12 Ebola Questions You’re Wondering About
In case you’ve missed it, the deadliest Ebola outbreak is spreading in Western Africa, taking at least 900 lives so far.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is sending 50 infectious disease specialists to the region in order to help quell the outbreak and provide much-needed resources and expertise. As the outbreak worsens, confusion and panic has grown.
To sort fact from doomsday fiction, we give you answers to 12 Ebola questions you probably are wondering about. Read below:
1. Where does the name “Ebola” come from?
The virus is named after the Ebola River in what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo. That’s where the virus was discovered in 1976.
2. If there’s no vaccine or cure, what are doctors doing to treat Ebola patients?
For now, all doctors can do is treat the symptoms and provide supportive care like monitoring heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing while making sure the patients’ fluids are replenished. Sometimes patients are given antibiotics to treat other possible infections. The hope is to sustain the patient through the infection so their immune system can eventually clear the virus. This is harder to achieve in rural health systems in West Africa that are tasked with treating thousands of patients with insufficient resources.
3. How do some people recover if there’s no cure?
When the body is infected with a virus, it starts creating antibodies to attack it. The people who survive Ebola or any virus have created enough antibodies to neutralize it.
4. I hear you can only get Ebola through direct content with an infected person’s bodily fluids. Does that mean you need to have an open wound or something?
A wound, sure, but the skin can also have microabrasions you can’t see. Additionally, the virus can get into your body through your eyes and mouth if those areas come into contact with something that contains the bodily fluids of an infected person. That’s why health care workers are supposed to keep themselves completely covered while treating patients. The doctors and health care workers in West Africa are working in rural clinics, where the proper protections are scarce. Infected people may be quarantined with other people infected with the disease, making this kind of contact easier.
5. Since the virus has a two-to-21-day incubation period, can you get the disease from someone who doesn’t have symptoms?
No. The CDC says people who are not symptomatic are not contagious.
6. Can Ebola spread through sweat?
Yes, the virus can be present in sweat.
7. What about sex?
Sure, though sex while infected with Ebola seems unlikely. In past Ebola outbreaks, men who survived the disease were told to refrain from sex or use condoms for about three months after recovery because the virus can be present in semen.
8. Why is there no vaccine or drug for Ebola?
There are several promising drugs and vaccines in development, but since Ebola is less common and research about it is not well funded there is no drug or vaccine that has been approved for use in humans. One experimental serum was used by the two American patients, but there’s not enough for widespread use yet. Many of the other drugs and vaccines have not yet been tested in humans. The WHO is meeting next week to discuss whether experimental treatments should be used during this outbreak.
9. What does the virus do to the human body?
The virus is systemic. That means it can move to and affect every part of the body causing direct damage to organs as well as internal bleeding. This causes shock, which drops a person’s blood pressure and causes multisystem organ failure.
10. Why is it spreading so fast in Africa?
CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden has said that the health systems in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia are severely lacking in resources, and health care workers may not have access to adequate protective clothing. There’s also been some pushback against healthcare workers. Since Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia share a border, it’s easier for people to move from one country to another, and increasing the risk for disease spread.
11. How did the virus start anyway?
The natural reservoir for Ebola remains unknown, but researchers hypothesize that the first infected in an outbreak likely becomes infected through contact with an infected animal. Bats are thought to be a carrier of the virus.
12. I am terrified about an outbreak in Nigeria. Should we be worried?
As of today, the 10th of August 2014 there have been 9 cases (2 probable, 7 suspect) on Ebola Virus Disease in Nigeria and 2 deaths. All nine cases have been known primary contacts of the index case in Nigeria; Mr Sawyer. At this point therefore, as far as we know, while there has been transmission in Nigeria, it is limited to contacts of the primary case. There is no confirmed community transmission i.e. further transmission from any of the currently infected cases.
In a report published on Sahara Reporters, Chikwe Ihekweazu-an infectious disease epidemiologist who worked on several WHO outbreak responses across the continent including an Ebola outbreak in South Sudan in 2004 said we should be worried enough to inform ourselves appropriately but we must not panic.
According to him the people most at risk at the moment are healthcare workers and family members caring for ill patients that may have been exposed to the index case, or caring for other returned patients from Sierra Leone, Liberia or Guinea.
"Specific efforts are going at the moment targeting these two groups. They must follow the infection control guidelines that I presume have been issued to them “religiously”. If you do not fall into any of these categories, please keep yourself informed of the general picture, take normal precautions and go about daily life." Chikwe said.
If you are caring for anyone with fever, body aches etc, please continue to care for the patient with compassion. The most important question to ask is if there has been contact with any of the nine known cases or a recent travel history to the 3 most affected countries; Guinea, Liberia or Sierra Leone.
If this is the case, please call the helpline 0800ebolahelp. Remember to continue taking precautions against other communicable diseases; use a bed net against malaria, condoms to prevent STIs and HIV, boil your water – a cholera outbreak is going on in Plateau State, and if you are coughing for more than 2 weeks, see your doctor; TB killed approximately 27,000 people in Nigeria last year.
