• Question: what is ebola

    Asked by anon-185891 to Trystan, Verity on 11 Nov 2018. This question was also asked by anon-186297.
    • Photo: Verity Hill

      Verity Hill answered on 11 Nov 2018:

      Ebola is a disease caused by the Ebola virus. It causes symptoms like headache and fever early on, and then later progresses to diarrhoea, vommiting and in some cases your organs just stop working. It kills up to 90% of the people infected with it.
      Before 2014, outbreaks used to be small and limited to rural villages in central and eastern Africa. In 2014, there was an outbreak in West Africa, specifically Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea which ended up infecting at least 28,000 people and killed about 11,000.
      There is currently an outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which has now infected over 200 people and is being complicated by the large numbers of military groups in the area.
      There is no cure for Ebola, but there is an experimental vaccine which seems to be working very well!

    • Photo: Trystan Leng

      Trystan Leng answered on 12 Nov 2018:

      Verity gives a great summary!

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