"As of 17 July 2014, the cumulative number of cases attributed to the Ebola virus disease (EVD) outbreak in Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Guinea stands at 1,048, including 632 deaths"
It was one of a number of "Butcher Bill" posts I have made since the epidemic started in February. A current count of the casualties...
A comment was made by a friend of mine who works in the health industry:
"Ok....why do you keep posting this?"
In light of the international news of the day, Gaza and Hamas and Israel, the Russians and Ukrainians and the shot down commercial jet... she has a point. Why is this so important to me?
Because Ebola scares me- and fascinates me. From the time I read The Coming Plague as a nurse in the South Bronx, I have been curious and terrified in equal portions.
Ebola, a filovirus, was first reported in 1976 in Zaire (now Congo) and killed 88% of those infected. It occurred in Yambuku and surrounding area. Ebola was spread by close personal contact and by use of contaminated needles and syringes in hospitals/clinics. Up until the current outbreak, this was the largest recorded with 318 cases. In the current epidemic, over 1,000 are sick in West African nations.
Labs have confirmed the Zaire strain in this outbreak- the most deadly of the five known versions of the virus.
Symptoms of Ebola include:
Fever, Headache, Joint and muscle aches, Weakness, Diarrhea, Vomiting, Stomach pain and Lack of appetite. In addition, some will have these: A Rash, Red Eyes, Hiccups, Cough, Sore throat, Chest pain, Difficulty breathing, Difficulty swallowing and Bleeding inside and outside of the
body
According to the CDC, Ebola symptoms can start 2-21 days after exposure, but most people see symptoms in 8-10 days.
Approximately 60% of those known to be infected in this outbreak are dying. I say "known" because there are likely many cases not being reported to authorities. People don't trust the international groups there to help. The health infrastructure is limited in the affected countries. This could be much bigger than we think.
This outbreak is nowhere near controlled. And that scares me.
Ken Isaacs of Samaritan’s Purse asked in the New York Times why we are ignoring the epidemic. He has reason to ask. And this weekend has pushed the question forward again:
From yesterday's NYT:
Last week, the Sierra Leone Health Ministry reported that
its lead doctor fighting Ebola, Dr. Sheik Umar Khan had contracted the disease (3 of his nurses have already died), and the virus had
spread to a fourth country, with a confirmed fatality in Nigeria (Patrick Sawyer, a consultant for the Liberian ministry of finance). Over the
weekend, an aid organization working in Liberia, Samaritan’s Purse, said that
two Americans, a doctor (Dr. Kent Brantly) who was treating Ebola patients and an aid worker (Nancy Writebol) on a
case management team, had tested positive for the virus. And the Liberian
government said Sunday that one of its most high-profile doctors (Dr. Samuel
Brisbane) had died of Ebola...
A fourth country, high ranking medical providers, and no end in sight...
Sawyer arrived in Nigeria on Tuesday and was immediately detained by health authorities suspecting he might have Ebola. If as reported, Sawyer did not show Ebola symptoms when he boarded the plane, how did authorities know to detain him?
It was announced on Friday that blood tests from the Lagos University teaching hospital confirmed Sawyer died of Ebola earlier that day, 3 days after his arrival. (Sawyer's sister also died of Ebola in Liberia, according to Liberian officials, but Sawyer claimed to have had no contact with her.)
I don't know that we won't see more cases in Togo (where the plane had a stop-over) and Nigeria, where Sawyer died.
We need to be talking about Ebola.
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