Health The current outbreak of Ebola Virus in West Africa is now the largest ever recorded

Donners

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According to the World Health Organisation there are a total of 3069 cases and 1552 deaths across Sierra Leone, Guinea, Liberia and Nigeria as of 26 August, up from 1848 cases and 1013 deaths as of 31 July.

The progression is set out in this image:

HBSHsmt.png


This is the first Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

The Sierra Leone outbreak was first reported in late May and the second wave of the Liberia outbreak began around then as well; the Guinea outbreak has been ongoing since February.

This is more than six times the size of the previous record holder, the 2000-01 Uganda outbreak, which had 425 cases.

The situation has not been helped by attacks on an Ebola clinic in Guinea and suspected infected people being "freed" from medical personnel by relatives.

Here's a good documentary from Foreign Correspondent:



[updated 27 August]
 
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little graham

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Is this fair dinkum or is some drug company trying to stitch up a revenue stream for decades?
 

Donners

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The outbreaks affecting humans have been in African countries like Sudan, Uganda and the DRC.

They also tend to appear once every few years and burn out after a few months and a handful of cases.

The virus is not really considered a threat to developed countries given its method of transmission.

It'd be a brave drug company which thought they could make money from sporadic and small outbreaks in Africa.

That's perhaps part of the reason why there has not been any vaccine or medication developed for it, though there are some efforts being made in that respect by government-funded bodies in a few countries.
 
You would think the challenge with creating an effective treatment is the degree of viral mutation.

As they say with drug development, the second treatment costs $20. The first one costs $20 million (plus).
 

Tasmaniac

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Very interesting. In a ghastly way.

I've read a book called Outbreak, which was a fictionalised incident with a Ebola type virus called Marberg.
That's a nasty one. Viruses evolve, and if Marberg evolves so it can be transmitted through the air in it's leathal form, we are going to lose a lot of people across the globe.
 

Donners

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I'm rather concerned by the range of the bat suspected to carry Ebola. It's not likely to spread much in a developed country in its present form, but it's still not something you want on your doorstep.
Global_EbolaOutbreakRisk_20090510.png


The Soviets actually worked on crossing Ebola with Smallpox - unimaginatively dubbed Ebolapox - and did quite a bit of work with Marburg. The book written by one of the major figure in their bioweapons program, Ken Alibek, is scary stuff.

We're stuffed if it ever becomes transmissible via mosquitos somehow - there have been 170,000 cases of the mosquito-borne chikungunya in the Caribbean alone recently.
 

Donners

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Temporal_evolution_of_the_2014_West_African_Ebola_outbreak.svg


Eep.

Now up over 750 cases and 450 deaths across three countries - an increase of 160 cases and 103 deaths in a week.
 

Sicarius

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I'm rather concerned by the range of the bat suspected to carry Ebola. It's not likely to spread much in a developed country in its present form, but it's still not something you want on your doorstep.

The Soviets actually worked on crossing Ebola with Smallpox - unimaginatively dubbed Ebolapox - and did quite a bit of work with Marburg. The book written by one of the major figure in their bioweapons program, Ken Alibek, is scary stuff.

We're stuffed if it ever becomes transmissible via mosquitos somehow - there have been 170,000 cases of the mosquito-borne chikungunya in the Caribbean alone recently.

There were up to 278 million cases and 789,000 deaths from Malaria last year.

I read something today saying that the major airport in the area has flights to Paris, so if it spreads anywhere, its there. As unlikely as it is.
It has such a ridiculous mortality rate too. Lots of bat transmitted diseases are scary, Lyssa, Marburg, Hendra, Nipah. Unfortunately we seem to be the leaders in that category. Edit: SARS as well, jeez.
 
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Has Madagascar shut down its ports yet???


Haha the first thing I thought about was the "Infection" game on the iPad too. Blood Madagascar is always the hardest to infect.

I'm moving there if this outbreak goes global.

On a serious note this is horrible and I hope they get the whole thing under control soon. The trend of that graph is pretty scary, albeit pretty small numbers at the moment.
 

Donners

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There were up to 278 million cases and 789,000 deaths from Malaria last year.

Sure, and Lassa kills 5,000 across Africa annually, and meningitis has killed over 1,100 in a handful of African countries in the year to date and goodness knows how many die from basic lack of sanitation and nutrition.

There's just something about Ebola. Partly the '90s pop culture of Outbreak and The Hot Zone, partly its sheer lethality, partly its elusive nature.

It's really something which shouldn't be that hard to contain, but things are going terribly wrong here. I see that Sierra Leone has reported another 20-odd cases in a day. That's more than some whole outbreaks.

I read something today saying that the major airport in the area has flights to Paris, so if it spreads anywhere, its there. As unlikely as it is.

There have been cases in the Liberian and Guinean capitals; both have international airports nearby. There was a suspected case in Spain from a person who flew from Guinea, which tested negative.

There's unlikely to be much spread in a developed country, but it'd well and truly have people up in arms if it did make it to Europe, where there's pretty strong anti-immigration sentiment.


It has such a ridiculous mortality rate too. Lots of bat transmitted diseases are scary, Lyssa, Marburg, Hendra, Nipah. Unfortunately we seem to be the leaders in that category. Edit: SARS as well, jeez.

Hantavirus, Rabies and MERS too. Filthy buggers...
 

bkozican

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Scary reading.......

Lets just hope it doesn't break out to something worldwide
 

Donners

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Updated the OP with the latest stats and a neat little graph and map.

It's now well over double the size of the previous largest outbreak, and is still progressing at a significantly high rate.
 

Donners

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Odds of this going global?

"The chance of Ebola spreading out of West Africa is very, very low," says infectious disease specialist Kamran Khan, with St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto. "But if it did spread, Paris is probably the first city on the list."

...

"The volume of travel in the Conakry airport is low," Khan says. "Most of the flights are local. But 10 percent of the traffic goes to Paris." That would make Paris the likeliest place for Ebola to arrive.
And it is a possibility. After a person is infected with Ebola, symptoms could appear within two days — or take up to 21 days, Khan says. So a person infected in Guinea could hop on a plane and bring Ebola to, say, France or another international destination.
Even if that happens, the odds of fellow passengers catching the virus are extremely low, says Dr. Mark Gendreau, who specializes in aviation medicine at Lahey Medical Center in Peabody, Mass.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/201...he-ebola-outbreak-spread-to-europe-or-the-u-s

Having said that, there's two stories today which cause concern.

The worst outbreak of Ebola in history has touched Africa's biggest city, with a hospital in Lagos confirming the death of a visiting Liberian government official.

http://online.wsj.com/articles/lagos-hospital-confirms-ebola-related-death-1406321646

Officials in Sierra Leone have appealed for help to trace the first known resident in the capital with Ebola, whose family forcibly removed her from a Freetown hospital after she tested positive for the deadly virus.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/20...m-deadly-virus-ebola-snatched-hospital-family

It's very hard to see it going too far in a developed country - it's a virus which spreads through very poor hygiene and lax precautions from medical personnel.

Still, things like this increase the risk of it popping up in a few other places.
 
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