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'Collateral' death toll expected to soar in Africa's Ebola crisis
By Kate Kelland, Health and Science Correspondent
LONDON, Sept 26 Fri Sep 26, 2014 5:40am EDT
LONDON, Sept 26 (Reuters) - Deaths from infectious diseases like malaria, diarrhoea and pneumonia are likely to soar in West African countries where a vast outbreak of Ebola has crushed health systems and killed nurses and doctors.
Specialists on deadly diseases say deaths from malaria alone, which even before the Ebola crisis killed around 100,000 a year in the West Africa region as a whole, could increase four-fold in Ebola-hit countries as people miss out on life-saving treatments.
Even at this point, said Professor Chris Whitty of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in London, in countries facing the worst of the Ebola outbreak, "many more people are dying of other things that are not Ebola".
As the epidemic continues, these so-called "collateral" deaths -- including from complications in childbirth and chronic conditions such as heart disease -- will rise as the clinics and health workers that would normally treat them are overwhelmed.
...
"The health services of West Africa have to a very large degree broken down," said Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust international health charity. "That means care of women in childbirth, of people with malaria, of people with conditions like diabetes and mental illness are all suffering.
"That will have huge secondary consequences way beyond Ebola, no matter how bad this epidemic becomes."
...
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/26/us-health-ebola-collateral-idUSKCN0HL0TU20140926
By Kate Kelland, Health and Science Correspondent
LONDON, Sept 26 Fri Sep 26, 2014 5:40am EDT
LONDON, Sept 26 (Reuters) - Deaths from infectious diseases like malaria, diarrhoea and pneumonia are likely to soar in West African countries where a vast outbreak of Ebola has crushed health systems and killed nurses and doctors.
Specialists on deadly diseases say deaths from malaria alone, which even before the Ebola crisis killed around 100,000 a year in the West Africa region as a whole, could increase four-fold in Ebola-hit countries as people miss out on life-saving treatments.
Even at this point, said Professor Chris Whitty of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in London, in countries facing the worst of the Ebola outbreak, "many more people are dying of other things that are not Ebola".
As the epidemic continues, these so-called "collateral" deaths -- including from complications in childbirth and chronic conditions such as heart disease -- will rise as the clinics and health workers that would normally treat them are overwhelmed.
...
"The health services of West Africa have to a very large degree broken down," said Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust international health charity. "That means care of women in childbirth, of people with malaria, of people with conditions like diabetes and mental illness are all suffering.
"That will have huge secondary consequences way beyond Ebola, no matter how bad this epidemic becomes."
...
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/26/us-health-ebola-collateral-idUSKCN0HL0TU20140926