Ebola news 10/22

[Buster's Uncle]

Cuban doctors arrive in Liberia to fight Ebola alongside U.S. troops
Reuters
By James Harding Giahyue  3 hours ago



MONROVIA (Reuters) - A plane carrying some 50 Cuban doctors and nurses arrived in Liberia on Wednesday to help treat victims of Ebola in the West African country, where a U.S. military mission is also deploying to fight the deadly virus.

An Air Cubana jet carrying the 51 medical staff touched down at Monrovia's Roberts International Airport. Another group of around 40 doctors from the communist-led Caribbean island were due to arrive in neighboring Guinea on Wednesday.

A top Cuban health official has voiced hope that collaboration in fighting Ebola could help thaw relations between Cuba and the United States, long-time adversaries.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry singled out the Cuban effort in West Africa for praise last week. 

Cuba is sending the largest medical contingent to West Africa from any country in the world. Cuban authorities have trained 461 doctors and nurses but so far only 256 have been sent on missions, which are scheduled to last six months.

The first group of 165 doctors and nurses deployed to Sierra Leone at the start of October. The final 205 medical staff remain in Cuba awaiting an assignment which will depend on funding from the United Nations, an invitation from the host countries and suitable infrastructure on the ground as determined by the World Health Organization.

The United States is sending 3,000 military engineers, medical personnel and other troops to the region to build Ebola Treatment Units and help train local medical staff to use them.

The communist-led Caribbean island has sent medical brigades to disaster sites around the world since the 1959 revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power. Cuban and U.S. personnel have worked together before, notably after the Haitian earthquake in 2010. 

Besides medical diplomacy, Cuba sends doctors overseas in exchange for money or goods, notably Venezuelan oil, making professional services a top export earner. More than 50,000 Cuban medical personnel are posted in 66 countries.

Nicknamed as the "army of white robes", and citing a long history of Cuban medical missions in Africa and elsewhere, the doctors told Reuters in Havana before deploying that they felt a sense of duty to fight Ebola and were willing to assume the risks.

(Additional reporting by Daniel Trotta in Havana; Writing by Daniel Flynn; Editing by David Lewis)


http://news.yahoo.com/cuban-doctors-arrive-liberia-fight-ebola-114646098.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Curfew in Sierra Leone town after rioting, shooting over Ebola case
Reuters  8 hours ago



Health workers spray themselves with chlorine disinfectants after removing the body a woman who died of Ebola virus in the Aberdeen district of Freetown, Sierra Leone, October 14, 2014. REUTERS/Josephus Olu-Mammah



FREETOWN (Reuters) - Authorities in Sierra Leone imposed a curfew in the eastern town of Koidu on Tuesday after a dispute between youth and police over a suspected case of Ebola degenerated into gunfire and rioting, officials said.

A local civil society leader said he had seen at least two bodies with gunshot wounds. The head of the local police unit said youth had fired at officers with shotguns but denied anyone had been shot dead.

The clashes highlight tensions in Sierra Leone over the government's attempt to bring the worst Ebola outbreak on record under control. Sierra Leone has recorded 1,200 deaths from just over 3,400 cases of Ebola, according the latest U.N. data.

David Koroma, the police unit commander in Koidu, said rioting began when a former youth leader refused health authorities permission to take her 90-year old grandmother for an Ebola test.

Dr Manso Dumbuya, the district medical officer, said he had been forced to abandon the hospital because of the rioting. The diamond-rich district of Kono, which includes the town of Koidu, does not have an Ebola treatment centre and cases are taken to neighbouring Kenema or Kailahun.

With cases of Ebola arriving in the West and the prospect of tens of thousands more in West Africa, the global effort to defeat Ebola is picking up pace.

But the lack of trust between communities and governments in West Africa has complicated efforts to contain a disease, for which there is no known cure. Ebola has now killed over 4,500 people this year, mainly in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.


http://news.yahoo.com/curfew-sierra-leone-town-rioting-shooting-over-ebola-075517851--finance.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Home care kits highlight gaps in West Africa's Ebola response
Reuters
By David Lewis and James Harding Giahyue  October 20, 2014 4:30 PM



Workers for International NGO Doctors Without Borders distribute home disinfectant kits to prevent Ebola in Monrovia, Liberia, October 20, 2014. REUTERS/James Giahyue



DAKAR/MONROVIA (Reuters) - With the number of Ebola cases spiraling in West Africa and weeks remaining until treatment units promised by Western governments are built, health workers fighting one of the world's deadliest diseases are being forced to improvise.

In the "hot zones" of Liberia, where Ebola patients are being turned away from overflowing clinics, aid agencies are distributing tens of thousands of protection kits, made up of buckets, chlorine, soap, gloves, a gown and instructions on how to look after the infected in their own homes.

In neighboring Sierra Leone, authorities advise those waiting for an ambulance to isolate the patient in a room, designate someone to treat them and ensure this person uses gloves or a towel soaked in chlorine when they are in contact.

As experts ponder how nurses treating Ebola even in Western hospitals contracted the disease, such efforts in West Africa highlight the steps being taken to bridge the gap between the care available and what is needed in the epicenter of the crisis.

Aid organizations acknowledge that getting people with Ebola into a professionally-manned treatment units is the only way to halt the worst outbreak on record, which has already killed over 4,500 people and risks claiming thousands more lives.

But with ambulances overloaded and an insufficient number of beds in treatment centers, getting the sick quickly out of their homes to avoid infecting others is a major challenge.

"Sometimes that's just not possible. When someone gets sick overnight, we have to ensure that they don’t infect others," Sheldon Yett, the head of U.N. child agency UNICEF in Liberia, told Reuters.

"People really want to give help to people who are sick, but we need to ensure that when they give help to people who are sick, they don’t get sick too. These kits are designed to do just that — to break the circle of transmission."



