The largest, most deadly, outbreak of Ebola Virus Disease
(EVD) in history is sweeping across West Africa, primarily in Liberia, Guinea,
and Sierra Leone. As of July 20, 2014, 1048 cases of EVD have been suspected or
confirmed, with 660 deaths in this current outbreak.
July 24, 2014, a Liberian male, Patrick Sawyer, collapsed,
on arrival at Lagos International Airport. He was rushed to the hospital and
admitted to an isolation ward, where swift measures were taken to test him for
EVD. He man died July 25, 2014, still quarantined. By July 26th, his death was
confirmed to be from EVD making this the first case of Ebola on record in
Nigeria, Africa’s biggest economy and most-populous country.
Knowledge
is power to fight spread of the deadly EVD. This is what you need to know:
Key
Facts
Ebola Virus Disease (EVD), formerly known as Ebola
hemorrhagic fever, is one of the world’s deadliest infectious diseases, killing
up to 90 percent of its human victims.
Outbreaks of EVD occur primarily in Central and West Africa,
near tropical rainforests.
Ebola’s natural host is the fruit bat of the Pteropodidae
family, which infects wild animals, which then infect humans.
Once EVD is contracted by humans, it rapidly spreads
human-to-human, via direct contact with body fluids or dead bodies of victims.
Infectious body fluids include: blood, saliva, semen, vomit, urine and feces.
Severely ill victims need intensive supportive care. There is no specific treatment to kill the
virus. There is no cure.
There is no vaccine for humans or animals.
There are five distinct species of Ebola virus. Three
strains, designated BDBV, EBOV, and SUDV, are the source of the outbreaks in
Africa. RESTV and TAFV, found in the Philippines and the People’s Republic of
China, can infect humans but are not known to cause illness or deaths.
Transmission
Ebola is introduced into humans through handling sick or
dead animals. Ebola then spreads in the community, human-to-human, from direct
contact with the blood, secretions, organs, or other body fluids. Indirect
contact with a contaminated environment is also a source of spread.
Burial ceremonies in which mourners have direct contact with
the body are sources of transmissions. Men who have recovered from EVD can
transmit the virus through their semen for up to 7 weeks after recovering.
Healthcare workers have become infected while treating
patients with suspected or confirmed EVD, when strict infection-control
precautions were not practiced.
Signs
and symptoms
EVD is characterized by the sudden onset of fever, extreme
weakness, muscle pain, headache and sore throat, quickly followed by vomiting,
diarrhea, rash, and impaired liver and kidney function. There may be internal
and external bleeding. Blood tests show low white blood cell and platelet
counts and abnormal liver enzyme levels.
The time from infection with the virus and onset of symptoms
(incubation period) is 2 to 21 days. People are infectious as long as their
blood and secretions contain the virus. Ebola has been found in semen 61 days
after the illness.
Diagnosis
Other diseases that must be ruled out before a diagnosis of
EVD is assigned include malaria, typhoid fever, shigellosis, cholera, plague,
rickettsiosis, relapsing fever, meningitis, hepatitis and other viral
hemorrhagic fevers.
Several laboratory blood tests can diagnose EVD
definitively: antigen, antibody, serum neutralization, and an enzyme reaction
test. High-powered electron microscopy and cell culture can also diagnose EVD.
Samples from patients are extreme biohazards, and must be handled under maximum
biological-containment conditions.
Vaccine
and treatment
There is no vaccine or specific drug treatment for EVD. Both
are under development. Patients require intensive supportive care. They are
frequently dehydrated and require oral or intravenous fluids.
For
More information
The Nigerian Federal Ministry of Health Fact Sheet on Ebola.
Available in English, Pidgin, Igbo, Yoruba and Hausa languages.
http://health.gov.ng/index.php/resources/ebola-virus-information
World Health Organization: http://www.who.int/csr/don/2014_07_10_ebola/en
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention:
http://www.cdc.gov/vhf/ebola/resources/outbreaks
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