Seven reasons why this Ebola epidemic spun out of control
http://www.vox.com/2014/9/4/6103039/Seven-reasons-why-this-ebola-virus-outbreak-epidemic-out-of-control
"If you'd asked public-health experts a year ago whether an Ebola outbreak could turn into an epidemic spread across borders, they probably would have confidently told you that there was no way: the virus isn't transmitted very easily, and people usually get so sick and die so quickly, it has little opportunity to infect a new host.
Then came 2014, the year that is rewriting the Ebola rulebook. More people have died from the virus in the last nine months than the total number of deaths since the first recorded outbreak in 1976. The virus has also popped up in enough countries — first Guinea, then Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, and now Senegal — that the cases add up to the world's first Ebola epidemic...."
1) Public-health campaigns started too late and didn't reach enough people
2) The countries affected by Ebola have some of the world's lowest literacy rates
3) There's a strong Ebola rumor mill
4) Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Guinea are some of the poorest countries in Africa with fragile health systems
5) These countries have spotty disease surveillance networks
6) The international community responded painfully slowly
7) The countries most affected — and our world — is increasingly interconnected.
http://www.vox.com/2014/9/4/6103039/Seven-reasons-why-this-ebola-virus-outbreak-epidemic-out-of-control
"If you'd asked public-health experts a year ago whether an Ebola outbreak could turn into an epidemic spread across borders, they probably would have confidently told you that there was no way: the virus isn't transmitted very easily, and people usually get so sick and die so quickly, it has little opportunity to infect a new host.
Then came 2014, the year that is rewriting the Ebola rulebook. More people have died from the virus in the last nine months than the total number of deaths since the first recorded outbreak in 1976. The virus has also popped up in enough countries — first Guinea, then Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, and now Senegal — that the cases add up to the world's first Ebola epidemic...."
1) Public-health campaigns started too late and didn't reach enough people
2) The countries affected by Ebola have some of the world's lowest literacy rates
3) There's a strong Ebola rumor mill
4) Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Guinea are some of the poorest countries in Africa with fragile health systems
5) These countries have spotty disease surveillance networks
6) The international community responded painfully slowly
7) The countries most affected — and our world — is increasingly interconnected.
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