People queue to receive home disinfectant kits from Doctors Without Borders to prevent Ebola in Monrovia, Liberia, October 20, 2014. REUTERS/James Giahyue


There is no known cure for Ebola and the limited stocks of experimental drugs have been exhausted. In treatment centers in West Africa, care involves preventing dehydration and helping treat other infections, with those who are diagnosed soonest faring the best.

UNICEF is supporting efforts to roll out 65 community care centers across Liberia. Units of 6-20 beds will be set up and manned by trained members of the community to look after people until they can be taken to an Ebola treatment unit.

Other organizations, like Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF) and Samaritan's Purse, are handing protection kits directly to families living in communities most at risk.

Yet the high toll the outbreak has taken on health staff - 236 dead from a total of 427 infected in West Africa - highlights how dangerous the disease is even for professionals with training and equipment.

"It’s a very fine balance to try to provide adequate and efficient protection without providing full safety," said Jens Pedersen, a South African who led MSF teams in Monrovia.

"If you aren't sufficiently trained, regardless of what protective gear you use, if you don’t know how to use it or know how to look after yourself and an infected patient, there’s very little that protective gear can do for you."

MSF says 16 of its staff have contracted Ebola, of whom 9 have died.

Some, but not all Ebola patients evacuated to Europe and the United States for better care in western medical facilities have survived. Those evacuated were mainly aid workers.



People queue to receive home disinfectant kits to prevent Ebola from Doctors Without Borders in Monrovia, Liberia, October 20, 2014. REUTERS/James Giahyue


Drug firms are fast-tracking vaccine research and GlaxoSmithKline says if current trials are successful frontline health workers in West Africa would be vaccinated early next year.


"ADAPTING"

First confirmed in Guinea's remote southeast in March, Ebola spread across the country and into neighboring Liberia and Sierra Leone, where it has torn through ill-equipped health systems in nations recovering from years of conflict.

Medics in Liberia, home to the world's largest natural rubber operation, lacked rubber gloves to treat patients.

The global response has accelerated as cases reached the West. Hundreds of millions of dollars in aid has been pledged, the U.S. and British militaries are deploying and volunteers from across the globe are signing up to help.

Yet the effects on the ground have been slow to materialize. So far, Liberia has 620 of 2,930 planned beds for Ebola cases. In Sierra Leone, there are 346 of 1,198 planned beds.

U.N. officials say the turning point for rolling back Ebola will be when 70 percent of cases are hospitalized and 70 percent of those Ebola kills are buried properly.

Nigeria was declared Ebola-free on Monday after it successfully traced and isolated 300 people who had come into contact with an Ebola patient who brought the disease to Lagos in July.

Manuel Fontaine, UNICEF's director for West and Central Africa, said providing care in community centers was an example of the ways in which an overstretched aid community was being forced to innovate to tackle an unprecedented epidemic.

"We’ve worked in wars or against malnutrition where we have pretty clear protocols. But here it is about adapting," he said, adding that training and supervision, especially on how to dispose of used kits, was essential to ensuring they did not spread infection.

In Ebola units, medics follow a laborious 15-step procedure to undress without infecting themselves. Underscoring the risks even in highly-controlled environments, authorities in Spain said a nurse looking after an infected patient appeared to have contracted the disease after making a mistake.

MSF, which has led much of the medical response, says the epidemic's scale demanded "unprecedented and imperfect measures". It plans to distribute over 50,000 kits to patients turned away from hospitals and to those living in communities vulnerable to further infection.

MSF says the equipment should be for short-term use until an ambulance arrives and the kits are not intended for longer-term care. "It is just too dangerous. It is about just giving food and water," said Thomas Curbillon, head of MSF's mission in Liberia.

Samaritan's Purse, a U.S.-based charity handing out 3,000 kits and training to community members, said home care was not ideal but the lack of beds and extent of unreported cases meant it was already happening on the ground.

"Good, bad or ugly, it has been happening," Ken Isaacs, vice president of programs, told Reuters. "We believe we can give care givers knowledge and basic equipment to take care of their loved ones and take care of themselves."

Latest estimates from the WHO warn that there could be 5,000-10,000 new cases of Ebola per week by December.

"I will acknowledge this is the least desirable option but there is no other option. We are dealing with is the reality of the situation," he said.

(Additional reporting by Ed Cropley in Johannesburg; Editing by Daniel Flynn and Anna Willard)


http://news.yahoo.com/home-care-kits-highlight-gaps-west-africas-ebola-203013434--finance.html

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Nigeria: How Ebola Was Contained in Africa's Largest City
LiveScience.com
By Bahar Gholipour  October 20, 2014 6:24 PM



Now that 42 days have passed without any new cases of Ebola in Nigeria, the country is officially Ebola-free, the World Health Organization declared today.

On July 20, an ill passenger from Liberia brought the Ebola virus to Lagos, which, with a population of 21 million, is the largest city in not only Nigeria but all of Africa.

From patient zero, the virus spread to 19 more people, eight of whom died of the disease. But the outbreak was contained, and no further cases have developed since then.

"This is a spectacular success storythat shows to the world that Ebola can be contained," Rui Gama Vaz, the head of WHO's country office in Nigeria, said at a news conference in the city Abuja, according to Al Jazeera.

The Nigerian Ebola outbreak occurred in a setting that had all the elements that could have allowed it to turn into a much bigger outbreak, similar to the one now ravaging Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia. Lagos has as many residents as the combined population of those three countries, and is also a major transit hub in the region, with air, land and sea ports of entry, according to the country's officials.

