Decisive action can stop Ebola before it spreads

Barrier nursing and an army of people can contain this infectious disease.

Liberian youths lead a sensitisation campaign to fight against the deadly Ebola virus in Monrovia, Liberia. Ahmed Jallanzo / EPA

While some of the statistics associated with the spread of the Ebola virus in West Africa are troubling, there is no cause for concern about a health crisis in wider Africa or beyond. Not yet, at least.

Since an outbreak earlier this year in Guinea, Ebola has spread to ­Sierra Leone and Liberia and is threatening other countries. It has killed about 2,500 people. It is difficult to track because it can take up to three weeks before symptoms appear. There is no proven vaccine or even a specific treatment for the disease, and the World Health Organisation puts the survival rate at just 47 per cent of infected patients – although this is higher than in previous outbreaks.

If the main toll is human, economists have also expressed deep concern about the potential financial impact on West Africa. Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia are fragile, hard-pressed economies that can ill afford and are ill prepared for the cost of such an outbreak.

World Bank Group data estimates the likely impact of the virus at up to $809 million this year on the three countries and more next year if the virus is not effectively contained. If it were to spread to Nigeria, the consequences on the regional economy would be even more severe.

The global community has already started to mobilise. US president Barack Obama, who said Ebola is “spiralling out of control”, has set up a command post in Liberia with up to 3,000 American troops at the ready. The US will also provide dozens of health workers and establish a site in Monrovia to train 500 local people per week to care for patients. China has pledged to send a mobile laboratory to Sierra Leone, along with a team of epidemiologists, clinicians and nurses, and Cuba has dispatched a 165-strong medical team.

The involvement of military personnel is particularly welcome because the kind of barrier nursing required to arrest the spread of Ebola requires strict discipline and attention to detail.

It also needs large numbers of people – perhaps even more than those already committed. Ebola will not become an economic or humanitarian crisis for Africa, provided appropriate fiscal and humanitarian support is put in place.