Pandemics

The recent, deadliest outbreak ever of Ebola, the killer virus that causes internal and external hemorrhaging, is raising new concerns about the disease's spread.

Doctors Without Borders, the only aid organization that is treating infected people in West Africa, says, "The scale of the current Ebola epidemic is unprecedented in terms of geographical distribution, people infected and deaths."

According to the World Health Organization...

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Africa’s biggest Ebola outbreak in seven years has probably spread from Guinea to neighboring Liberia and also threatens Sierra Leone.

Five people are suspected to have died from the disease in Lofa county in northern Liberia, Bernice Dahn, Liberia’s chief medical officer, said at a briefing yesterday. At least 86 cases and 59 deaths have been recorded across Guinea, the west African country’s health ministry said. The capital, Conakry, hasn’t been affected, government spokesman Albert Damantang Camara said.

submitted by Luis Kun

homelandsecuritynewswire.com - December 13, 2013

Computational model demonstrates how disease spreads in a highly connected world. The computational work has led to a new mathematical theory for understanding the global spread of epidemics. The resulting insights could not only help identify an outbreak’s origin but could also significantly improve the ability to forecast the global pathways through which a disease might spread. . .

. . . Their study is published today (13 December) in the journal Science.

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RESEARCH - Science - The Hidden Geometry of Complex, Network-Driven Contagion Phenomena

Image: The Marburg virus: 'If tourists were tripping in and out of some python-infested Marburg repository, unprotected, and then boarding their return flights to other continents… it was an international threat.' Photograph: Science Photo Library

guardian.co.uk - September 28th, 2012 - David Quammen

Astrid Joosten was a 41-year-old Dutch woman who, in June 2008, went to Uganda with her husband. At home in Noord-Brabant, she worked as a business analyst. Both she and her husband, Jaap Taal, a financial manager, enjoyed annual adventures, especially to Africa. The journey in 2008, booked through an adventure-travel outfitter, took them to the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, home to mountain gorillas.

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