In September 1976, Piot, who was then working with the Institute of Tropical Medicine in Antwerp, received blood samples from a Belgian nun in Zaire, now the Republic of the Congo, who had died after she was diagnosed with yellow fever. After isolating the virus, Piot and his team found that it did not resemble any virus they knew. And then the team got news from the World Health Organization (WHO) that Zaire was in the grip of an epidemic with a very high mortality rate. The scientists were instructed to stop all research as the labs were not equipped to handle such a dangerous virus. The sample was sent to the Center for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta, US. The CDC confirmed that this was a new virus. Piot then travelled to Zaire with several other teams, including from CDC, to find out how the disease gets transmitted and to contain the epidemic. Piot said India should to be particularly vigilant against Ebola, as the early symptoms of the virus are similar to other prevalent diseases such as malaria and dengue. “India has a huge population and urban centres are very densely packed, which could pose a challenge if any cases did arrive, as it makes it harder to isolate patients and trace their contacts for observation,” Piot, who is director of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said. “Lack of adequate sanitation is also a problem in parts of the country. These elements could make containing Ebola cases more challenging than in some other countries,” he added, noting that there are many people from India who work in trade or industry in West Africa. Read more at: livemint/Politics/9H9AhLcpf3eOzctG3iJgXL/Ebola-a-humanitarian-catastrophe-Peter-Piot.html?utm_source=copy
Posted on: Thu, 30 Oct 2014 04:33:32 +0000
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