Let me set your mind at ease: I was actually at the hospital in question all day today (disclaimer: non-medical personnel, just coincidence) and I was in more d

Let me set your mind at ease: I was actually at the hospital in question all day today (disclaimer: non-medical personnel, just coincidence) and I was in more danger from the sushi at dinner than the Ebola in the ICU. Yes, there is a small chance of a multifocal outbreak, though CDC has moved quickly to identify and isolate potential contacts. There is an infinitesimal but still nonzero chance of an honest-to-god epidemic. But medical institutions and the federal government have wargamed all sorts of epidemic scenarios in the decade and a half of OMG ANTHRAX/SMALLPOX/H-N-SOMETHING-SOMETHING panic we've endured. Even in the (vanishingly unlikely) worst case scenario, state and local authorities have extremely expansive authorities to impose and enforce isolation and quarantines, violation of which (in Texas) is a third-degree felony. (CDC, under HHS delegation, can also impose quarantines to prevent interstate spread of disease, but generally this is left up to the state.) Dallas and surrounding communities could enforce a quarantine and let the outbreak burn out that way, although the economic cost would be enormous. But even mid-tier nations like Nigeria -- which spends per-capita 1% of what the US does on its health system, and which has what could be charitably described as a less-effective government -- have been able to stop Ebola cold with far less drastic action. In truth, the greater threat comes from citizens who could mob doctors' offices and ERs, demanding nonexistent ZMAPP cocktails for garden-variety seasonal flu symptoms. Unsurprisingly, there's not much medical surge capacity in most hospitals, and beds and labs are in chronically short supply. Health system resource consumption by scared but non-sick patients is a far more likely cause of mortality than an Ebola outbreak.