"The dense population and overburdened infrastructure create an environment where diseases can be easily transmitted and transmission sustained," researchers wrote in an Oct. 3 report published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

But a rapid, coordinated response halted the outbreak in its tracks. By late September, about 900 people — nearly everyone who'd had contact with patient zero and another person he infected — were identified, interviewed and monitored. Approximately 18,500 face-to-face visits were conducted by investigators from the Nigerian Center for Disease Control and the State Ministry of Health to achieve this, according to the report.

People who were suspected of having Ebola were transported to an isolation ward, and those who tested positive for Ebola were moved to a treatment center.

People can contract Ebola if they have contact with the bodily fluids of a person who is sick with the virus. It can take between two and 21 days for an infected person to start showing symptoms.

After 21 days, if an exposed person does not develop symptoms, he or she will not become sick with Ebola, according to the CDC. But for WHO to declare an Ebola outbreak over, a country must pass 42 days (twice the incubation period for Ebola virus) with no new cases detected. Moreover, active surveillance must be in place to detect "chains of transmission that might otherwise remain hidden," according to WHO.

Another key reason that Nigeria overcame its Ebola crisis was the country's virology laboratory at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, where researchers were able to quickly diagnose cases, according to WHO.

People were also educated about the disease via social media and TV programs delivered by Nigerian movie celebrities.

"Strong public awareness campaigns — teamed with early engagement of traditional, religious and community leaders — also played a key role in successful containment of this outbreak," WHO said.

Nigeria remains on "high alert," with officials looking out for other imported cases of Ebola. But its success story shows other countries that with a proper response, Ebola can be controlled.

"If a country like Nigeria, hampered by serious security problems, can do this ... any country in the world experiencing an imported case can hold onward transmission to just a handful of cases," Dr. Margaret Chan, WHO director-general, wrote in a statement.


http://news.yahoo.com/nigeria-ebola-contained-africas-largest-city-222417978.html

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Ebola Airport Screening Prevents 3 Cases Per Month from Traveling
LiveScience.com
By Rachael Rettner  October 20, 2014 6:51 PM



If the Ebola screening procedures currently taking place at airports in West Africa were to stop, about three people with the disease would leave the outbreak region each month as they traveled by plane, according to estimates from a new study.

The results underscore the importance of maintaining effective Ebola screening at the airports in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, the countries most affected by the current Ebola outbreak, the researchers said. The screening of travelers departing from these countries began on Aug. 8.

In addition, the new findings suggest that screening passengers as they leave the countries most affected by Ebola is much more efficient than screening passengers as they enter other countries. The United States began Ebola entry screening at five airports on Oct. 8.

"Exit screening at the three international airports — Conakry, Monrovia and Freetown — in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone [respectively] should allow all travelers at highest risk of exposure to Ebola to be assessed with greater efficiency compared with entry screening the same passengers as they arrive in cities around the world," Dr. Kamran Khan, of St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto, said in a statement. However, exit screening "will require international support to effectively implement and maintain,"Khan said.

The researchers analyzed information from upcoming and recent flight schedules, as well as data on Ebola virus surveillance in West Africa, to model the number of people with Ebola expected to travel by plane out of the three affected countries.

The study found that more than half of air travelers who were leaving Guinea, Liberia or Sierra Leone had final destinations in Ghana, Senegal, the United Kingdom, France and Gambia. And more than 60 percent of travelers leaving the outbreak countries this year are expected to have final destinations in low- or lower-middle-income countries, the researchers said.

Without airport exit screening in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, an average of 2.8 travelers with Ebola would leave these countries on international flights each month, the study found.

In addition, the study determined that exit screening was much more efficient and less disruptive than entry screening.

Exit screening is conducted at airports in just three cities; entry screening would need to be conducted in the 15 cities that receive direct flights and more than 1,200 cities that receive indirect flights from Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. In cities that do not receive direct flights from these countries, more than 2,500 people would need to be screened upon arriving in order to identify one person who traveled out of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, the researchers said.

What's more, the nonstop flights out of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone are 2.7 hours on average, so it's unlikely that a person who was screened just before getting on a plane would develop symptoms during the fight. (It takes between two and 21 days for a person infected with Ebola to show symptoms.)

"While screening travelers arriving at airports outside of West Africa may offer a sense of security, this would have, at best, marginal benefits, and could draw valuable resources away from more effective public health interventions," Khan said.

Dr. Jesse L. Goodman, a professor of medicine at Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington D.C., agreed that exit screening is more efficient than entry screening. However, entry screening provides an additional layer of caution, and may catch people with symptoms who were missed on exit screening, Goodman said.

"If exit screening was prefect, [entry screening] might not add much," said Goodman, who was not involved in the new research. But it's sometimes hard for people to understand or answer questions asked during exit screening, so entry screening might uncover a new Ebola exposure, Goodman said.

The finding that many travelers from West Africa are headed for lower-income countries, which may have limited medical resources to respond to Ebola, is concerning, Goodman told Live Science.

"If you look at how [the United States] has been challenged by this single patient," the new findings should emphasize to these other countries "just how important it is for them to be ready for the same challenges," Goodman said.

Although some countries have restricted air travel from Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, "excessive constraints on air travel could have severe economic consequences that could destabilize the region and possibly disrupt critical supplies of essential health and humanitarian services," Khan said. "The best approach to minimize risks to the global community is to control the epidemic at its source," Khan added.

For the study, the researchers assumed that all travelers from the three West African countries had an equal risk of exposure to Ebola. However, people in higher socioeconomic groups (who tend to have more access to air travel) may actually have a lower risk of exposure than those in lower socioeconomic groups, the researchers said. This means the findings may overestimate the risk of a person with Ebola traveling by air to another country. On the other hand, the study did not account for the underreporting of Ebola cases, which could result in an underestimation of risk, the researchers noted.

The study is published in the Oct. 21 issue of the journal The Lancet.


