Talk:Ebola

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Good article Ebola was a nominee for good article, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There are suggestions below for improving the article. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.

Please keep this page clean and sign all posts with ~~~~

Contents

[edit] Correct pronounciation?

I have only heard it said as "ee-bowl-a," but I now have heard several people, all British say "eb(like in ebony)-O-la" with the accent on the second syllable 4.143.234.188 (talk) 21:08, 23 March 2008 (UTC)eric

[edit] Removed statement from fever section

"Ebola is a very deadly virus and will wipe out everyone in it's path" as given the previous sentence explained that the virus is deadly it's pretty fatuous. 163.1.176.253 (talk) 20:12, 11 March 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Treatment and Vaccines

I have updated the treatment and vaccines section. The antisense treatment described by Warfield et al. (PMOs) has been moved to the treatment section. In the vaccine section I have tried to point out that there are two vaccine systems successful in non human primates (Adenovirus based by Sullivan, Nabel et al. and VSV based by Jones, Feldmann, Geisbert et al.).

I have another question about the treatment section: I can not find any reference in scientific literature about the Garcinia kola extract. Does anybody know where this comes from, and if not, should that be removed? --Sperber 05:19, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Ahh yes, I was wondering about that too. The full paragraph before I edited it looked like this:
In 1999, Maurice Iwu announced at the International Botanical Congress that a fruit extract of Garcinia kola, a West African tree long used by local traditional healers for other illnesses, stopped Ebola virus replication in lab tests. It is a treatment however, not a vaccine.
If you cannot find any literature or sources supporting this then by all means, remove it from the main page and place it on the talk page here so future editors can try to reference it. Cheers, -- Serephine ♠ talk - 05:46, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

I have looked into it, and actually found a BBC article (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/411030.stm) about this treatment. However, there is no scientific paper about it, despite the initial finding being seven years old and the fact that Maurice Iwu seems to be still rather actively publishing in this area. Also, there are a lot of other treatments against EBOV that work in cell culture, but fail to show an effect in animals or have so far only been shown effective in rodent models, which are not listed in the treatment section. I have, therefore, deleted the sentence about Garcinia kola. --Sperber 02:21, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

In the treatment section it says "blood serum from Ebola survivors has been shown to be ineffective in treating the virus" but the reference cited for this section makes no mention of this. Anyone know a source for this? --99.236.28.45 (talk) 22:32, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Natural Host?

I believed there was a news article indicating that a species of bat in caves in the hot spot for Ebola seemed to be carriers without showing symptoms. Shouldn't this be updated? 192.28.2.42 17:45, 22 June 2006 (UTC)


Numerous news articles cited three species of fruit bats as being the natural host of Ebola, and they were shown to posses the virus without symptoms. This was in late 2005. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.198.28.55 (talk) 09:41, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Confliction?

"Six of the Reston primate handlers tested positive (two due to previous exposure) for the virus, and exhibited severe flu-like symptoms... No human illness has resulted from any of these outbreaks."

Is the second quote referring to the latter outbreaks or is it plainly wrong, since it contradicts the first quote? Anyone with information on this please correct.--nunocordeiro 04:38, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

The people infected with REBOV showed no disease symptoms at all; however, in laboratory tests it could be shown that they developed antibodies against REBOV, and from the blood of one of them virus could be reisolated, thus proving that they had were infected with REBOV. I have, therefore, deleted the part about flu-like symptoms. --sperber 16:26, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Fiction vs Non-Fiction

I have edited out the "fiction" section and changed it to "non-fiction". Richard Preston's The Hot Zone was put in non-fiction sections of bookstores because it was published as non-fiction. It was supported by an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation grant: the Sloan foundation does not support fiction and apparently was satisfied enough with RP to give him another grant.

"... In 2002, Richard Preston published The Demon in the Freezer, a bestseller about the first major bioterror event in the U.S. and the government's ongoing efforts to protect against smallpox and other potential bioweapons. Demon is Preston's first nonfiction book since the The Hot Zone, also supported by the Foundation." http://www.sloan.org/programs/edu_public.shtml

Googling any of the significant names ("Nancy Jaax", "Gerald Jaax", "Peter Jahrling"--add "Ebola" and "Reston" to reduce results) in The Hot Zone will lead to authorative articles (CNN, *.edu, etc.) supporting the book.

