Ebola: How quickly can it be spread?

[DaughterDilemma]

It takes 21 days to incubate, during which time the victim is not contagious.

Most sources say it can be passed through bodily fluids entering broken skin or mucous membranes. Is that only when there is blood present in those bodily fluids?

Here's a good link from CDC on how ebola is transmitted

In short, it is any bodily fluid. It is not airbourne (in the usual sense of the term), but if you are in very close proximity (elsewhere on CDC pages it says within 1 metre) then contact with droplets is possible.

This from the WHO might clarify things a little bit.

The only bodily fluid they've said they are not sure about being a potential carrier is sweat.

Thanks AuntieStella that link is very clear, this is the bit that concerns me

"This could happen when virus-laden heavy droplets are directly propelled, by coughing or sneezing (which does not mean airborne transmission) onto the mucus membranes or skin with cuts or abrasions of another person"

It's fairly serious then if it gets on public transport?

It's fairly serious then if it gets on public transport?

No, not really. I think that method of transmission is more of a theoretical possibility than anything else. It's never actually known to have happened in humans.

Someone who knows more can probably correct me on this later but I get the feeling that you need to be more than symptomatic to expel virus particles through coughing and sneezing. I think you'd need to be quite seriously ill, so unlikely to be on public transport. Which might be why very case known so far in the last 40 years has been in people with very close personal contact with someone infected.

The woman on R4 the other day said it was relatively difficult to catch and it is easily killed with bleach and soap and water.

Ebola is a very ineffective virus in terms of how it spreads. By the time the host is symptomatic, and therefore contaigous, they are very ill and most likely housebound. That is why the vast majority of people infected are close relatives of victims or healthcare workers.

If Ebola was able to spread itself whilst the host appeared outwardly healthy it would be a much bigger problem, but that is not the case with this virus.

Its all body fluid sweat, semen etc.
It is supposed to be very difficult to catch you have to have fairly close contact with the infected when they are ill.
I'm not sure about things such someone sweating Holding onto a banister then you touching the banister.
The most effect (if it properly hits the UK that is) way to deal with it would be to avoid physical contact, public transport and wash your hand regularly especially if you have just been outside.

the article i read said incubation period can be 7-21 days

The incubation period is between 2 and 21 days. Most people develop symptoms 7-13 days after exposure (I've also seen 7-10 written somewhere).

According to the WHO article whole Ebola virus particles haven't yet been isolated from sweat so I think contracting Ebola from touching a surface that someone who is sweating have touched are unlikely, if not impossible.

It has been calculated that in the current epidemic, in the 3 worst country, the spread rate is 1.5-2 people per patient.
It doesn't spread that much, actually. Not compared with other diseases, such as the flu.

Those two people are those who are in close contact with the patient, most likely those taking care of them while ill, and not taking enough precautions.
In a country with the most basic disease control, all people who have been in contact with a symptomatic patient will be placed under observation, or isolation, and it dies out soon.

The title says 'be' spread.... Some malicious people out there. ( Isis)

are you suggesting that someone might attempt germ warfare HeySoul?

Seems unlikely, surely the logistics would rule out ebola as a suitable biological weapon...airborne infectious agents like smallpox and antrax are the usual ones afaik.

God I don't know! Anything seems possible after seeing the news lately. All seems so threatening. I was very unnerved to hear that a big attack had been thwarted. I used to work in this area and know for it to be even reported on and made public, then it must have been a massive and large scale plan

The impartial title is intentional. It's not really the people that spread it, it's the nasty things inside their system that spread it. I want to know what happens when someone with the virus sneezes on the London underground.

I don't think sneezing is much of a problem, wouldn't most of the virus present in expelled fluid drops die as the fluid dried?
or are you asking what proportion of people would be susceptible to the virus if exposed?

If someone with Ebola sneezes on the Underground, another person will only be at risk (theoretically) if the spray enters their body via a cut or the mucous membranes. In reality, someone with a Ebola at the contagious stage will be vomiting and bleeding profusely, so highly unlikely to be on the Underground in the first place.

I think with Ebola the droplets expelled during sneezing are heavy and don't travel far. I don't think they stay in the air for as long as something like flu might either. They also have to make contact with the mucous membranes so even if someone sneezed on you you probably wouldn't get Ebola. I'm not sure that somebody with Ebola getting onto a tube with Ebola and sneezing would effect a lot of people.

I think this sort of situation comes down to what our QA manager refers to as all the holes in the cheese lining up.

There is a theoretical risk of someone with Ebola transiting Ebola to another person by sneezing on the tube. But it involves a number of things happening and each of those things is so unlikely that the chances of all of them happening is very, very, very small.

I like the cheese metaphor, makes a change from the now cliched 'perfect storm' :o

Honestly there's a whole power point presentation with pictures of emmental and everything

sounds like he views the world through cheese smeared spectacles

Tbf it was a work related power point on risk management systems/how to reduce the rates of accidents/incidents/errors or how to record or investigate them, not just cheese. It's a nice simple analogy though and works for quite a lot of things.

Also, what about animals spreading it?

Animals can spread it, that's how this outbreak began when a child was bitten by a bat. You'd have to be bitten by an infected animal, or let one lick an open wound on your body to catch it.