Since then, officials have tried to contain the disease by isolating victims and educating populations on how to avoid transmission, though porous borders, satellite outbreaks and widespread distrust of health workers have made the outbreak difficult to bring under control.
But they note that unusual properties of the virus, together with a controversial Chinese response to a previous bird flu outbreak of distributing millions of free vaccines, may have made the outbreak harder than usual to detect at first.
The E. coli bacteria that killed dozens of people in Germany over the past month have a highly unusual combination of two traits and that may be what made the outbreak among the deadliest in recent history, scientists there are reporting.
IN GERMAN E. COLI STRAIN The E. coli bacteria that killed dozens of people in Germany over the last month have a highly unusual combination of two traits and that may be what made the outbreak among the deadliest in recent history, scientists said.
The near-collapse of the country's healthcare system has made the outbreak even deadlier.
MSF Ebola expert Dr. Michel Van Herp, who was on the ground in October, said the mass crowds, population movement and possible political violence the election could create would only make the outbreak more difficult to control.
Their information hasn't been all that much better than what I could have provided, and I didn't go to medical school for four years". Earlier this month, CDC Director Tom Frieden said that a travel ban to countries battling Ebola would make the outbreak worse.
A standardised outbreak definition can help to send uniform messages to inform the general public and make the outbreak analysis comparable within and between countries.
Overall, the prior distribution selection at this stage should be regarded as a pragmatic approach to making the outbreak detection procedure work.
While population density might have made the outbreak more difficult to control in Beijing, the massive and efficient mobilization of communities and health workers to respond to the outbreak was likely an asset.