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-airport-screening-prevents-3-cases-per-month-225158268.html

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CDC Updates Its Ebola Guidelines for Health Care Workers
LiveScience.com
By Karen Rowan  October 20, 2014 10:28 PM



To better protect health care workers against the risk of contracting Ebola, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention now recommends that workers undergo rigorous training in putting on and taking off personal protection equipment, according to new guidelines announced this evening (Oct. 20).

The CDC also recommended that workers not leave any of their skin exposed when caring for an Ebola patient, and that they put on and take off equipment under the close supervision of a trained supervisor, said CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden, speaking at a news conference this evening.

Previous guidelines were established in 2008 and were updated in August, Frieden said.

Those guidelines had been used successfully before, but the Dallas hospital where Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan was treated was relying on those guidelines, and still two nurses became infected with Ebola after caring for Duncan. "This is unacceptable," Frieden said.

The new guidelines provide "an increased margin of safety" for workers, he said. They were developed with input from workers at the three specialized care units — Emory University Hospital in Atlanta, Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha and the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center in Bethesda, Maryland — where Ebola patients have been treated.

"The greatest risk in Ebola care is the taking off of whatever a health care worker has on," Frieden said. The new guidelines standardize and ritualize how this is done, he said.

In the guidelines, the CDC also recommends that workers wear a specialized respiratory mask, rather than just a facemask. The care for Ebola patients that takes place in U.S. hospitals is quite different from the care that Ebola patients in hospitals in West Africa receive, Frieden noted.

"What gets done in U.S. hospitals — suctioning, intubation, other things — that may not be done in Africa or the parts of the world where Ebola is spreading now," mean that additional safety measures are needed for workers in this country, he said. (The Ebola virus is not airborne; it spreads through contact with an infected patient, or their bodily fluids.)

On Sunday (Oct. 19), the last of the people who had contact with Duncan in the Dallas community, before he went into isolation at the hospital, cleared their 21-day monitoring period, and no cases of Ebola developed within that group. A number of health care workers who had contact with Duncan during his treatment are still within their monitoring period, Frieden said.

To date, the two nurses who contracted Ebola while treating Duncan are the only people to ever become infected with Ebola while in the United States. As of Oct. 14, there were at least 9,200 confirmed or suspected cases of Ebola in West Africa, and more than 4,500 people have died of the disease in that region.


http://news.yahoo.com/cdc-updates-ebola-guidelines-health-care-workers-022858219.html

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US to track everyone coming from Ebola nations
Associated Press
By CONNIE CASS  1 hour ago



Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, says he expects revised CDC protocols on Ebola to focus on training, observation and ensuring health care workers are more protected. (Oct. 20)



WASHINGTON (AP) — Stepping up their vigilance against Ebola, federal authorities said Wednesday that everyone traveling into the U.S. from Ebola-stricken nations will be monitored for symptoms for 21 days. That includes returning American aid workers, federal health employees and journalists, as well as West African travelers.

The program will start Monday in six states that represent 70 percent of people arriving from Liberia, Sierra Leone and New Guinea, said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

CDC Director Tom Frieden said monitoring would extend to other states in coming days and reach "every person coming back to the country for the 21 days they are at risk for Ebola." He said it would continue until the outbreak in West Africa is controlled.

"We have to keep our guard up," Frieden told reporters on a conference call.

Local and state officials will perform the daily monitoring, which may consist of keeping up with people by phone or visits. The first states are New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, New Jersey and Georgia.

Individuals arriving from West Africa will receive "care kits" that include thermometers, detailed information on how take their temperature twice a day, and logs for recording the information. Temperatures must be reported to health officials at least once per day, he said.



Dallas officials announced Monday that almost all of the 48 people being monitored for Ebola following possible exposure to Eric Duncan have been cleared. (Oct. 20)


Frieden said the message to travelers is: "If you become sick, get care quickly because that could save your life and protect your family."

The kits also will include information on whom to call if symptoms occur and a card the traveler can present to health care providers if they seek care.

CDC already was telling its own employees and other health professionals working in the outbreak zone to monitor their temperature for 21 days upon return, so Wednesday's announcement adds another step to their ongoing fever watch.

The new program comes after authorities announced Wednesday plans to funnel all visitors from the three nations through five airports where fever checks and other Ebola screening measures have been put in place.

An American video journalist who has recovered from Ebola left the hospital Wednesday and headed home to Providence, Rhode Island.



This undated handout photo provided by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) shows a kit that travelers from Ebola-stricken West African nations will be given containing information cards and a thermometer and they will be required to make daily check-ins with state or local health officials to report their status. CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden said the check-ins could be in person, by telephone, Skype or Facetime or through employers — CDC was consulting with the state and local officials to help them work that out. (AP Photo/CDC)


"Today is a joyful day," Ashoka Mukpo said in a statement released by the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha. The hospital said testing found him free of the virus now.

"I feel profoundly blessed to be alive, and in the same breath aware of the global inequalities that allowed me to be flown to an American hospital when so many Liberians die alone with minimal care," said Mukpo, who arrived at the Nebraska hospital Oct. 6.

The virus has killed more than 4,500 people in West Africa, nearly all in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea. Mukpo caught it while working in Liberia as a freelance cameraman for NBC and other media outlets.

Two American nurses remain hospitalized after catching the virus from a Liberian man who traveled to the U.S. before exhibiting symptoms and dying at a Dallas hospital. Because of their cases, the CDC issued more stringent safety guidelines this week and is working with states to spread them to health care workers across the country.

Debra Berry, the mother of Dallas nurse Amber Vinson, said Tuesday her daughter is "doing OK, just trying to get stronger" while being treated at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta.



