Ebola is a contagious, uncomfortable, and deadly virus. It has killed many people and infected many more.  Ebola should not be taken very lightly because it is a very serious matter.  Ebola is often joked about and on Halloween this year people even dressed up as Ebola patients or doctors.  In my opinion this is a very insensitive thing to do to the people that have Ebola and have love ones that have died of Ebola.  Ebola is not a joking matter.

Ebola is a very deadly virus, 50% of the people that contract Ebola die from the disease.  But, this has ranged from 25% to 90% in other out breaks since 1976. This is not including other variables, like if people that have contracted Ebola  can reach a hospital and receive the treatments for Ebola, which there is really no 100% proven treatment or cure for.  Only two potential vaccines are undergoing human testing.  Most of the cases of Ebola are in Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Liberia.  The current Ebola outbreak is the most complex and largest there has been since it was discovered in 1976.   There are 4,910 confirmed deaths of Ebola as of October 29, 2014.  There are 7,728 laboratory-confirmed cases of Ebola. But, the unconfirmed number of cases is around 13,567 people.  Just imagine how many more people can get Ebola just in the next 5 years.

Ebola also causes very extreme discomfort.  Most people don’t show any symptoms from 2 to 21 days.  When the symptoms start is when it gets the most uncomfortable.  People who have Ebola have to deal with a fever, severe headache, joint and muscle aches, chills, and weakness when they first start to show symptoms of Ebola. If that’s not bad enough the symptoms of Ebola start to become worst the longer you have it.  People who have had  Ebola for a while start to have Nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, red eyes, raised rash, stomach pain, severe weight loss, and bleeding usually from the eyes.  They also experience bruising and internal bleeding, which is usually deadly.  This proves my point of how serious Ebola really is.

Ebola is also contagious, like most viruses, even though Ebola cannot be spread though insects, air, or water, unless contaminated.  Ebola is found in some animals, mostly primates.  It can be found in monkeys, fruit bats, chimps, gorillas, forest antelope, and porcupines. Milder strains can be found in pigs and monkeys in the Philippines.  One of the ways to get Ebola is coming into contact with an infected animal’s blood or an infected animal’s waste products. Even from person to person Ebola is very infectious. You can get Ebola though direct contact through broken skin, blood contact, or any body fluids like sweat, urine, and saliva. There has also been cases were people have contracted Ebola by having direct contact with family members that died of Ebola while trying to prepare them for burial.

Ebola is really a horrible virus to contract. Think of how scared you would be if you got Ebola. Think of how scared you would be if your mom, dad, brother, sister, or any other family member got Ebola. It’s a very scary thing and, I know some people deal with things differently than others but, you shouldn’t make fun of Ebola under any circumstance.  It just makes you seem insensitive. It does have a funny name and you can make hundreds of jokes about Ebola but, that doesn’t mean you should. Ebola should be treated seriously like that of cancer or brain trauma.