The author of the "fiction" section seems to have felt that Preston over-dramatized. I have found no evidence to support that. While The Hot Zone suffers the usual faults of popular non-fiction books, it seems no worse than Blackhawk Down or All the President's Men, to name just two. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.179.200.34 (talk)

[edit] Disambiguation argument

This is not a valid use for a disambiguation page. Ebola virus is a redirect to Ebola haemorrhagic fever and the most commonly used name for the river is Ebola River ? therefore at most, the river would go into a ?see also? or ?terms that have ?Ebola? as part of their name? section. That only leaves one valid item for this disambiguation page ? meaning a redirect is the best thing to do. With that said, please see my comment in talk:Ebola haemorrhagic fever about a possible move of content here. --maveric149

I have to disagree with you too, mav. The virus was named after the river. The river's name is Ebola, and the virus' name is Ebola. Sounds like a disambiguation page to me. --Stephen Gilbert
The river is known as the Ebola river in English and not simply Ebola so there is no ambiguity to resolve.

Using Anon's logic the American river should be listed at [[American]] because the river has American in its name -- this is not what disambiguation pages are for. However, the disease and the virus are both simply known as Ebola and therefore it makes sense to have that material here. Ebola River is linked in sentence two of paragraph two, BTW. --maveric149

I have changed the page back from having been made a disambiguation page. Whether the river is called 'Ebola' or 'Ebola River' is not really an important point in my opinion - the Disambiguation page says that one can use a disambiguation block if one meaning of the term is much more important than the others. I think this is clearly such a case. Andre Engels

[edit] Removed copyvio section on new vaccine

Removed section on new vaccine, which is a copyvio of the following Washington Post article: [1] Wikiti 22:53, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Music as well

There is a section for fiction on this page but no section for related music. Can't write about Ebola without mentioning "Ebola Reston" by the band Grotus.155.178.180.5 13:26, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

Well go right ahead and put it in then ;-) -- Serephine ♠ talk - 05:18, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] General cleanup needed.

I'm putting the cleanup tag back on here. Several major issues with this page:

1. The 'Bioterrorism' section is almost entirely concerned with fictional works. These need to be added to the fiction section, but not just copied and pasted.

2. The neutrality tags seem less necessary now, and could probably be removed, but there are still a few areas where things could be worded differently. These areas suggest a strong dislike for the entertainment media's use of Ebola as a plot point, rather than simply pointing out the differences between fact and fiction.

3. The entire myths section could probably have some formatting changed, and be added to the fiction section under a subheading.

4. Even if the above changes were made, the sheer about of words on the topic of fictional references to Ebola is enormous, and should be trimmed down.

5. Heading and subheading styles are inconsistent. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rodeosmurf (talk • contribs)

I'll improve this a bit if I have time. Right now I'm kind of busy. Please sign name with tildes next time a comment is posted. - Freddie 23:47, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "Ebolavirus" or "Ebola virus"?

A commentator wrote to info-en writes to comment on the spelling of "ebolavirus":

[A]ccording to my infectious diseases reference book, "ebolavirus" (as on your pages) is incorrect. The correct reference should be: Ebola virus. Two words. It's not listed in the book, but I would guess that the correct way to reference an individual virus would be -- Reston Ebola virus. My reference book doesn't show Ebola virus as one word at all.

My reference book is: Stedman's Organisms and Infectious Disease Words. Stedman's books are routinely used as medical references and known for their accuracy. - Kelly Martin (talk) 18:33, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi Kelly, I've changed them all back to ebolavirus when used in a taxonomic context, as per world authority International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses. This is the naming convention currently recognised, you may want to check the publish date of your text. Anything before about 1995 can get very outdated in virology. Cheers, -- Serephine ♠ talk - 02:40, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

The size of the virus is listed at two completely diiferent lengths. One sentence says the average the length of 80nm and the next sentece says 1000 nm is typical. These are vastly different measurements. Can we get the correct length and have this cleaned up?

EBOV particles have a thread-like shape (like a very long cylinder). The average diameter of an EBOV particle is 80nm, the average length is about 1000nm. I have changed the sentences and tried to make this more clear. --Sperber 14:02, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Deleted article

I deleted two or three lines about a supposed case of ebola in London on May 19, 2006:

"A potential outbreak occurred on May 19, 2006 when a woman traveling from Africa to London complained initially of flu-like symptoms. On the flight she began vomiting and later died from symptoms similar to Ebola. An autopsy to determine true cause of death is currently being performed."

It then links to this article. The "newspaper" that the paragraph quoted is a tabloid, and no other news outlets, to my knowledge, picked up the story (feel free to prove me wrong). Seems like a hoax to me. Cathryn 08:26, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

I searched online, a few sources which seem credible have run the story: [British Nursing News Online]... I will reinstate the paragraph ☺ -- Serephine ♠ talk - 05:18, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Linnaean Classification?