Sources: Time, Sahara Reporters
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is sending 50 infectious disease specialists to the region in order to help quell the outbreak and provide much-needed resources and expertise. As the outbreak worsens, confusion and panic has grown.
To sort fact from doomsday fiction, we give you answers to 12 Ebola questions you probably are wondering about. Read below:
1. Where does the name “Ebola” come from?
The virus is named after the Ebola River in what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo. That’s where the virus was discovered in 1976.
2. If there’s no vaccine or cure, what are doctors doing to treat Ebola patients?
For now, all doctors can do is treat the symptoms and provide supportive care like monitoring heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing while making sure the patients’ fluids are replenished. Sometimes patients are given antibiotics to treat other possible infections. The hope is to sustain the patient through the infection so their immune system can eventually clear the virus. This is harder to achieve in rural health systems in West Africa that are tasked with treating thousands of patients with insufficient resources.
3. How do some people recover if there’s no cure?
When the body is infected with a virus, it starts creating antibodies to attack it. The people who survive Ebola or any virus have created enough antibodies to neutralize it.
4. I hear you can only get Ebola through direct content with an infected person’s bodily fluids. Does that mean you need to have an open wound or something?
A wound, sure, but the skin can also have microabrasions you can’t see. Additionally, the virus can get into your body through your eyes and mouth if those areas come into contact with something that contains the bodily fluids of an infected person. That’s why health care workers are supposed to keep themselves completely covered while treating patients. The doctors and health care workers in West Africa are working in rural clinics, where the proper protections are scarce. Infected people may be quarantined with other people infected with the disease, making this kind of contact easier.
5. Since the virus has a two-to-21-day incubation period, can you get the disease from someone who doesn’t have symptoms?
No. The CDC says people who are not symptomatic are not contagious.
6. Can Ebola spread through sweat?
Yes, the virus can be present in sweat.
7. What about sex?
Sure, though sex while infected with Ebola seems unlikely. In past Ebola outbreaks, men who survived the disease were told to refrain from sex or use condoms for about three months after recovery because the virus can be present in semen.
8. Why is there no vaccine or drug for Ebola?
There are several promising drugs and vaccines in development, but since Ebola is less common and research about it is not well funded there is no drug or vaccine that has been approved for use in humans. One experimental serum was used by the two American patients, but there’s not enough for widespread use yet. Many of the other drugs and vaccines have not yet been tested in humans. The WHO is meeting next week to discuss whether experimental treatments should be used during this outbreak.
9. What does the virus do to the human body?
The virus is systemic. That means it can move to and affect every part of the body causing direct damage to organs as well as internal bleeding. This causes shock, which drops a person’s blood pressure and causes multisystem organ failure.
10. Why is it spreading so fast in Africa?
CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden has said that the health systems in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia are severely lacking in resources, and health care workers may not have access to adequate protective clothing. There’s also been some pushback against healthcare workers. Since Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia share a border, it’s easier for people to move from one country to another, and increasing the risk for disease spread.
11. How did the virus start anyway?
The natural reservoir for Ebola remains unknown, but researchers hypothesize that the first infected in an outbreak likely becomes infected through contact with an infected animal. Bats are thought to be a carrier of the virus.
12. I am terrified about an outbreak in Nigeria. Should we be worried?
As of today, the 10th of August 2014 there have been 9 cases (2 probable, 7 suspect) on Ebola Virus Disease in Nigeria and 2 deaths. All nine cases have been known primary contacts of the index case in Nigeria; Mr Sawyer. At this point therefore, as far as we know, while there has been transmission in Nigeria, it is limited to contacts of the primary case. There is no confirmed community transmission i.e. further transmission from any of the currently infected cases.
In a report published on Sahara Reporters, Chikwe Ihekweazu-an infectious disease epidemiologist who worked on several WHO outbreak responses across the continent including an Ebola outbreak in South Sudan in 2004 said we should be worried enough to inform ourselves appropriately but we must not panic.
According to him the people most at risk at the moment are healthcare workers and family members caring for ill patients that may have been exposed to the index case, or caring for other returned patients from Sierra Leone, Liberia or Guinea.
"Specific efforts are going at the moment targeting these two groups. They must follow the infection control guidelines that I presume have been issued to them “religiously”. If you do not fall into any of these categories, please keep yourself informed of the general picture, take normal precautions and go about daily life." Chikwe said.
If you are caring for anyone with fever, body aches etc, please continue to care for the patient with compassion. The most important question to ask is if there has been contact with any of the nine known cases or a recent travel history to the 3 most affected countries; Guinea, Liberia or Sierra Leone.
If this is the case, please call the helpline 0800ebolahelp. Remember to continue taking precautions against other communicable diseases; use a bed net against malaria, condoms to prevent STIs and HIV, boil your water – a cholera outbreak is going on in Plateau State, and if you are coughing for more than 2 weeks, see your doctor; TB killed approximately 27,000 people in Nigeria last year.
Sources: Time, Sahara Reporters
12 Ebola Questions You’re Wondering About
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