- Ebola causes a severe disease with fever, rashes, vomiting, diarrhea, and sometimes internal and/or external bleeding. It kills about half of patients.
- Humans are first exposed to the virus from contact with bats or other infected animals. Once a person is infected, they can transmit the virus directly to other people via bodily secretions. All bodily secretions are considered infectious, but the virus cannot spread through the air.
- The largest outbreak occurred in West Africa in 2014-2015, affecting almost 30,000 people and killing 40% of them. From this outbreak, 4 cases occurred in the U.S.–2 traveled from Africa and 2 additional healthcare workers contracted the disease.
- The current outbreak in Democratic Republic of Congo involves 58 people and 27 have died.
- Healthcare workers are frequently infected during outbreaks due to close contact with patients despite rigorous precautions and personal protective equipment.
- Burial ceremonies that involve contact with the deceased, which are common in Africa, have been implicated to spread disease.
- Ebola virus has been detected in semen of male survivors months after infection, but it is not known whether it can be transmitted via sexual intercourse this long after infection.
- Rehydration and supportive care improves survival, but there is no proven therapy to treat patients with Ebola. A few experimental therapies are being tested.
- There is no licensed vaccine available, though an experimental vaccine appeared to work during the West Africa outbreak and has been deployed to Democratic Republic of Congo.
- Ebola virus is a slow moving target that poses little risk for a worldwide pandemic with proper control and coordination from the WHO and partners.
For more information:
WHO
DynaMed Plus
Cloudy Media Blog posts about Ebola