In this Oct. 16, 2014, file photo, Registered nurse Keene Roadman, stands fully dressed in personal protective equipment during a training class at the Rush University Medical Center, in Chicago. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released new guidelines Monday, Oct. 20, for how health workers should gear up to treat Ebola patients. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast, File)


Fellow Dallas nurse Nina Pham's condition has been upgraded from fair to good at the National Institutes of Health outside Washington.

At the White House, President Barack Obama was meeting with his new Ebola coordinator Ron Klain and top aides Wednesday afternoon.

Under heavy criticism for the government's handling of the first Ebola case diagnosed within the U.S., Obama reached for help last week from Klain, a veteran political operator and former chief of staff to Vice President Joe Biden. Klain will coordinate the array of federal agencies dealing with Ebola in the U.S. and helping to tackle the crisis in West Africa.

The Obama administration has resisted increasing pressure to ban travel from the three countries at the center of the Ebola outbreak. Obama and federal health authorities say that could make the situation worse, by making it harder for foreign doctors and aid workers to get help to nations that desperately need it and can't stop the outbreak on their own.

In addition to Mukpo, three American doctors and an aide worker, all infected in Liberia or Sierra Leone, have been treated at the Nebraska Medical Center or Emory University Hospital in Atlanta, and have recovered.

___

Associated Press writers Mike Stobbe in New York and Emily Schmall in Dallas and Alicia Caldwell in Washington contributed to this report.


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-airport-checks-expand-nurses-training-070804801--politics.html

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Did Deforestation Cause Ebola?
Takepart.com
By Marc Herman | 2 hours ago



While Ebola continues to ravage Liberia and Sierra Leone, an old debate has returned over how best to discourage future transmissions in areas like the one the virus emerged from.

A report by the National Institutes of Health last week confirmed that the outbreak began with a single case of transmission to a human from an animal. That likely raised the hackles of activists who've been insisting that human incursion into forests is likely to increase the incidence of disease transmission. Mining and logging means roads and camps and workers who need food, often leading to increased consumption of, and new trade in, wild animals, known as bushmeat.

That's the thinking anyway. But it’s not clear that human activity in forests where diseases like Ebola are present increases the odds of outbreaks. The two positions—Ebola creates itself in the forest, or Ebola moves with animal populations that industry decimates—are opposite sides of a long-running, arguably life-and-death debate among scientists studying the disease.

“It [Ebola] hasn’t been associated with natural resource exploitation,” said Peter Walsh, who studies primate ecology at Cambridge University. “The original outbreak on the Ebola River wasn’t, and the ones in southern DRC [Democratic Republic of Congo] in 1995 and 1997 were also not. It’s just not happening.”

Though West Africa is heavy populated, the transmission that led to the current outbreak didn’t occur in an area with extensive road systems or a large population. It appears to have begun in one of the region’s remaining forested areas, Walsh said.

“There are plenty of logging and mining concessions out there in central Africa. If there was a strong tendency for [human activity] to be associated, it would have happened.”

Walsh’s argument is part of a long-running debate over how Ebola emerges in animals in the first place. Virologist Eric Leroy argued in a 2004 article in the journal Nature that the virus exists as multiple strains and could emerge anywhere. If so, road building would, in theory, increase the odds of people coming into contact with infected animals. (The following year, it was Leroy's team that identified fruit bats—suspected as the source of the transmission that led to the current outbreak—as a potential “reservoir” for the virus.)

Leroy’s team had found evidence of independent strains in samples taken from primates in Gabon. “The five outbreaks were caused by five distinct Ebola viral strains, rather than by one strain that mutated into different forms,” they claimed.

At the heart of the question is explaining why places where road building exists have not had large outbreaks. Walsh argues that areas developed for industry, or developed generally like West Africa, quickly lose habitat to support the animals carrying diseases like Ebola.

Ebola, he said, is “density dependent. When it gets in the gorillas, then more gorillas die, [and] you’ve got a lot of dead gorillas on the ground. If you’ve got a logging operation [nearby], they quickly get hunted out.” Instead, outbreaks tend to occur in pristine places, where small-scale hunters and bushmeat traders can reliably find animals. 

If Leroy is right, then an epidemic like the current one in West Africa could happen virtually anywhere.

If Walsh is right, then mapping animal populations should allow us to predict outbreaks, and prepare


http://news.yahoo.com/did-deforestation-cause-ebola-163046565.html

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Ebola survivors in Liberia are symbols of hope and help
Reuters
By Misha Hussain  1 hour ago



Four survivors of the Ebola outbreak, who were treated by Gorbee Logan, a Liberian doctor who says he has successfully treated Ebola patients with anti-retroviral drugs, walk at a clinic outside Monrovia October 3, 2014. REUTERS/James Giahyue



DAKAR (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Ebola survivors in Liberia are quickly becoming an important part of the fight against the deadly virus that has killed more than 4,500 people in West Africa since being detected in the region in March.

Once rejected by their communities, survivors are now being seen as part of the solution as scientists try to find a way to use the antibodies in their blood to help treat victims.

Sheldon Yett, Country Director for the United Nations Childrens Fund (UNICEF) in Liberia, said survivors were still stigmatized, but people were starting to see them as a real sign of hope and help.

In the capital Monrovia, Ebola survivors are helping in Liberia’s first state-run interim care center for Ebola orphans. There are some 3,700 Ebola orphans in the region today, according to UNICEF.

“Ebola plays on the most basic of human emotions; children just want a hug, but fear has meant that even loved ones have kept them at arms' length. Ebola survivors can provide that support, knowing that they have a natural immunity to the virus,” Yett told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by telephone from Monrovia.



Survivors of the Ebola outbreak attend a discharging ceremony at a health clinic in Freetown October 6, 2014. REUTERS/Umaru Fofana


Meinu Kpetermani, a survivor working at the Willing Hearts center, monitors the children's temperature and reports to the caretaker if any child has a fever or shows other symptoms of Ebola.