Why is it that the various strains of Ebola are not referred to by their Linnaean classification?—Preceding unsigned comment added by Iandefor (talk • contribs)

Linnaean taxonomy is for living things. Viruses are not alive. --Eyrian 16:19, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
That's heavily contested. There isn't a scientific consensus on the matter yet, and they do have Linnaean classifications. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Iandefor (talk • contribs)
Moot points, please see the Wikiproject Viruses project to find the standards for Wikipedian virus classification -- Serephine ♠ talk - 05:18, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
The Linnaean classification is based on the work and life of Carolus Linnaeus. Therefore, if one would name a virus without seeking consensus from the linnaean pupils, one should actually append ones own name.Highlander

[edit] Good Article nomination has failed

The Good article nomination for Ebola has failed, for the following reason:

This article shows promise but needs to be improved in two ways before being passed. First, the language is a bit awkward. Because the topic is technical, it must struggle to balance the need for technical jargon with readability for the the general reader. It is not quite there on the readability side. Second, it is important to fully document the details of these kind of topics. Most of the article has yet to be documented. Please work on the article and bring it back. --CTSWyneken(talk) 16:22, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Scientific data on proteins loses the reader

I consider myself reasonably literate and science-savvy however I find the technical jargon around the areas of proteins and glycoproteins just makes me lose interest. There does not seem to be any laypersons description of what all of that means. Suggest information gets rewritten from an educational POV (meaning year 12) rather than from a biochemistry Scientist's POV. Otherwise I love this article! --Read-write-services 23:25, 26 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Reason for contradiction tag

The "Ebola as a Weapon" section contains the following statement:

"Ebola shows potential as a biological weapon because of its lethality but due to its short incubation period it may be more difficult to spread since it may kill its victim before it has a chance to be transmitted." However, shortly afterwards, the "Cultural impact" section says:

"One pervasive myth follows that the virus kills so fast that it has little time to spread. Victims die very soon after contact with the virus. In reality, the incubation time is usually about a week. The average time from onset of early symptoms to death varies in the range 3-21 days, with a mean of 10.1."

--Redeagle688 21:08, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

the speed thing is caused by movies, to speed up movies Markthemac 23:27, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

As far as viruses go, that IS quick. I am removing the contradict tag. ViridaeTalk 13:52, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
The two sections are still confusing at best. One section says that it is more difficult to spread due to the short incubation period, the other says thats its a myth that it has little time to spread. While they don't quite directly contradict each other, they're pretty close. Could definately do with being more clearly explained, especially as many readers aren't likely to know whether a week is "quick" or not. Jasonisme 12:45, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
Rotavirus and Noroviruses that cause GI infections can be as short as 48 hours. Same goes for the cold. That is extremely rapid, because they are transmitted by the fastest routes, respiratory and faecal-oral. For acute blood-borne diseases, which ebola falls into, incubation can typically range from 7-21 days, with Hepatitis capable of incubating for up to 8 weeks or so. So taking that into account, ebola can be pretty rapid. -- Permafrost 16:16, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Spelling 'mistakes'

All too often, various corrections have been made regarding the rectification of perceived spelling 'mistakes'. The article is equally contributed to by many different people, not just Americans. The spelling of words such as "diarrhoea" or the american version, "diarrhea" needs to be left as is. Either we need to maintain spelling as all American-English or all English. Maybe even a combination of the two. Constant correction/recorrection of "misspelled words" is becoming tiresome as the correct version is correct for a few countries, while incorrect for others. Same with "hemorrhagic" versus "haemorrhagic". As this is a worldwide effort, I feel that we should go with the majority of readers language-the English version. The links to the World health Organisation's factsheets (and I'm sure they know how it SHOULD be spelled), shows the spelling to be "haemorrhagic"-the English version. Does anyone want to discuss this further? --Read-write-services 22:38, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm all for the BE spelling, however the sheer amount of people coming along and changing the spelling 'mistake' back to AE makes it tiresome to police this. Says I, who had to add a message informing editors to Golgi body that the article was in BE and to be kept that way. Sheesh. -- Serephine ♠ talk - 07:53, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
Don't change the existing spelling in an attempt to make the article more global. Wikipedia policy is very clear on this. --Eyrian 10:18, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Possible Contradiction

This article referring to Ebola Reston states that "Six of the Reston primate handlers tested positive for the virus, two due to previous exposure."

