Ebola; A Whole New Level of Scary Has Emerged

Since it claimed its first victims in Guinea last March, the Ebola virus epidemic has killed 660 people in three countries and infected nearly 1,100—more lethal than any other outbreak in the virus’s nearly 40-year history.

Last week’s developments could transform this outbreak from an unusually nasty regional epidemic to something much bigger. 

On Jul. 24, Nigerian authorities confirmed that a Liberian man, Patrick Sawyer, had collapsed in Lagos after flying there from the Liberian capital, Monrovia, and tested positive for Ebola; Sawyer died on the night of July 24-25.

This is alarming. So far, Ebola has been confined to Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia—war-torn and largely rural west African countries. But Lagos is different; not only is it Africa’s biggest city, with 21 million people. It’s also one of the world’s most densely populated. And perhaps scariest of all, it’s a center for international travel—meaning that if it’s not contained, the virus could easily go global. Sawyer’s was the first-ever recorded case of Ebola in Nigeria, according to the Nigerian Tribune.

So far, the Nigerian government’s efforts to contain it inspire little confidence. The World Health Organization says that Sawyer, who worked for the Liberian finance ministry, turned himself in to Nigerian health authorities after he began vomiting and having diarrhea in the middle of the three-hour flight from Monrovia to Lagos. Nigeria’s health minister says authorities are currently trying to track down an unspecified number of the 100 or so other passengers on the flight.

This might be tricky. The 35 Nigerian co-passengers took flight once word got out that the health ministry was supposed to have quarantined them, prompting the federal government to launch a manhunt to track them down, reports Sunday Newswatch, a Nigerian newspaper, citing a federal security agent. The government has only now begun screening passengers arriving from foreign countries for the virus, according to the Tribune.

Read More http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2014/07/30/why-ebola-reaching-nigeria-s-largest-city-whole-new-level-scary