Health workers remove a body from the streets during the outbreak last year. Yahoo/Reuters.
Three cases of Ebola have been found in Liberia, two months after the country was declared Ebola free. Reuters. Officials are baffled at how the virus turned up so far away from the borders with Sierra Leone and Guinea, were the virus is still infecting people. They are trying to determine to source of the disease and suspect that there may be an animal link. The three villagers are suspected of eating a dog, which may have been infected with the disease. It is not at all clear if that was the source or not. So far dogs have not been proven to be a host for the Ebola virus, though some people have contracted the virus through eating other kinds of meat, such as monkey. None of the victims traveled to Sierra Leone or Guinea. Other possible explanations for the spread of the disease include the possibility that Liberia never really defeated Ebola in the first place. The virus could also have been spread through sex as the disease often lingers on in bodily fluids after the symptoms cease. One of the victims, a 17 year old male has died, and the other two are in stable condition.
My Comment:
It's been awhile since I have talked about Ebola but the disease never really went away. It looked like Liberia's long nightmare was over, but apparently that is not the case. And it has never been eradicated from Sierra Leone and Guinea. This outbreak, which has lasted more then a year, still lingers on.
The real mystery is how this showed up in Liberia again, so far away from the borders. It seems as though they have eliminated travel to outbreak zones as a possibility so there must be some other situation. I think the dog meat theory is probably correct. Why anyone would ever want to eat a dog is beyond me, but that's beside the point. They are possibly a host for the virus and it seems pretty easy for them to contract the virus. All they would need is close contact with blood or other bodily fluids. Domestic dogs could easily contract the disease from their owners and feral ones could do so if they came into contact with dead bodies or even tainted garbage, like blood soaked bandages or mattresses.
But there isn't any proof that dogs are the culprit here. There are dozens, if not hundreds, of other animals that could act as a host. Ebola has been shown to survive in monkeys, apes, bats and other animals, most of which are commonly eaten by humans in this part of the world. Many of these animals could carry the disease and not show any symptoms. A hunter could have killed an animal and, in the process of slaughtering it, contracted the disease. Or it could have been from a bite or any number of ways blood or other fluids can be exchanged.
If the virus has found a new host in Liberia, then they will have a real problem eradicating the disease. For example, if the virus lives in dogs, what will they do? It's not like they can test all dogs. Even putting them down wouldn't work because there would still be feral ones running around. People regularly come into contact with dogs and it is hard to imagine a world were dogs are infected and don't infect the humans around them. Of course, if the people there would refrain from eating dogs, the chances would go down somewhat. Any other animal would have the same kinds of problems and would mean that Ebola is in West Africa for the long haul.
It's possible that this has nothing to do with animal hosts though. I think the possibility of Ebola having been spread sexually is probably more likely. The disease does not go away after people have recovered from the disease. It is known to live in seminal fluid for months and all it would take is one time without protection, and perhaps even with protection, to infect someone. Liberia is full of survivors that still have Ebola virus in their system that can spread this way. Still, without the sexual history of the victims, which I am sure is being investigated, there is no way to currently know if this is the case.
I'm not so sure about the theory that Ebola has never really left the human population of Liberia. The country has been Ebola free for two months and to be declared Ebola free you have to wait 42 days to double the incubation time of the disease. So Liberia has been free of Ebola for more then three months. If there are still cases in the country, we should have seen them before now. Yes other diseases look like Ebola, but you would hope that the Liberian medical system would be more vigilant in looking for the disease. Experience tells me that probably isn't the case, but I still like the other explanations better.
The worst case scenario is that this is a separate outbreak of the disease. Though it is very unlikely, it may be possible that this is a new strain of the Ebola virus, or just one that isn't related to the current West African outbreak. That is possible, but it seems very unlikely. DNA test are being done right now to make sure, and my guess is that they will find that this is the same strain. But if it isn't it could be that a new strain could act in different ways then the Ebola we all know so well by now. That x-factor worries me a bit and I hope that it is the same strain.
Finally, the West African Ebola outbreak isn't the only show in town right now. MERS has made its way to South Korea, but has not made the media impact that Ebola has. It's a dangerous disease in its own right, but just doesn't have the name recognition Ebola has. I've been keeping an eye on it, but as of right now it doesn't seem that serious. That could always change though... And there are now some limited reports of Ebola popping up again in the Democratic Republic of Congo... again. Let's hope that outbreak, if it exists, doesn't flare up anymore then it has too.
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