In the year 1976, Ebola climbed out of its unknown hiding place, and caused thedeath of 340 people. Fear gripped the victims faces, and uncertainty torturedtheir minds. The people of Zaire waited outside clinics, churches and in theirhomes for a treatment of the horrible disease, but there was no cure. They wereforced to watch people die, hoping that they would be saved from the violentdeath of the Ebola virus.
From the year of 1976 to the present date of 1996,researchers have searched for origin and cure of the virus. Scientists havecarried out numerous studies and investigations, but no one has been able tofind the right explanations. Prevention of a world wide outbreak lies within theeducation of what the virus is capable of doing, how Ebola victims can beproperly treated , and by performing prompt action to isolate the virus beforeit has dispersed. The Ebola virus is a member of a family of RNA viruses know asfiloviruses.
Marburg virus and four Ebola viruses: Ebola Zaire, Sudan, Restonand Tai are the five different viruses that have been known to cause disease inhumans, while Ebola Reston only causes disease within monkeys. Filoviruses,arenaviruses, flaviruses, and bunyaviruses are the viruses responsible forcausing viral hemorrhagic fevers. All forms of virus of viral hemorrhagic feverbegin with fever and muscle aches. These diseases usually progress until thepatient becomes very ill with respiratory problems, severe bleeding, kidneymalfunctions, and shock.
The conclusions of the viral hemorrhagic fever canrange from a mild illness to death. Ebola viruses are spread though closepersonal contact with a person who is very ill with the disease. Usually thewide spread action of the virus takes place among hospital care workers orfamily members who were aiding an infected person. Ebola can spread by the reuseof hypodermic needles, which occurs frequently in underdeveloped countries likeZaire and Sudan, but it is unlikely to become infected by close contact withpersons infected who show no symptoms. The Ebola virus spreads through the bloodand is replicated in organs, including the liver, lymphatic organs, kidneys,ovaries and testes.
The central lesions appear to be those affecting thevascular endothelium and the platelets. The resulting symptoms are bleeding,especially in the nose, abdomen, pericardium and vagina. Capillary leakageappears to lead to loss of intravascular volume, bleeding, shock and the acuterespiratory disorder seen in fatal cases. Patients basically die of intractableshock.
Those with severe illness often have fevers and are delirious, combativeand difficult to control. Some victims of the Ebola virus, one out of ten peopleinfected, survive the virus’s deadly operations. Due to its self limitingnature, the Ebola virus is known to sometimes die out within a person beforekilling the host organism. Just like the history of wars and other socialepidemics, the Ebola outbreaks need to be remembered and learned from.
The firsttwo Ebola outbreaks were in 1976, in the countries of Zaire and western Sudan. These were large outbreaks, resulting in more than 550 cases and 340 deaths. In1979, Ebola mysteriously appeared in Sudan causing 34 cases and 22 fatalities. The most recent Ebola Zaire outbreak started with a surgery on a suspectedMalaria patient in Kikwit, Zaire on April 10, 1995. As in the 1976 outbreak,secondary transmission of the virus in Kikwit occurred though close personalcontact with infectious blood and other body fluids. Members of the surgicalteam then developed symptoms similar to those of a viral hemorrhagic feverdisease.
The Ebola Zaire in Kikwit spread quickly, but investigation and controlof the outbreak come from a combined effort of medical teams from the Centersfor disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the World Health Organization,Belgium, France, and South African countries. Since July 1, 1995, 233 deathshave been reported among the 293 cases. So has the Ebola virus ever made it tothe United States? This question has come up in various letters to editors, andin FAQ (frequently asked questions) on the Internet. Truth is that in 1989monkeys infected with Ebola Reston were imported to Reston, Virginia from thePhilippines. Importation of African Green and rhesus monkeys was immediatelybrought to a halt, and was not resumed until the virus responsible for the quickdeaths of these monkeys was analyzed. The scariest characteristic about theEbola Reston was that it was known to have been airborne, and that it wasefficiently killing the monkeys that had been imported form the Philippines (Palca,1990).
Reston, Virginia and the 149 workers who came in contact with the monkeyswere grateful to find that the newly discovered Ebola Reston did not causedisease in humans. Of the 149 workers, none of the workers became ill and onlytwo developed antibodies for the Ebola Reston (Marjorie, 1990). The outbreaks of1976 and 1979 left no evidence to what might have been carrying the Ebola beforeit was passed onto humans. To this date no clues have been uncovered about wherethe virus hides between outbreaks.
Collection of animal specimens is currentlyunderway in Kikwit, but the possible species in tropical Africa are so numerousthat a long and lucky search is likely to be required. The Ebola Tai found onNovember 24, 1995 by a Swiss researcher in Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), WestAfrica. The researcher caught the Ebola Tai from a chimpanzee while carrying outan investigation about a spate of deaths among local chimps of the Tai forest. When the Pasteur investigators examined tissue taken from the dead chimpanzee,they found that the animal’s spleen and liver contained large areas of necrotictissue resembling what had previously been found in autopsies of patients whoperished from Ebola Zaire and Sudan. Instant investigation of the 4200square-kilometer reserve of the Tai forest was launched, but to this day notrace to the location of Ebola has been found. The researcher was evacuated to ahospital in Switzerland where she recovered.
The dedicated researcher has nowreturned to Ivory Coast to continue her work. During most of these outbreaks,field teams of researchers have captured more than 3,000 birds and mammals,including small rodents and several thousand possible insects. Material of theseanimals are now being processed for virus isolation. Blood samples of anestimated 64 suspected cases have also been serologically confirmed.
Still tothis day, many questions like “Where is Ebola originally from?” and”Will Ebola Zaire, Sudan, or Tai be able to become air- born?” remaina mystery.Bibliographyhttp://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Lab/5738/level2.html (Ebola VirusInformation Head Quarters)copyright 1999 and http://www.lfc.edu/~musilam/bio1.htmcopyright 1997Health Care
