Adding to the distress is knowing that a great number of people who go into the treatment centers don’t make it out alive, leading to a conclusion that the treatment centers are killing patients.
Eyeing where Ebola makes its mark
Although a few cases have sprung up outside of West Africa, by far, the only geographic area of major concern for Ebola right now is in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea, and their immediate neighbors. Chapter 2 takes a closer look at these countries to paint a clearer picture why Ebola has affected so many people there.
But the bigger takeaway here is the importance of a substantial healthcare system in each country, and the value of a worldwide network and plan for responding to health emergencies. This outbreak is happening specifically in these countries because of a lack of sufficient infrastructure to provide the response and education needed to stop it (such as doctors, nurses, and hospitals for treatment; mass media for public health messages; and highways and developed transportation to get help fast). None of the other countries in which Ebola has surfaced has suffered so deeply because they have the resources to combat it.
This time, Ebola has struck West Africa, but many other places could be next. So the point is that voters need to pressure their representatives and lawmakers to make sure funding and resources stay in place (or get added where needed) in the United States and Canada – or wherever you call home – to provide for the proper establishment and upkeep of vital infrastructure.
Knowing when Ebola became a concern
Since Ebola was first discovered in 1976, it has had 35 outbreaks. All of them have been small – mostly less than 50 deaths, and none more than 300. Starting in December of 2013, Guinea experienced an outbreak of an unknown virus that took 50 lives. By March of 2014, Guinea figured out that it was Ebola, and Liberia and Sierra Leone each reported a few cases as well.
Doctors Without Borders recognized the signs of a widespread epidemic in the making and sounded the alarm in April. The organization was concerned that cases were being diagnosed in three different countries at the same time. (That’s how the organization knew that there was a big problem.) The current case count for this outbreak is closing in on 14,500 at time of publication.
For more on the timeline and how the World Health Organization (WHO) and the rest of the world reacted to this news and are planning for the future, turn to Chapter 6.
Comprehending why Ebola is a global concern
In West Africa, this outbreak is leaving thousands of families destroyed. Children have become orphans, and survivors are being cast out for fear that they will still spread the disease or are somehow cursed. The agriculture, trade, and tourism industries in these areas have totally disintegrated, and the situation is especially dire in the hot zone countries of Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone – and even in the countries that border them, such as Ivory Coast and Mali. And the reach of this crisis is being felt around the world.
Nobody wants to go to these countries, and people in these countries are finding it difficult to get out, due to travel and border restrictions.
All three countries had been on the economic upswing, but each of them now stands to lose between 2 and 9 percent of their respective GDPs.
Recent estimates by the CDC say case numbers could hit 1 million, and the World Bank estimates that this could cost $32 billion over the next two years if Ebola keeps spreading across West African borders. You can read more about the global impact in Chapter 6.
Examining how Ebola is transmitted
Ebola is transmitted only through direct contact with infected body fluids, which means that the fluid has to touch your mucus membrane or non-intact skin. And that’s it. That’s the only way you can contract it. So in other words, you can’t:
✔ Transmit the virus unless you have symptoms
✔ Catch Ebola just by being in the same room as a patient with Ebola (because the virus isn’t airborne)
Well, the rate at which the virus has spread during this outbreak is unprecedented, so it was extremely unexpected and caught a lot of the world health leaders off guard. Ebola was spreading in epidemic proportions before anyone could get ahead of it. Here are a couple of reasons why:
✔ Ebola hit large, highly populated urban areas versus the remote, far-flung villages it has historically appeared in.
✔ West African funeral rituals involve a lot of touching and washing of the body. Because a lot of fluids are involved when someone dies of Ebola, multiple people were (still are) coming into contact with infected fluids regularly.
✔ The borders are very porous in this part of West Africa, so it’s typical for folks to come from miles around and from other countries to attend funerals, and then go back to their country and spread the virus unknowingly.
Chapter 4 discusses transmission in greater depth.
The tricky thing about Ebola is that the early symptoms are very common and can easily be confused with symptoms of everything from influenza to malaria. Symptoms in the early stages of Ebola include fever, headache, muscle pain, weakness, which could describe how I felt the last time I was in bed sick.
After the disease progresses, symptoms do change a bit and move into diarrhea, vomiting, and unexplained bruising and bleeding. Chapter 5 spells out the common symptoms.
What you really need to know about recognizing Ebola is that it’s less about taking the symptoms at face value or looking at them in a vacuum and more about identifying them and comparing them to your exposure history.
Most people (especially outside of West Africa) who exhibit these symptoms don’t have Ebola. So if you’re sitting on your couch in Fort Worth, Texas, or Fort Wayne, Indiana, or St. Paul, Minnesota, or St. Augustine, Florida, wondering if your fever is Ebola, I can pretty much tell you that it’s not.
Preventing the spread of Ebola is remarkably simple and similar to any other virus prevention, so long as you’re not in a hot zone in West Africa. But even if you’re in a hot zone, some detailed protocols and safety gear and equipment can protect you.
✔ Wash your hands frequently with warm water and soap or use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer.
✔ Avoid contact with the blood and body fluids of any person, particularly someone who is sick.
✔ Don’t handle items that may have come in contact with an infected person’s blood or body fluids.
✔ Don’t touch the body of someone who has died from Ebola.
✔ Don’t touch bats and nonhuman primates (apes and monkeys) or their blood and fluids, and don’t touch or eat raw meat prepared from these animals.
✔