The Ebola Freakout of 2014

Another person in the United States has tested positive for Ebola. That makes four people. It’s official; there are now more cases of Ebola in the US than women who have married Newt Gingrich.

Republicans are freaking out and fundamentalist Christians are declaring that the Ebola “outbreak” in America is the start of the End Times. The media is in full court press mode. The only thing that can knock Ebola out of the news now is a missing plane or a political sex scandal and even they might not be able to take down this scary sounding virus that almost no one in America actually has.

Sure, if you are living in West Africa, then you should be pretty worried. Not necessarily because of the disease itself (although that would be understandable), but also because the illness has devastated the entire society. Fortunately, I don’t live in West Africa and I doubt many if any of my readers do either. If you don’t live in West Africa, you shouldn’t be freaking out!

The sad thing is that there have been at least two instances in which people have joked about Ebola and faced serious consequences from it. In one case, I guy was boarding a plane and joked that he had just come from West Africa and the airport went into full panic mode. In another case, a man was gambling in a casino and joked about avoiding his wife because she had Ebola and hour after leaving the casino, the man was arrested.

If we can’t joke about Ebola, then the virus has already won. I mean it is really, really hard to get Ebola in America. You basically have to either fuck the person with obvious symptoms or be caring for someone showing obvious symptoms. Tina Dupuy had a great comment about that second part. She tweeted, “So far every case of Ebola in this country got it by helping people. So relax, Republicans, you’re in the clear.”

To be far, it isn’t just Republicans freaking out about this virus. The media has really worked almost everyone into a constant state of fear around anything having to do with Ebola. Despite the fear, the fact remains that Ebola is really hard to contract in the industrialized world. In America, a person (singular) who has Ebola is treated in isolation by people who are skilled professionals wearing protective gear. There has been a mistake or two, but for the most part Ebola has been contained in this country.

So relax, you aren’t going to get Ebola. You almost have a better chance marrying Newt Gingrich than you have of getting Ebola. You actually do have a better chance marrying Larry King. For the End Times believers — Ebola is not your wet dream. Sorry, the rapture is not here and Jesus isn’t coming back. He’s just not into you and neither is Ebola. And if you are shouting into a megaphone telling people that the “End is Nigh” and that the Rapture is upon us, they will continue to treat you as if you have Ebola.