“Ebola survivors are doctors, nurses and social workers. We come from all walks of life. We can make a real contribution to society if people are willing to use our skills,” said Kpetermani, a nurse who contracted Ebola in September.


SURVIVORS’ ANTIBODIES

The World Health Organization, now largely responsible for coordinating the development of a treatment and vaccine for Ebola, said on Tuesday that a serum based on antibodies in survivors’ blood might be ready as early as December.



Survivors of the Ebola outbreak, who were treated by Gorbee Logan, a Liberian doctor who says he has successfully treated Ebola patients with anti-retroviral drugs, receive care packages at a clinic outside Monrovia, October 3, 2014. REUTERS/James Giahyue


“The partnership that is moving the quickest will be in Liberia where we hope that in the coming weeks there will be facilities set up to collect the blood, treat the blood and be able to process it for use,” WHO assistant director general Marie Paule Kieny told a news conference in Geneva.

In the past, Ebola outbreaks occurred mainly in remote parts of Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo and were managed through contact tracing, isolation and rehydration therapy. There is currently no widely available vaccine or treatment.

The West Africa Ebola outbreak is the largest in history and has infected more people than the 25 previous outbreaks over 40 years combined. The WHO has reported more than 9,000 cases, mostly in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

Kieny warned that supply of a new serum may not meet demand, and that extreme care must be taken to avoid infecting Ebola victims with other diseases such as HIV or hepatitis. Drugs and vaccines may not be ready till January 2015, she said.



Survivors of the Ebola virus pose for a picture outside a clinic near Tubmanburg, Liberia, October 15, 2014. REUTERS/James Giahyue


EBOLA SURVIVORS TOP 1,000

The medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), which has been leading the fight against Ebola, said this week it had released the 1,000th Ebola survivor treated in its clinics in West Africa, Liberian James Kollie.

Kollie, like many other survivors, now faces a struggle to avoid being rejected in his home town of Hengbelahun, in Lofa County's Kolahun District, just across the border from the original source of the outbreak in Guinea.

“They are afraid of me. They say I still have Ebola and I want to kill them,” Kollie, 16, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by skype from Foya in Liberia, where his father is an outreach worker for MSF.

Kollie’s father, Alexandre Kollie, said many people in their community didn’t believe Ebola existed, including his own wife, who died of Ebola in Monrovia while he was working in Foya.

“Ebola had come to Liberia so I tried to talk to my family about the virus and to educate them, but my wife did not believe in it. I called my wife begging her to leave Monrovia and bring the children north so we could be together here. She did not listen. She denied Ebola.”

James Kollie, who also lost his two sisters to Ebola, said he would like to work with his father, telling people how to avoid the disease. “It’s important that you wash your hands with chlorinated water and avoid body contact to keep Ebola out of your community.”

(Reporting By Misha Hussain, editing by Tim Pearce)


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-survivors-liberia-symbols-hope-help-175418541.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Africa Union chief to visit Ebola-hit nations
AFP  5 hours ago



Addis Ababa (AFP) - African Union chief Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma will travel to three west African nations worst hit by the Ebola crisis, one of the most senior officials to do so since the outbreak, her spokesman said Wednesday.

AU Commission chair Dlamini-Zuma will visit Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia "to assess the situation first hand", her spokesman said in a statement.

She arrived in the Ghanian capital Accra on Wednesday, her spokesman said, the base of the United Nations Mission on Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER), and is expected to travel on to Liberia on Thursday.

"We remain committed and in solidarity with our sisters and brothers in west Africa to put the Ebola epidemic under control," Dlamini-Zuma said in the statement.

"We commend the ongoing continental and global efforts, but frankly, a lot more needs to be done to raise the needed resources considering the magnitude and rate of increase of the epidemic."

She is accompanied by UN Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) chief Carlos Lopes, as well as the African Development Bank (AfDB) president Donald Kaberuka.

The deadliest-ever outbreak of Ebola has claimed more than 4,500 lives in west Africa, and experts warn the rate of infections could reach 10,000 a week by early December.


http://news.yahoo.com/africa-union-chief-visit-ebola-hit-nations-134654009.html

[Buster's Uncle]

US journalist to head home after Ebola recovery
Associated Press  2 hours ago



OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — An American video journalist who has recovered from Ebola will soon head home to Rhode Island with his family, hospital officials said Wednesday.

Nebraska Medical Center officials said Ashoka Mukpo, who had contracted the virus while working in Liberia as a freelance cameraman for NBC and other media outlets, was released from the hospital's biocontainment unit around 9 a.m., but had not left the hospital complex by late morning.

In a statement read by Dr. Jeffrey Gold, the University of Nebraska Medical Center chancellor, Mukpo said: "Today is a joyful day." Mukpo, of Providence, Rhode Island, did not attend the news conference.

Hospital officials had said Tuesday that Mukpo's blood tested negative for the virus. He had arrived Oct. 6 and was the second Ebola patient to be treated there. The first, Dr. Rick Sacra, has also recovered.

In his statement, Mukpo thanked Dr. Kent Brantly, who provided blood for a transfusion. Brantly, who was treated for Ebola in Atlanta, also donated blood to Sacra. Such transfusions are believed to help Ebola patients because a survivor's blood contains antibodies to fight the disease.

"I feel profoundly blessed to be alive, and in the same breath aware of the global inequalities that allowed me to be flown to an American hospital when so many Liberians die alone with minimal care," Mukpo said.


http://news.yahoo.com/us-journalist-head-home-ebola-recovery-053509041.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Official WHO Ebola toll near 5,000 with true number nearer 15,000
Reuters
By Tom Miles  30 minutes ago



GENEVA (Reuters) - At least 4,877 people have died in the world's worst recorded outbreak of Ebola, and at least 9,936 cases of the disease had been recorded as of Oct. 19, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday, but the true toll may be three times as much.

