ISIS or Ebola?

[DanieltheDragon]

Which is a greater threat both in terms of lives lost and long term damage globally? ISIS or Ebola?

A week of fighting ISIS through airstrikes runs about 35 million dollars. What have we done so far against Ebola?

The current 3000 troops and 30 million is simply to little to late. The virus is spreading at an exponential rate. A year ago it would have taken very few resources to contain 6 months ago 3000 troops would have been overkill to stop the virus's transmission. The sad thing is over 2000 people have died and that really is just the start. does anyone really think 3000 troops will be sufficient to help enforce quarantines and build treatment centers in population centers in the millions? Current projections put the disease at 20,000 infected a month from now. That my friends is a 7 to 1 ratio of infected per soldier. currently there are 5000 known cases and very likely even more unreported. In fact that seems very likely given the new death rate numbers of 70% vs 50% a week ago the deaths were simply not being reported. Lets really put that in perspective a month from now 14,000 people will likely be dying. By December they expect roughly 250,000 at a minimum infected which leaves us anywhere from 125,000 to 175,000 dying. These numbers are going to get really big before it is all said and done. ISIS has estimated to have killed roughly 2000 civilians mostly Syrians and Iraqis

So again what is the bigger threat ISIS? or Ebola? Why are we investing more in ISIS than Ebola?

[WinePusher]

So again what is the bigger threat ISIS? or Ebola? Why are we investing more in ISIS than Ebola?

I suggest that we look at Ebola from a historical perspective. Civilization managed to survive the black death, even though at that time medicine was horribly underdeveloped. We're now living in the 21st century and the field of medicine has evolved drastically. Sadly, Ebola will continue to wipe out the developing areas of the world but the first world, including the United States and Europe, are pretty much insulated from the problem.

Now, the issue with ISIS is much more complicated than the Ebola crisis and the West should tread with extreme caution when responding to this threat in order to avoid creating any additional problems in the future. At the moment ISIS is the bigger threat since it isn't necessarily confined to the Middle East, while Ebola is confined to the developing world. But who knows, things may change.

[DanieltheDragon]

[Replying to post 2 by WinePusher]

I am not saying that ISIS should not be dealt with. I am just saying monetarily where are our priorities. It's not a matter of just are we isolated from the problem. We were isolated from ISIS until we started airstrikes against them. We sorta made ISIS our problem(rightly so I don't want our country to sit idly bye while they starve thousands of people in a mountain).

If our involvement with ISIS was for humanitarian reasons. Why did we not involve ourselves with combating EBOLA when it was very manageable. Now it frankly will be incredibly expensive and difficult to maintain. The commitment now of $130,000,000 is a bit to late they could have used that months ago. Now it has spread into highly dense population centers something Ebola has never done before. You have a population that is afraid of health officials and afraid of treatment. The conditions are terrible. This is not an outbreak that will stop anytime soon.

[JoeyKnothead]

From the OP:

Which is a greater threat both in terms of lives lost and long term damage globally? ISIS or Ebola?

Inaction.

Some threats take more resources to counter, some less.

...
Why are we investing more in ISIS than Ebola?

Disregarding my comments above, ebola hasn't declared it wants to establish a caliphate, or to destroy so many other nations to do it.


I propose that humans are best geared to understand "human threats", as opposed to threats from stuff so many of us ain't ever laid us an eyeball on.



I commend you on a very thought provoking OP.

[EasternSP]

I see this issue as Ebola is merely a bacteria infection as I understand it and it will respond to proper medical treatment. ISIS is a man made issue that can be deceptive. A peace offering could be made and ISIS accept it, but they may later change their mind without returning the peace offering.

[DanieltheDragon]

[Replying to post 5 by EasternSP]

Its not about offering peace to ISIS. sans an expirimental drug of which there were only 6 doses of in the world. Ebola kills at an effective rate of 70% with proper medical care.
It is also a virus not a bacterial infection.

Currently it is estimated that the total cost to curb the outbreak is around $1 billion, currently we have contributed 130 million. Now that we have expanded into Syrian air space we will spend 1.4 billion a month.

If we had a budget of 1 billion dollars and we had to choose

Combat the spread of Ebola and save potentially hundreds of thousands of lives

Or

Combat ISIS

What would you choose?

[DanieltheDragon]

[Replying to post 6 by DanieltheDragon]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/ ... F720140930


First documented case in the states Ebola is officially more of a threat to Americans than ISIS

[Wootah]

I wish my country imported neither.

Both need to be contained and some good people will have to be potentially sacrificed to do so.

To the extent we can contain and degrade extreme Islam we should.

[99percentatheism]

[Replying to post 1 by DanieltheDragon]

Which one, when it threatens an American, is always deadly: Beheading by an ISIS-Muslim executioner or treatment for Ebola?

I think the better question would have been to add political correctness to what is deadliest to Americans when compared.

Ebola, ISIS or Progresssives in political power?

[DanieltheDragon]

[Replying to 99percentatheism]

Please stop dodging the question EBOLA which has a potential to end more lives than ISIS is not being treated as the threat that it is. Why is that?

Political correctness is just a phrase you use to side step the question