Ebola may have subsided, but the danger still lurks

It is imperative that there is no let-up in global efforts to combat the threat of the deadly virus

Ababy girl, treated for Ebola, was recently discharged from a hospital in Guinea. Officials breathed easy — the killer virus that has claimed more than 11,000 lives across Liberia, Guinea, Sierra Leone and Nigeria since March 2014 was now on the wane. But governments and organisations such as the World Health Organisation (WHO) cannot rest, believing that the threat has gone. The virus, first detected in 1976, has resurfaced, time and again claiming lives. A country has to be disease free for 42 days from the day after the burial of the last victim or from the date a second virus-free blood sample is taken from the last case before the WHO can declare it Ebola free. Liberia was declared free of the virus and days later Ebola attacked a 15-year-old boy.

There has been enormous impact — on the health of the population and the economy of these countries. The fatality rate is extremely high, more virulent than terror attacks. But what is shocking and disturbing is that this virus, which is transmitted to people from wild animals and then is viciously infectious, still affects lives in the modern world. Hence, it is imperative that there are international efforts to combat Ebola, which has a fatality rate of 50 per cent. The countries in West Africa that have been affected by this virus have poor infrastructure and weak health care. The international community must rally around them because the threat may have subsided for now, but the killer still lurks.