The WHO has said real numbers of cases are believed to be much higher than reported: by a factor of 1.5 in Guinea, 2 in Sierra Leone and 2.5 in Liberia, while the death rate is thought to be about 70 percent of all cases. That would suggest a toll of almost 15,000.

Liberia has been worst hit, with 4,665 recorded cases and 2,705 deaths, followed by Sierra Leone with 3,706 cases and 1,259 deaths. Guinea, where the outbreak originated, has had 1,540 cases and 904 deaths.

On Friday the WHO put the toll about 300 lower with more than 745 fewer cases.

In the past week, transmission of the disease was most intense in the capital cities of Monrovia and Freetown, while Guinea's capital Conakry reported 18 confirmed cases, its second highest weekly total since the outbreak began.

Although Ebola has been contained in Nigeria and Senegal, the disease is spreading towards Ivory Coast in both Liberia and Guinea, including in Guinea's Kankan district on a major trade route with Mali. Kankan saw its first case in the past week.

However, the WHO said the Liberian district of Lofa had seen a third consecutive week of decline in the number of cases, which reports from observers suggested was a result of disease control measures.

Among the thousands of cases are 443 health care workers, 244 of whom have died. The WHO said it was undertaking extensive investigations to determine why so many had caught the disease.

"Early indications are that a substantial proportion of infections occurred outside the context of Ebola treatment and care," it said.

A U.N. plan to stop the epidemic, known as 70-70-60, involves isolating at least 70 percent of cases and safely burying at least 70 percent of those who die by Dec. 1, a 60-day deadline from the start of the plan. That is supposed to rise to 100 percent by the 90-day deadline on Jan. 1.

The number of isolation beds had increased substantially to 1,126 but remained only 25 percent of the 4,388 expected to be needed in 50 Ebola treatment units. There were also firm commitments from foreign medical teams to staff only 30 units.

Without those beds in those units, families have to care for sick relatives at home and risk infection.

The WHO also estimates 28 laboratories are needed in the three worst-hit countries, with 12 now in place, and 20,000 staff will be needed to keep track of people who have had contact with Ebola patients and may be at risk.

The three worst-hit countries will also need 230 dead-body-management teams by Dec. 1, it said. They have 140.

(Editing by Louise Ireland)


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-deaths-4-877-cases-near-10-000-170158348.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Pledges to U.N. fund to fight Ebola more than double to $50 mln
Reuters
By Michelle Nichols  12 hours ago



UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Pledges to a United Nations trust fund calling for nearly $1 billion to fight Ebola in West Africa have more than doubled to almost $50 million, days after it was disclosed that only one $100,000 donation had been deposited.

The United Nations said in September that $988 million would be needed to try to halt the spread of the deadly virus over the next six months. Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea in West Africa have been hardest hit by Ebola, but cases have also been reported in Nigeria, Senegal, Spain and the United States.

Donors can contribute directly to U.N. agencies such as the World Health Organization and aid groups working in West Africa or to the trust fund created by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to allow for rapid, flexible funding of urgent needs.

By Oct. 16, donors had committed $365 million, but nearly all of that money was directed to U.N. agencies and aid groups. Only $100,000 from Colombia was deposited in the trust fund, which has received pledges totaling $19 million from Chile, Australia, Estonia, India and Romania.

According to the trust fund website on Tuesday, Australia has deposited $8.7 million and Venezuela has committed $5 million. New non-binding pledges have also been received from Finland, New Zealand, Norway, South Korea and Kazakhstan, taking the total promised money to nearly $35 million.

"Much more is needed," U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said on Tuesday. "The Secretary-General urges all countries that have contributed to consider what more they can do, and those who have yet to contribute to do so as a matter of urgency."

The trust fund aims to raise at least $100 million by the end of October, according to its website.

More than 4,500 people have died in the worst Ebola outbreak on record, the World Health Organization said on Friday.

The United Nations has established a special mission, known as UNMEER, in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea to coordinate efforts to contain Ebola.

"The only way to end the Ebola crisis is to end the epidemic at its source. The people and governments of West Africa are demonstrating significant resilience. The world has a duty to provide assistance for which they have asked," Dujarric said.

The United Nations Financial Tracking Service showed on Tuesday that more than $410 million had been committed to Ebola response efforts, while another $225 million in non-binding pledges had been made. These figures include payments and pledges to the U.N. trust fund.

Dujarric said Ban established the fund "to provide a flexible, accountable, strategic and transparent platform to finance critical unfunded priorities and help reduce the rate of Ebola transmission."

"Ebola is a major global problem that demands a massive and immediate global response. Needs include trained medical personnel, mobile laboratories, vehicles, helicopters, protective equipment, and medevac capacities," he said.


http://news.yahoo.com/pledges-u-n-fund-fight-ebola-more-double-061949047.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Red Cross head says Ebola travel bans "irrational"
Reuters
By Michael Martina  9 hours ago



Airport doctors demonstrate how medical staff will check the body temperature of a passenger arriving from Ebola infected zones at the Vaclav Havel Airport in Prague October 21, 2014. The Czech Republic begins screening air passengers for Ebola on Tuesday if they arrive on flights from regions hit by the disease. REUTERS/David W Cerny



BEIJING (Reuters) - Closing borders will not effectively curb Ebola infections, the head of the Red Cross said on Wednesday, amid debate over whether bans on travel from hardest-hit African countries would help combat the spread of the deadly virus.

This year's outbreak of the highly infectious haemorrhagic fever thought to have originated in forest bats is the worst on record, having killed more than 4,500 people, mostly in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone.