However the specific Reston article states that "However, four of the Reston primate handlers tested positive for antibodies to the virus, suggesting that they had been infected but were asymptomatic." Richard Preston's book The Hot Zone also only states that four people showed signs of the virus in their blood. Does anyone have any knowledge of these two people from "previous exposure."? 70.21.157.163 00:47, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi, sorry if this is a bit late (being a year on), but I think the other two handlers handled previous shipments of apes forwarded from the station off Lake Victoria, but the primates were not a problem for them at the time - maybe due to the asymptomatic nature of the virus, or the apes were already put down during experimentation. -- Permafrost 16:11, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Revision

I re-wrote the following paragraph of this article as I found it was not written appropriately. It simply read like an assignment paper that was written by an elementary school student:

"The main limitation on the spread of an Ebola outbreak is the speed with which it kills its victims. In the initial outbreaks, by the time epidemiologists arrived, the entire community (village, rural hospital) had been infected, and most of those infected had died. The foreign doctors made few friends by banning traditional funeral preparations and ordering all dead bodies to be burned immediately, but they also saved few lives, because everyone around them was obviously dying. If ebola mutates to spread more quickly, incubate more quickly, and kill more slowly, it could spread across continents, decimating Europe as the Black Death once did. Instead, what happens is this: one infected person enters a village or hospital, becomes ill, and infects others. Within a few weeks, the entire group is infected and most are dead. The virus can't spread any further, because there are no new people to infect. The outbreak burns itself out, like a fireplace with only a few logs. "

I removed some of the unnecessary information that did not belong in that section of the article, such as the fact that "doctors made few friends by banning traditional funeral preparations and ordering all dead bodies to be burned immediately" (This should be cited if it is to be used in the article). The following is the re-written paragraph:

"Ebola is limited on a global scale due to its difficulty in spreading by airborne transmission and the period of time that the virus can use a living and contagious victim to spread compared to other infectious diseases. In isolated settings such as a quarantined hospital or a remote village, most victims are infected shortly after the first case of infection is present. In addition, the quick onset of symptoms from the time the disease becomes contagious in an individual makes it easy to identify sick individuals and limits an individual's ability to spread the disease by traveling. Although bodies of the deceased are still infectious, doctors implemented measures to properly dispose of dead bodies in spite of some traditional local burial rituals. "

[edit] Link fixes

Hello, This afternoon I "fixed" a link that has bothered me for ages, the biosafety level 4 link went to biosafety, but not to the actual levels. Also, the bioterrorism catergory A was not a direct link to catergory A. Does anyone object to this? cheers --Read-write-services 03:29, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Ebola Photos

Hi guys, I have found some public domain ebola pictures, high resolution, including electron micrographs of the virus and pictures during several out breaks. Go to http://phil.cdc.gov/phil/quicksearch.asp and type ebola in the search box. Perhaps someone more technical could import these pictures to Wikipedia?--Hontogaichiban 03:55, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

I updated the main electron micrograph picture so we now are using a public domain version, but with 123 images listed under a search of "ebola", I'm not sure which other ones you'd suggest we add. If you'll post the image ID numbers here, I'll do the work for you. Tijuana Brass 23:23, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
Micrographs need distance scales. Xxanthippe (talk) 09:48, 4 February 2008 (UTC).

[edit] Myths creeping into the article

Some serious problem with edits remain:

Characterization of the virus as airborne or causing bleeding in normal circumstances, Strong, dramatic language, especially with regards to symptoms, transmission, and dangers to humanity at large, Uncited speculation as to why Ebola has not yet become an epidemic, Original research in general

On the other hand, this is becoming a much better article by the week.

--Mark_08 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.66.192.122 (talk) 19:37, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Ebola rendered harmless in lab

Just thought I would post this link to a news article about the Ebola virus, in case it is useful to the article. From the article:

American researchers say they have developed a safe version of the ebola virus so that it can be studied more easily.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/01/22/2144081.htm -- B.D.Mills  (T, C) 11:21, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your suggestion. When you feel an article needs improvement, please feel free to make those changes. Wikipedia is a wiki, so anyone can edit almost any article by simply following the edit this page link at the top. The Wikipedia community encourages you to be bold in updating pages. Don't worry too much about making honest mistakes — they're likely to be found and corrected quickly. If you're not sure how editing works, check out how to edit a page, or use the sandbox to try out your editing skills. New contributors are always welcome. You don't even need to log in (although there are many reasons why you might want to). Webhat (talk) 21:53, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I've seen one article for an ebola vaccine which has been successful in "non-human primates" which they are attempting to make it work on humans. [2] Brian Pearson (talk) 03:52, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

There is a vaccine for this virus created in 2004. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.128.67.55 (talk) 20:10, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Is this a mistake?

Near the end of the "Transmission" section:

"Ebola is unlikely to develop(sometimes) into a pandemic..."

I don't understand that "(sometimes)". 86.149.133.204 (talk) 15:48, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

You could image that "(at some time)" is what is meant, but even that doesn't really add anything to the article. It looks like an edit that missed reversion because of a subsequent edit. I've removed it. Lavateraguy (talk) 16:26, 7 June 2008 (UTC)