Rand Paul wants you to believe that Ebola is 'incredibly contagious' [View all]

[uhnope]

Source: The Week

Two of the nearly 100 nurses and medical staff who were in close contact with dying Ebola patient Thomas Duncan in Dallas have tested positive for the virus, so far. But on Thursday, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) told a group of students at New Hampshire's Plymouth State University that Ebola is "incredibly contagious," that you can spread it from 3 feet away, and that "if someone has Ebola at a cocktail party they're contagious and you can catch it from them." The White House "should be honest about that."

Paul is an ophthalmologist, but infections disease experts disagree with his diagnosis. Paul's "3 feet" statement is based on CDC guidelines for health-care workers dealing with symptomatic (thus highly contagious) patients — it considers prolonged periods within up to 3 feet of a patient without protective gear to be "low-risk" contact.

The CDC, World Health Organization, and other Ebola experts say the only way to catch Ebola is through direct contact with blood, vomit, feces, or other body fluids. "The virus has not become an airborne transmitted disease since it was first identified in the 1970s," says CBS News medical correspondent Dr. Jon LaPook.

Read more: http://theweek.com/speedreads/index/270093/speedreads-rand-paul-wants-you-to-believe-that-ebola-is-incredibly-contagious

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And he wants to be president