2 ms·
> Early in the investigation, an elderly man in one of the affected villages told the doctors, “This disease has happened because the rain has not washed our ca
by nerdponx 4y ago
> Early in the investigation, an elderly man in one of the affected villages told the doctors, “This disease has happened because the rain has not washed our cassava.” Perhaps understandably, investigators initially ignored him. The practice of disease outbreak investigation involves an established sequence of steps concerned with relating cases to “time, place, and person.” Heeding advice from grizzled old locals does not feature prominently in field epidemiology manuals.
This is so incredibly frustrating. Why wouldn't you at least take this as a clue? The arrogance of Western medicine and science is astounding sometimes.
- emmelaich 4y ago.. and (but I realise this is hindsight) > almost invariably in rural villages that had already endured months of a severe drought You'd think to look for nutritional reasons in a drought, not infections or viruses, which, afaik, tend to be associated with water.
- AinderS 4y agoYou're looking at it with the benefit of filtered hindsight. How many other things were they also told? They had to distribute their investigative efforts to what they reasonably thought were the most likely culprits. Once those didn't pan out, they did take the clue: > However, as each new test failed to yield evidence for any old or new pathogens, the investigators returned to the old man’s words. Cassava was an important element of the local diet in Nampula, and therefore hard for Cliff and her team to overlook if they were considering a nutritional cause for the puzzling paralysis. Doesn't seem arrogant at all.
- dmix 4y ago> The arrogance of Western medicine and science is astounding sometimes. As opposed to what?