The Democratic Republic of Congo recently declared the end of the twelfth outbreak of Ebola. It had killed six people in the eastern province of North Kivu.
About Ebola Outbreak
- The current Ebola outbreak was genetically linked to that of the outbreak that occured in 2018-20.
- Currently, Guinea is also fighting against Ebola epidemic.
- The Ebola virus was discovered in 1976. The 2014-16 outbreak of Ebola in West Africa is the largest Ebola outbreak since its discovery.
- In June 2019, the World Health Organisation declared outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo as Global Health Emergency.
Global Health Emergency
The Global Health Emergency is declared when a disease outbreak is risk to other countries. It requires a coordinated international response.
Ebola virus
- The Ebola virus transmits from wild animals to people. It spreads among human population through human-to-human population.
- The natural hosts of Ebola virus are the fruit bats.
- The methods used to diagnose Ebola are ELISA, Serum neutralization test, electron microscopy, virus isolation by cell culture, reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), antigen capture detection tests.
- The fatality rate of Ebola is 50%.
In 2019, WHO declared Ebola as one of the top ten threats to Global Health in 2019. The other threats were non-communicable diseases, air pollution, climate change, global influenza pandemic, anti-microbial resistance, weak primary health care, vaccine hesitancy, HIV, and fragile and vulnerable settings.
Ebola Vaccines
- rVSV-ZEBOV was an Ebola vaccine used in Guinea in 2015.
- It was also used during 2018-19 Ebola outbreak in Congo.
- The vaccine is administered to pregnant women and breastfeeding women under the same condition as that of the general population.