10 Important Facts About Ebola

The outbreak of Ebola virus centered in West Africa is frightening for many reasons. It is the largest outbreak ever, having claimed thousands of lives; and the deadly infectious disease can travel easily from person to person in the later stages.

On September 30, 2014, the first Ebola case diagnosed in the United States was reported. It was in Dallas, at the Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital, confirms the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, (CDC). Among earlier confirmed U.S. cases were two Americans who returned already ill from West Africa for treatment at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. They were treated and released, virus free.

Still, the chances you’ll be exposed to Ebola in the United States are very low because of the tight infection control practices of public health workers here.

CDC workers are taking steps to identify anyone who may have been in contact with the patient who has Ebola, who was hospitalized in Texas on Sept 28. Health workers are using infection control practices that will include isolating any of the patient’s contacts who may become ill.

In the two previous cases in the United States, the patients were kept at a unit at Emory that has very high security for infectious disease, says Amar Safdar, MD, an associate professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases and Immunology at NYU Langone Medical Center in New York. “Only people who are allowed to see them could be potentially exposed,” says Dr. Safdar. Those people are using protective gear and procedures that are effectively fail-proof, he says.

Tom Frieden, MD, director of the CDC, stressed in a public statement that the situation here in the United States, where health care systems are strong, will be far different from the experience in West Africa. He noted that he has no doubts about the ability to contain Ebola here.

Meanwhile, public health officials are working hard in West Africa to contain the disease and prevent its spread. Researchers around the world are looking for ways to prevent and treat Ebola by searching for a vaccine and a cure. The first human safety tests of a new trial vaccine are underway, developed with the U.S. National Institutes of Health.

Here are 10 essential facts about Ebola that may ease your fears:

1. The current Ebola outbreak is most widespread and intense in West Africa.

The countries of Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia, have reported 6,553 cases of Ebola as of September 26, 2014, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). An additional 21 cases were reported in the countries of Nigeria and Senegal, the WHO reports, as well as 70 cases in the Democratic Repubic of the Congo. The single case confirmed within the United States, was in a person who had travelled from West Africa to Dallas. People who are most at risk are those in close physical contact with an infected person, like family members and the healthcare workers taking care of the patient.

2. Travel warnings have been issued for Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone.

Because of the increasing numbers of Ebola cases in these West African countries, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advises against all “nonessential” travel to these countries while the Ebola outbreak is ongoing.

3. Few entry points to the United States screen for Ebola cases.

The CDC is not screening people who travel from the countries affected by Ebola, their travel advisory notes. The U.S. case of Ebola was not apparent during travel, because the patient did not have symptoms until several days after arriving in the United States from West Africa, the CDC notes. Screening could be implemented by checking for fever in any passengers to airports whose flights began in West Africa, says David C. Pigott, MD, professor of emergency medicine at the University of Alabama, Birmingham (UAB). Dr. Pigott published a 2005 review of the virus in Critical Care Clinics journal.

4. Ebola is caused by an RNA virus.

This emerging health threat is the result of a RNA (ribonucleic acid) virus that infects wild animals — like fruit bats, monkeys, gorillas, and chimpanzees — as well as people. Contact with an infected animal’s blood or body fluids is probably the original source of the infectious disease. Outbreaks of Ebola began in 1976 in the Democratic Republic of Congo on the Ebola River, and Sudan, with later outbreaks in Uganda and other African nations, according to World Health Organization data.

“It is not a casual contact-acquired infection,” notes Safdar. Rather, in its later stages, Ebola is passed from person to person via bodily fluids. “There is no known Ebola transmission through coughing or sneezing, like with influenza or tuberculosis,” he says. The virus can live on surfaces that are soiled with blood or other body fluids, but sterilizing hospital equipment with bleach kills Ebola.

5. Early Ebola symptoms are also symptoms of other viral infections.

Early symptoms include fever, headache, body aches, cough, stomach pain, vomiting, and diarrhea. Because these could be symptoms of other diseases, it’s difficult to diagnose Ebola early on. The time it takes from exposure to Ebola to actually getting sick, known as the incubation period, is anywhere from 2 to 21 days, says UAB’s Pigott. Most people who are infected with Ebola will develop early symptoms eight to nine days after exposure to the virus, according to the CDC. Tests for antibodies against Ebola and viral DNA help doctors make a conclusive diagnosis.

6. Bleeding is common in the later stages of Ebola.

Later symptoms of Ebola can appear quickly, within a few days after onset of early symptoms. Due to internal and external bleeding, the patient’s eyes may become red, and they may vomit blood, have bloody diarrhea, and suffer cardiovascular collapse and death, explains Pigott. The only treatment doctors can provide is supportive care — they give the patient fluids and oxygen, and keep their blood pressure steady.

7. Ebola is often fatal.

Nearly half of the cases of Ebola viral infection in West Africa have resulted in death, based on WHO data. Of the 6,553 cases in the current outbreak, 3,083 people have died, as of Sept 26, according to WHO statistics. Saudi Arabia reported the death of a man suspected of having become infected with Ebola during a trip to Sierra Leone. If confirmed, it would be the first Ebola death outside of Africa.

Health workers often succumb to the disease because of close contact with sick patients. Among those infected with Ebola was the doctor who was the head of Ebola virus treatment in Sierra Leone, Dr. Sheik Umar Khan, who died on July 29. The head doctor for Ebola treatments in Liberia, Dr. Samuel Brisbane, died from the disease three days earlier.

8. New Ebola medications are in development.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has not approved any treatments for Ebola, notes Pigott, who adds that there is “nothing that’s been tried in humans at all.” But two American health workers who were infected in Liberia, Dr. Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol, are being treated with a drug that’s still under study.

The drug is called ZMapp, and it’s made by Mapp Biopharmacuetical Inc. “It’s an experimental, antibody-based medication,” explains Pigott, but it has not been tested in human trials for effectiveness.
 Developed in early 2014, ZMapp is produced in plants and has not yet been found to be safe for use in people, according to the manufacturer.

9. There is no vaccine to prevent Ebola.

Vaccines in development have been effective at preventing Ebola infections in animal studies, researchers from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) report. The research, on apes in particular, is controversial because ape populations are dwindling and in danger of extinction. It would be very difficult to test effectiveness of an experimental vaccine in people, Pigott says, because it’s unlikely anyone is going to let you inject them with Ebola and later see whether or not they get the infection. However, safety testing of new vaccines in people is now underway.

10. Ebola is not a risk to the general public in the United States.

You are not at risk for Ebola infection unless you are in direct contact with bodily fluids of someone with Ebola while they have viral symptoms such as fever, vomiting, and cough. “If you don’t have early viral symptoms, you’re probably not contagious,” says Pigott. New infections come from close contact with an infected person, especially with blood, body fluids, or contaminated needles, late in the disease when viral levels are high.

To protect the U.S. public health, the CDC is building up their capacity for testing and surveillance, and getting infection control information out to health workers. They are training medical responders, flight crews and airport workers on how to report a sick passenger to the CDC in case isolation becomes necessary.

Source: healthdigezt.com