What is a fact about Ebola?
Ebola is a virus disease The virus can affect both humans and animals. The disease is rare but very severe and potentially lethal. In Africa, more than half of the infected do not survive. The largest Ebola epidemic ever, in 2014 and 2015, cost the lives of more than 11,000 people.
What exactly is Ebola?
Ebola is a virus that causes problems with how your blood clots. It is known as a hemorrhagic fever virus, because the clotting problems lead to internal bleeding, as blood leaks from small blood vessels in your body. The virus also causes inflammation and tissue damage.
What is Ebola and how is it caused?
What causes Ebola? Ebola is caused by viruses in the Ebolavirus and Filoviridae family. Ebola is considered a zoonosis, meaning that the virus is present in animals and is transmitted to humans. How this transmission occurs at the onset of an outbreak in humans is unknown.
Why is it important to know about Ebola?
Ebola hemorrhagic fever, or just Ebola for short, is a severe disease often leading to death in humans and non-human primates (such as monkeys, gorillas, and chimpanzees). Five different Ebola virus species have been identified, and four of these cause disease in humans.
What caused Ebola?
EVD is caused by the Ebola virus. It’s origin or how it started is unknown. Scientists believe that it is animal-borne and most likely comes from bats, which transmit the Ebola virus to other animals and humans. There is no proof that mosquitos or other insects can transmit the virus.
Does Ebola still exist?
As of 14 February 2021, four cases of Ebola virus disease (EVD), including two deaths, have been reported in the North Kivu province in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), where a large outbreak was declared over in June 2020. Two health zones are currently affected: Biena and Katwa.
How do you explain Ebola to kids?
How to Talk to Your Kids About Ebola
- Be honest about how Ebola is spread. Explain that Ebola is nothing like the common cold or the flu, diseases that are far more contagious.
- Explain that people can and do survive Ebola.
- Stress that we are not at risk for an outbreak.
What causes Ebola?
How did the first person get Ebola?
The first human case in an Ebola outbreak is acquired through contact with blood, secretions organs or other bodily fluids of an infected animal. EVD has been documented in people who handled infected chimpanzees, gorillas, and forest antelopes, both dead and alive, in Cote d’Ivoire, the Republic of Congo and Gabon.