unknown about the Ebola virus
unknown about the Ebola virus. The microbe, which re-emerges from time to time usually in Africa, causes a hemorrhagic fever with a fatality rate as high as 90%. One of the many goals of epidemiology is to understand the ecology of infectious disease. Where does the virus go when there isn't an active human outbreak? Viruses can't survive in the environment, so some type of animal must be serving as a "reservoir" from which outbreaks re-emerge. So far, evidence points to fruit bats as the guilty party, but gorillas, chimpanzees, and antelope may also play a role. Furthermore, there was some evidence that pigs might be able to host the Ebola virus. This is particularly worrisome because it would mean that a common animal used as livestock could be spreading the disease. To further investigate this possibility, a team of scientists collected blood samples from 400 pigs in regions of Sierra Leone that had reported human cases of the Ebola virus. Of the 400 pigs, thre...