Most of the people infected with Ebola in the West Africa epidemic that began in 2014 got sick through contact with a small number of “superspreaders” with the disease, researchers said on Monday.
The study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows such “superspreaders” can be extremely dangerous when it comes to infectious disease outbreaks.
The West African Ebola epidemic was the largest in history and killed more than 11,300 people, with many of the cases involving people infected while caring for a sick person or burying a body.
“We now see the role of superspreaders as larger than initially suspected,” said coauthor Benjamin Dalziel, an assistant professor of population biology in the College of Science at Oregon State University. “It was the cases you didn’t see that really drove the epidemic, particularly people who died at home, without making it to a care center.”
At the time, researchers counted cases according to those seen in medical centers, but they later realized these were a small fraction of the total.
“There wasn’t a lot of transmission once people reached hospitals and care centers,” Dalziel said.
“In our analysis we were able to see a web of transmission that would often track back to a community-based superspreader,” he said.
Researchers said 61 percent of those infected with the disease caught it from people accounting for just 3 percent of those who got sick.
The study included researchers from Princeton University, Oregon State University, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the Imperial College London and the US National Institutes of Health.
If superspreading had been completely under control about two-thirds of Ebola cases could have been avoided, the report said.
Superspreaders have also played a role in the epidemic of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, in 2003 and Middle East respiratory syndrome in 2012.
Through the noise of rushing papers and whirring belts at a print factory in Kyoto, two creators watch their photo essay come to life in broadsheet form — part of an effort to win new audiences in the age of artificial intelligence (AI). Despite the decline of the publishing industry, self-publication and handmade “zine” magazines are growing in popularity in Japan, reflecting the nation’s enduring love of paper in the digital era. While speaking to Agence France-Presse at the plant, his hands black with ink, one of the creators, Kazuma Obara, said: “I think [paper] is a medium that engages all five
‘CROSSING THE LINE’: China’s embassy in Seoul criticized US Forces Korea Commander General Xavier Brunson, asking if his ‘hostile’ remarks were authorized by Washington South Korea and the US are in talks over recent public remarks by the commander of US Forces Korea, Seoul’s presidential office said yesterday, after the comments drew sharp criticism from China. In a recent podcast interview, US Forces Korea Commander General Xavier Brunson described South Korea as “the dagger in the heart of Asia” from China’s east coast, prompting the Chinese embassy in Seoul to say that he had “truly crossed the line.” The interview came amid growing speculation that Washington might seek to expand the role of US Forces Korea in countering the growing regional influence of China, a key
Australian researchers have trained lab-grown brain cells on a silicon computer chip to play the 1990s shooter game Doom and said they are just scratching the surface of what the neurons could be capable of doing. It is the science-fiction work of biotech boffins at Cortical Labs, who researched and developed the technology that harnesses the workings of the brain’s networking system. Each so-called “biological computer” contains about 200,000 living human brain cells, grown from stem cells that were harvested from blood donations. Having mastered the simple computer game Pong, where a paddle is moved up and down to send a ball
‘ABSURD MISTAKE’: The election commission said that there had been a failure to anticipate turnout after 14 polling stations ran short of ballot papers South Korean riot police yesterday cleared protesters from a Seoul polling station after a 35-hour blockade sparked by a shortage of ballot papers during local elections earlier this week. Wednesday’s election was the first nationwide vote since South Korean President Lee Jae-myung took office following the ouster of Yoon Suk-yeol over his short-lived martial law declaration. Lee’s ruling Democratic Party swept most races, but failed to flip the crucial Seoul mayoral seat. The South Korean National Election Commission apologized, blaming a failure to anticipate turnout after 14 polling stations in Seoul ran short of ballot papers. Some polling stations stayed open until 10pm to
RSS