Dr. Daniel Bausch : Aggressive Diagnostics Use Will Be The Key To Managing New Epidemics...

As new viral vectors mutate, emerge and develop, especially in Africa -- in transmission from mammalian hosts to human ones, the powerful new diagnostics -- if they can be manufactured somewhere in the "middle" expense range. . . will be absolutely critical. But we need to get them on the ground, there too -- close to the spots for the likely next outbreaks, for this all to be transformative.

Here's NPR, reporting on it all:

. . .For decades, Dr. Daniel Bausch fought the world's most dangerous emerging tropical viruses directly from the trenches: He has trapped bats in Democratic Republic of Congo in search of the animal reservoir of Marburg virus. He has jumped into outbreaks of diseases such as dengue, yellow fever, Lassa fever and Ebola, spending months at a time treating patients in lower income countries ranging from El Salvador to Guinea. . . .

But now Bausch says of this work, "You realize that's all on the response side. . . ."

Increasingly, Bausch says, he's come to appreciate that, "the impact is with trying to change the system. . . ."

"The architecture for outbreak response has changed drastically," he says. "When we have outbreaks of Ebola in places like the Democratic Republic of the Congo, colleagues at the main research institute there, they're very experienced now with this."

"It doesn't mean that they don't need – nor receive – any support," Bausch adds. "But they have gotten this down and figured it out. So things happen much more independently than they did [before]."

"No longer – and this is a good thing — no longer should anybody from the U.S. CDC or the World Health Organization or London or Geneva or anywhere else think, 'Okay, We're going to come in and tell people what to do.' Those of us who are not from that area of the world really need to recognize that we're there to play an important but a supporting role in the leadership that's going to come from the African continent. . . ."

Now you know. Off to fly Easter kites with the baby girls, on a perfect Spring Sunday afternoon. . . grinning -- out.

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