Travellers from the region have infected two people in the U.S. state of Texas and one in Madrid, prompting some leaders, including some U.S. lawmakers, to urge a ban on travel from West Africa.

Elhadj As Sy, Secretary General of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), said such restrictions would not make sense.

"It (Ebola) creates a lot of fear and extreme panic that sometimes lead to very irrational type of behaviours and measures, like closing borders, cancelling flights, isolating countries etc.," Sy told reporters in Beijing, where the IFRC, the world's largest humanitarian network, was holding a conference.

"Those are not solutions. The only solution is how can we join our efforts to contain those kinds of viruses and epidemics at their epicentre, right where they start."

Sy said he believed it was possible to contain the disease in four to six months if proper practices were implemented, but that additional investment in the West Africa's health infrastructure would be needed to prevent future outbreaks.

Sy joins world leaders, including World Bank President Jim Yong Kim, in voicing opposition against such travel restrictions.

The World Health Organization (WHO), which so far has not recommended blanket travel or trade restrictions on the West African countries, has warned of 5,000-10,000 new cases of Ebola globally every week by December.

It has said the outbreak constitutes an international public health emergency and has urged the screening of passengers from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

Health experts warn that excessive constraints on air travel could have severe economic consequences that could destabilise the region and possibly disrupt essential health and humanitarian services.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security ratcheted up safeguards against Ebola on Tuesday, requiring travellers from the three African countries to fly into one of five major airports conducting enhanced screening for the virus.

The White House has said President Barack Obama remains open to a travel ban if public health experts advise it, but Obama has said if a ban was implemented some travellers might attempt to enter the United States by avoiding screening measures, which could lead to more Ebola cases, not fewer.

(Reporting by Michael Martina; Editing by Nick Macfie)


http://news.yahoo.com/red-cross-head-says-ebola-travel-bans-irrational-095255260.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Dozens released Ebola-free from Sierra Leone site
Associated Press
By KABBA KARGBO and CLARENCE ROY-MACAULAY  42 minutes ago



In this grab from video provided by Associated Press Television on Wednesday, Oct. 22, 2014, Ebola survivors Hawanatu Turay, left and an unidentified woman, display their certificates, after being given the all clear, at a treatment centre at Hastings, near Freetown, Sierra Leone. Dozens of Ebola survivors were discharged from a treatment center near Sierra Leone's capital on Wednesday and told they were virus-free. The third group released from the Hastings Treatment center, which included 45 patients, were also issued with health certificates they proudly held up. (AP Photo/Associated Press Television)



FREETOWN, Sierra Leone (AP) — Dozens of Ebola survivors have been discharged from a treatment center near Sierra Leone's capital and told they were virus-free, as police and residents clashed in other areas of the West African country.

Assistant inspector police general Karrow Kamara said Wednesday a curfew had been imposed in the eastern diamond-rich Kono district after protests Tuesday. Police fired tear gas to disperse crowds who had gathered with sticks and machetes in support of an opposition figure who wanted to stop health officials from taking blood samples from his mother. Kamara said he was traveling to the area to get more information.

At the Hastings Treatment center near Freetown on Tuesday, 45 patients were issued with health certificates claiming they were Ebola-free, and proudly held them up as they were released.

Hawanatu Turay, 14, said she was happy to be feeling healthy again.

"I feel good because nothing hurts me anymore and I am feeling fine, I can do anything I want to do. I am happy, I can eat fine, my stomach hurts no more, my head aches no more and also my neck, nothing hurts and I have no more pains," Turay said. She is among only 130 patients who have been treated and released from the facility, which is run by Sierra Leone doctors and nurses and started operating on Sept. 19.

Such releases are glimmers of hope in an outbreak that has infected some 9,900 people and killed more than 4,800 in the hardest hit countries in West Africa — Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea.



A child, center, stands next to a signboard reading 'Police order quarantined home unauthorised should keep off' as a family home is placed under quarantine due to the Ebola virus in Port Loko, Sierra Leone, Wednesday, Oct. 22, 2014. U.S. authorities said Wednesday that everyone traveling into the U.S. from Ebola-stricken nations will be monitored for symptoms for 21 days. That includes returning American aid workers, federal health employees and journalists, as well as West African travelers. The program will start Monday in six states that represent 70 percent of people arriving from Liberia, Sierra Leone and New Guinea, said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (AP Photo/ Michael Duff)


Dr. Sankoh, a lieutenant from the Sierra Leone Army, said the release of the patients is a clear indication that the treatment center is helping.

"This is a clear manifestation that we cure a good number of Ebola patients in this center," he said. He did not give another name. Many patients come in unstable, and some unconscious, he said.

"We are actually doing a good job here, we discharge, we treat patients and also do follow up treatment, not only treating them, but we also make sure that they have their full dose of combinations that they need," he said. That follow up and treatment is why, he said, they recover in large numbers and quickly at the center.

"Some people just came in here about a week ago and they have been discharged today," he said.

British International Development Secretary Justine Greening noted that training is key for health care workers who are risking their lives.

"One of the worst aspects of what's happened here in Sierra Leone is a breakdown of the health care system. We've seen health care workers really on the front line and also being many of the people who have lost their lives," Greening said Tuesday while visiting a U.K.-funded Ebola treatment and training center.

More than 400 health workers have contracted the disease in West Africa.

African Union chief Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma will travel to Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia "to assess the situation first hand", her spokesman said in a statement Wednesday.

She arrived in the Ghanaian capital Accra on Wednesday, the base of the United Nations Mission on Ebola Emergency Response, and is expected to travel on to Liberia on Thursday.


http://news.yahoo.com/dozens-released-ebola-free-sierra-leone-150815216.html