Where have you read that this Ebola outbreak has become airborne?
Don’t know what GOPJ has run across, but I’ve seen several reports that it’s been transmitted by large droplets between lab animals. They were in close proximity but not in direct contact. As I understand it, this doesn’t mean the virus was floating around in the air for days, it means being in close proximity to the equivalent of sneezing.
I strongly suspect the infectious animals were in the severe symptoms stage, which in this country means they’d be in an intensive care ward of a hospital.
I am pretty sure every HCP out there is on the lookout for flu-type symptoms in anybody just returned from Africa, and that they’ll take immediate precautions.
Water droplets from sneezing... not quite the same as airbourn. I’ll see if I can find the link.
This specific form of Ebola virus, no recent reports that it has become airborne; first reports on this Ebola outbreak suggested possible airborne
No recent report seen , as this would cause a more severe panic in the already infected areas.
(titled) " Growing concerns over 'in the air' transmission of Ebola" (dated:11/15/12)
< / http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-20341423 >
"Canadian scientists have shown that the deadliest form of the ebola virus could be transmitted by air between species.
In experiments, they demonstrated that the virus was transmitted from pigs to monkeys without any direct contact between them.
The researchers say they believe that limited airborne transmission might be contributing to the spread of the disease in some parts of Africa...
Now, researchers from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and the country's Public Health Agency have shown that pigs infected with this form of Ebola
can pass the disease on to macaques without any direct contact between the species.
In their experiments, the pigs carrying the virus were housed in pens with the monkeys in close proximity but separated by a wire barrier.
After eight days, some of the macaques were showing clinical signs typical of ebola and were euthanised.
One possibility is that the monkeys became infected by inhaling large aerosol droplets produced from the respiratory tracts of the pigs.
One of the scientists involved is Dr Gary Kobinger from the National Microbiology Laboratory at the Public Health Agency of Canada.
He told BBC News this was the most likely route of the infection
"But they can be absorbed in the airway and this is how the infection starts, and this is what we think,
because we saw a lot of evidence in the lungs of the non-human primates that the virus got in that way."
A Freep article on 4/16/14 discusses coughing and the size of droplets remaining suspended in the air, depending on size :
< / http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3142204/posts >
and the artilcle further describes how long these droplets remain suspended in the air, and how droplets travel further than we think.