Here's why public health experts in the Lehigh Valley are paying attention to the new Ebola outbreak in Africa

As an uncommon strain of Ebolavirus begins to tear through central Africa, it is something public health experts, including those in the Lehigh Valley, are keeping an eye on.

A variant of Ebola is primarily impacting the Democratic Republic of Congo and has not reached international pandemic status, but cases have quickly spread, including to nearby Uganda. An American doctor has also contracted the disease and is currently receiving treatment in Germany. There have been Americans who have come into contact with that man and are being quarantined.

The World Health Organization has warned that there are many worrying factors about this disease, and declared it a "public health emergency of international concern." Dr. Jeffrey Jahre, chief emeritus of infectious disease for St. Luke's University Health Network, also said there are things about this outbreak of Ebola that are concerning, though he added it is not at the level where the American public needs to be fearing for their lives or taking measures to protect themselves.

Jahre said this strain, called Bundibugyo, is much more concerning than hantavirus, which has also been in the news recently. For one, it's more easily spread, capable of being contracted by the bodily fluids or secretions of an infected person coming in contact with the blood or mucus membrane of a non-infected person. Jahre added Ebolavirus can exist in the sexual secretions of someone previously infected for up to 18 months after an infection began.

The Bundibugyo variant does not show up on tests for other, more common forms of Ebola, and it doesn't present the same, either. Jahre said that Ebola usually has a dry phase, where symptoms are along the lines of muscle aches, headaches, pains and fatigue followed by severe gastrointestinal and hemorrhagic “wet” symptoms. However, replication by the virus and onset of symptoms appear to be lower, though, in the Bundibugyo strain. And this led to the first case being identified long after the first case likely emerged.

Unlike the most common Ebola strain, called the Zaire virus, there are no specific treatments or vaccines for the Bundibugyo strain, and it is fatal, with about 32% of people who contract it dying. So far, about 140 deaths have been confirmed and there are more than 600 suspected cases in Congo. Jahre said this is actually mild to low compared to other, more common forms of Ebola, which are deadly anywhere from 25% to 90% of the time.

He said that the U.S. has never had a large number of cases of Ebola; the last major outbreak of Ebola in 2014 resulted in more than 11,000 deaths internationally, out of 28,000 cases.

Jahre said, however, that due to commercial aviation, even in Africa or Asia, any virus is 12-24 hours from our shores.

"We are not insulated from other parts of the world and these kinds of outbreaks point out why we need a robust public health system that monitors these things and can take action to try and contain them so that they don’t become a problem in the United States," Jahre said.

Jahre said that though the U.S. has withdrawn from the World Health Organization, that doesn't mean nothing is being done. He said there is a robust presence on the ground by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The U.S. has also implemented travel restrictions, with an advisory in place not to travel to affected areas and non-citizens from the affected areas are not allowed into the country.

He said that should the virus arrive in the U.S., there are already protocols in place to control and isolate the spread of the disease. He added that while St. Luke's has never treated any patients with Ebola, doctors there would know what to do to handle the situation as best as they possibly could.

"We have a lot of muscle memory from COVID,” he said. “In other words, if we had a suspicion, we would know immediately what to do in terms of isolation to protect both the patient and the staff and there’s a very specific advisory even right now about what kind of specimens to send off and the way to do it."

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