How One Traditional Healer’s Funeral Spread Ebola Across Africa - Scientists

As Africa continues to try and find a way to
get rid of the Ebola virus, Scientists with
Degrees in MIT and Harvard have revealed
some 300 mutations specific to this outbreak
in a new paper in popular magazine,
SCIENCE.

The scientist research included 78 patients in Sierra
Leone who contracted the disease in May and June
who they successfully sequenced the genomes of
Ebola from these patients.
The current Ebola outbreak is the worst outbreak ever
in Africa and has been spotted in Four countries,
Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia.
It has afflicted 3000 people, killing 1,500 people, so
far and its showing no signs of slowing down.
The scientists research has discovered that the recent
viral strains come from a related strain that left
Central Africa within the past ten years.
They say that one Sierra Leonean Traditional healer
had started boasting of having the cure of the virus
and started treating Guinean Ebola patients who
came over to seek quick help.
Then the Traditional healer contracted the disease
and died, but due to the importance of the man to the
area, his funeral was attended by people from all
nook and cranny of Sierra Leone.
An according to the traditional funeral ways, the all
took turn touching the highly infected leader before
heading back to their homes acting as Transmitters
of the virus.
The paper also talks about sequence of the Ebola
genomes, With Harvard and MIT trained co-senior
author Pardis Sabeti revealing that they are trying to
work out the Sequence as fast as possible.
The toll to write the paper has been Mortally high,
with five co authors dying of Ebola before the paper
was even published.
Scientists have been able to track how the Ebola
virus has traveled from person to person and when
using mutations as markers.
Well their analysis have revealed that the ancestors
of the recent Ebola outbreak some place in Central
Africa roughly around 2004
It is then written that the more than 14 women got
infected after they paid a visit to the funeral of the
traditional healer who had been treating Guinean
Ebola patients and contracted the disease.
But the ultimate surprise was when the scientist
discovered two different strains of the virus came out
of that one funeral, this has got them working with
two theories, either the healer was infected with two
different strains or that another person at the funeral
was already infected.

How Genetic sequences Explain the recent
Ebola strain-

As the virus continued its death march through
Sierra Leone, one more strain reared its ugly head.
Sabeti notes that catching and recognizing the strain
of Ebola is hard and risky but he says, he and his
team won't stop until the strain dies off.
Sabeti said: "We hope that this work opens up new
doors for more people to work together to stop this
virus now."
Nigeria has already recorded six deaths from the
Ebola virus since the late Liberian diplomat,Patrick
Sawyer, brought the disease to Lagos on 20 July.
According to latest report, over 160 people are
presently being observed in Port Harcourt, Rivers
State for traces of Ebola after a medical doctor died in
the oil rich state two weeks ago.

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