Posted on 08/16/2014 1:23:08 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Best evidence so far is that it can survive for up to 5 days outside the host. How long it can survive exposes to UV depends on a number of factors. There is a reason they use level 4 precautions and not just UV lights.
http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/lab-bio/res/psds-ftss/ebola-eng.php
Public Health Agency of Canada
PATHOGEN SAFETY DATA SHEET - INFECTIOUS SUBSTANCES SECTION I
- INFECTIOUS AGENT NAME: Ebola virus
INFECTIOUS DOSE: 1 - 10 aerosolized organisms are sufficient to cause infection in humans (21).
MODE OF TRANSMISSION: In an outbreak, it is hypothesized that the first patient becomes infected as a result of contact with an infected animal (15). Person-to-person transmission occurs via close personal contact with an infected individual or their body fluids during the late stages of infection or after death (1, 2, 15, 27). Nosocomial infections can occur through contact with infected body fluids due to the reuse of unsterilized syringes, needles, or other medical equipment contaminated with these fluids (1, 2). Humans may be infected by handling sick or dead non-human primates and are also at risk when handling the bodies of deceased humans in preparation for funerals, suggesting possible transmission through aerosol droplets (2, 6, 28). In the laboratory, infection through small-particle aerosols has been demonstrated in primates, and airborne spread among humans is strongly suspected, although it has not yet been conclusively demonstrated (1, 6, 13). The importance of this route of transmission is not clear. Poor hygienic conditions can aid the spread of the virus (6).
INCUBATION PERIOD: Two to 21 days, more often 4 - 9 days (1, 13, 14).
COMMUNICABILITY: Communicable as long as blood, secretions, organs, or semen contain the virus. Ebola virus has been isolated from semen 61 days after the onset of illness, and transmission through semen has occurred 7 weeks after clinical recovery
SUSCEPTIBILITY TO DISINFECTANTS: Ebola virus is susceptible to sodium hypochlorite, lipid solvents, phenolic disinfectants, peracetic acid, methyl alcohol, ether, sodium deoxycholate, 2% glutaraldehyde, 0.25% Triton X-100, β-propiolactone, 3% acetic acid (pH 2.5), formaldehyde and paraformaldehyde, and detergents such as SDS (20, 21, 31-34).
PHYSICAL INACTIVATION: Ebola are moderately thermolabile and can be inactivated by heating for 30 minutes to 60 minutes at 60ºC, boiling for 5 minutes, gamma irradiation (1.2 x106 rads to 1.27 x106 rads), and/or UV radiation
SURVIVAL OUTSIDE HOST: The virus can survive in liquid or dried material for a number of days (23). Infectivity is found to be stable at room temperature or at 4°C for several days, and indefinitely stable at -70°C (6, 20). Infectivity can be preserved by lyophilisation.
You’re Welcome, Alamo-Girl!
Thanks! I’ll look into finding a book about it. Can you recommend any?
Whats that got to do with the fact that about 1200 people in Africa have died from Ebola so far? Its not an epidemic.
Why aren’t you wringing your hands over the 30,000 to 40,000 people that died in the USA last year from the regular flu?
We have enough stuff to panic about on the plate already without getting hysterical over something that is unlikely to occur. I repeat its unlikely to occur.
It is certainly an epidemic in West Africa. People from Europe and the US travel to and from these locations every day.
The flu primarily effects the very young or the very old. Those in good general health face little risk from the flu as long as they seek proper medical care when appropriate.
In other words your use of the flu as a comparison is a straw man. My house is unlikely to burn down but I still pay my homeowners insurance.
So you never answered my question. Why are you not hysterical over the significant death rate in the US from the regular flu? That’s a lot closer to “epidemic” than 1200 cases in Africa.
If you are so worried about it buy a bunch of survival food and prepare to shelter in place for 3-4 mos til the Ebola here subsides.
When we get 1200 cases of Ebola here in the US which is not going to happen then it will be something to worry about.
Its a lot more likely that somebody will put the grid down and then half the population will starve to death. Now I do worry about that one. :-)
I didn’t answer because its a stupid question. Nobody is hysterical over ebola. Which by the way is considered one of the most infectious and dangerous viruses on the planet.
Ebola does not make a very good weapon.
You tend to run out of carriers as fast as you can infect them and in the western societies, the damage they would do would not be enough.
bfl
Andromeda Strain
The worry with ebola transmission during the Hajj isn’t it’s survival in sunlight. It’s whether or not an infected person uses the (indoors) communal footbaths.
That scenario could transmit it to literally thousands of people.
Some of the medical staff who got it in the current outbreak never actually touched the patients. They think they got it by touching something the patient did.
Well Mr. GG2 agrees with you. He is getting out his Ebola mask and getting it ready. :-)
Tell him a mask wont be enough.
Read http://learn.flvs.net/educator/common/EnglishIIv10/TheHotZone.pdf
It was posted upthread. Apparently true stories about ebola and its victims.
That’s entirely believeable. It supposedly survives on surfaces for 3-5 days or more.
Could you give us a link to the site which says five days?
My understanding is that the fatal stage of Ebola is more like setting off something like the autoimmune hyper-reaction/cykotine storm of 1918 Flu and smallpox.
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