The outbreak of the Ebola Virus in West Africa is undoubtedly the biggest health and humanitarian crisis currently facing the world, and is potentially the biggest health issue the globe has faced in decades.
Already the worst outbreak of the virus in recorded history, the World Health Organisation has warned that cases of the disease could skyrocket, topping 10,000 new cases per week within two months in affected regions. The official death toll from the current outbreak current stands at 4,447 out of 8,914 reported cases. Although officials from the WHO have stated that due to unreported cases and deaths, that number is likely quite a bit higher.
Speaking in Geneva, WHO assistant director-general Dr Bruce Aylward stated that to accept the current on-paper mortality rate of 50 percent would be erroneous. And that after analysing the results of investigations it becomes clear that this current outbreak of the disease carries a death rate of 70 percent, particularly in the hardest hit regions of Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea.
“This is a high-mortality disease in any circumstances but particularly in these places.“
The good news, however, is that people across the globe are more than up to the challenge of fighting this horrendous illness. Wealthy tycoons in Nigeria, including Africa’s richest person Aliko Dangote, have poured personal resources into helping to stem the spread of the illness within Nigeria, which could soon be declared Ebola-free.
And perhaps more significantly, Facebook CEO and all-around rich person Mark Zuckerberg has announced that he and wife Priscilla Chan are donating a total of $25million to the Centres for Disease Control Foundation to help the fight to get things under control in West Africa – and to assist prevention efforts in the United States, which has just seen its first recorded human-to-human transmission of the disease.
Unsurprisingly, Zuckerberg made the announcement on Facebook.
Post by Mark Zuckerberg.
To put that amount in perspective, the Australian Government has so far donated $18million to the cause. Granted, Zuckerberg doesn’t have an entire federated nation to run out of his bank account. But still, one man outdoes a country with the 12th highest GDP in the world? Alarm bells.
As for any potential outbreak in Australia, it should be noted that at the present time it’s considered highly unlikely. The unhygienic conditions in West Africa are, in large part, to blame for this current outbreak. And while fruit bats – the native carrier of the virus – are in plentiful numbers in Australia, it’s the African, not the Australian, breed that hosts the virus and are more likely to transmit to humans.
Beyond someone bringing it into the country after West Africa, experts believe there is little chance of the virus arriving in the country. And even in that event, Western health systems are far better equipped to contain the disease – with human-to-human transmission only occurring through direct contact with the bodily fluids of a patient exhibiting symptoms of the illness.
But regardless of that, it remains an extremely concerning outbreak that requires the focused efforts and resources of the entire globe in order for it to be contained and, eventually, eradicated.
Photo: Justin Sullivan via Getty Images.
