kms.  The possibility of this outbreak going global is not too far fetched.