Term Papers on Ebola

Term Paper Title	Ebola
# of Words	1119
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	4.48

Ebola

March 1, 1996

     Imagine going on vacation to a foreign country and when you come home you
are horribly sick.  Your head hurts, you have a highfever, and you start
vomiting.  Chances are that you may havecontracted the Ebola virus.

     Ebola was first discovered in the village of Yambuku(1) nearthe Ebola River
in Zaire.  Since its discovery, there have beenfour outbreaks of this disease.
There are three known strains, ofvariations of ebola. There is no known cure for
this disease(2).Ebola has become one of the most mysterious and feared viruses
onthe face of this earth.

     Ebola's first documented appearance was in Zaire in 1976.  Noone knows
where ebola comes from or what the original host is.However, scientists know
that man is not ebola's natural host(3).The host was first suspected of being
carried by monkeys in the African rain forests(4), but in one case the monkeys
at a holding facility broke out and had to be killed.

     In the pursuit of a cure and an origin, there have beenseveral teams of
scientists whose top priority is to find theviruses origin(5).  The teams have
trekked through the rainforests of Africa to collecting different species of
animals,bugs, and plant life.  Bugs are also collected from the hospitals and
from the surrounding huts of the villages.  So far 36,000specimens have been
collected.  Once they have been gathered, the specimens are put into liquid
nitrogen and flown back to theUnited States, where they are studied at the
Centers for DiseaseControl in Atlanta Georgia and the Army Medical Research
Instituteof Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick Md.,(6).  Researchers have
discovered the source of human infection for all level fourorganisms except
ebola(7).  This means that all organisns that cause deadly viruses have been
contained and studied, and have had antibodies created to ward of the illnesses
that are caused.     Although Ebola is a mystery to humans, the virus is
relatively hard to catch and it kills quickly, lessening the chance victims will
infect others.  It is transmitted by contactwith bodily fluids like blood, vomit
and semen or contaminated syringes and is not known to be passed along through
casual contact(8).

     When the first outbreak of ebola occurred, it was in 1976 in Zaire and in
Sudan at the same time.  There were 318 cases reported in Zaire and 240 of those
cases proved to be fatal.  In Sudan, there were 284 cases and 134 of those cases
proved to befatal.  In 1979, there was another small epidemic in the same region
of Sudan.  In 1989 there was a breakout in Reston Virginia,at a monkey holding
facility, that killed over 400 monkeys thathad been shipped from the Phillines.
This strand however, is only lethal to monkeys and id not a threat to humans(9).
In 1995, there was an outbreak in Kikwit Zaire that claimed 233 lives.  At
least7 people survived that outbreak becauses of a new breakthrough that is a
possible solution to the loss of lives that are suffered in a outbreak.  Blood
from one surviving patient can be transfusedto a person of the same blood type
to possibly save the persons life.  Such was the case in 1995(10). Scientists
were able tofind who the first person to contract the virus was in 1995.
Theman's name was Gaspard Menga.  Menga infected his family, and his family
infected others(11).  Menga is known as the index patient.The reason it is so
important to have the index patient is thatthis way they can trace the ...

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