Estimating the number of secondary Ebola cases resulting from an unsafe burial and risk factors for transmission during the West Africa Ebola epidemic.
BACKGROUND:Safely burying Ebola infected individuals is acknowledged to be important for controlling Ebola epidemics and was a major component of the 2013-2016 West Africa Ebola response. Yet, in order to understand the impact of safe burial programs it is necessary to elucidate the role of unsafe b...
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ftdoajarticles:oai:doaj.org/article:c2924b4fd4a74e4b8cc970378c52a29a 2023-05-15T15:12:03+02:00 Estimating the number of secondary Ebola cases resulting from an unsafe burial and risk factors for transmission during the West Africa Ebola epidemic. Amanda Tiffany Benjamin D Dalziel Hilary Kagume Njenge Ginger Johnson Roselyn Nugba Ballah Daniel James Abdoulaye Wone Juliet Bedford Amanda McClelland 2017-06-01T00:00:00Z https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0005491 https://doaj.org/article/c2924b4fd4a74e4b8cc970378c52a29a EN eng Public Library of Science (PLoS) http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC5480832?pdf=render https://doaj.org/toc/1935-2727 https://doaj.org/toc/1935-2735 1935-2727 1935-2735 doi:10.1371/journal.pntd.0005491 https://doaj.org/article/c2924b4fd4a74e4b8cc970378c52a29a PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, Vol 11, Iss 6, p e0005491 (2017) Arctic medicine. Tropical medicine RC955-962 Public aspects of medicine RA1-1270 article 2017 ftdoajarticles https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0005491 2022-12-31T00:23:26Z BACKGROUND:Safely burying Ebola infected individuals is acknowledged to be important for controlling Ebola epidemics and was a major component of the 2013-2016 West Africa Ebola response. Yet, in order to understand the impact of safe burial programs it is necessary to elucidate the role of unsafe burials in sustaining chains of Ebola transmission and how the risk posed by activities surrounding unsafe burials, including care provided at home prior to death, vary with human behavior and geography. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS:Interviews with next of kin and community members were carried out for unsafe burials in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, in six districts where the Red Cross was responsible for safe and dignified burials (SDB). Districts were randomly selected from a district-specific sampling frame comprised of villages and neighborhoods that had experienced cases of Ebola. An average of 2.58 secondary cases were potentially generated per unsafe burial and varied by district (range: 0-20). Contact before and after death was reported for 142 (46%) contacts. Caregivers of a primary case were 2.63 to 5.92 times more likely to become EVD infected compared to those with post-mortem contact only. Using these estimates, the Red Cross SDB program potentially averted between 1,411 and 10,452 secondary EVD cases, reducing the epidemic by 4.9% to 36.5%. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE:SDB is a fundamental control measure that limits community transmission of Ebola; however, for those individuals having contact before and after death, it was impossible to ascertain the exposure that caused their infection. The number of infections prevented through SDB is significant, yet greater impact would be achieved by early hospitalization of the primary case during acute illness. Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles Arctic PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases 11 6 e0005491 |
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Open Polar |
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Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles |
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ftdoajarticles |
language |
English |
topic |
Arctic medicine. Tropical medicine RC955-962 Public aspects of medicine RA1-1270 |
spellingShingle |
Arctic medicine. Tropical medicine RC955-962 Public aspects of medicine RA1-1270 Amanda Tiffany Benjamin D Dalziel Hilary Kagume Njenge Ginger Johnson Roselyn Nugba Ballah Daniel James Abdoulaye Wone Juliet Bedford Amanda McClelland Estimating the number of secondary Ebola cases resulting from an unsafe burial and risk factors for transmission during the West Africa Ebola epidemic. |
topic_facet |
Arctic medicine. Tropical medicine RC955-962 Public aspects of medicine RA1-1270 |
description |
BACKGROUND:Safely burying Ebola infected individuals is acknowledged to be important for controlling Ebola epidemics and was a major component of the 2013-2016 West Africa Ebola response. Yet, in order to understand the impact of safe burial programs it is necessary to elucidate the role of unsafe burials in sustaining chains of Ebola transmission and how the risk posed by activities surrounding unsafe burials, including care provided at home prior to death, vary with human behavior and geography. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS:Interviews with next of kin and community members were carried out for unsafe burials in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, in six districts where the Red Cross was responsible for safe and dignified burials (SDB). Districts were randomly selected from a district-specific sampling frame comprised of villages and neighborhoods that had experienced cases of Ebola. An average of 2.58 secondary cases were potentially generated per unsafe burial and varied by district (range: 0-20). Contact before and after death was reported for 142 (46%) contacts. Caregivers of a primary case were 2.63 to 5.92 times more likely to become EVD infected compared to those with post-mortem contact only. Using these estimates, the Red Cross SDB program potentially averted between 1,411 and 10,452 secondary EVD cases, reducing the epidemic by 4.9% to 36.5%. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE:SDB is a fundamental control measure that limits community transmission of Ebola; however, for those individuals having contact before and after death, it was impossible to ascertain the exposure that caused their infection. The number of infections prevented through SDB is significant, yet greater impact would be achieved by early hospitalization of the primary case during acute illness. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Amanda Tiffany Benjamin D Dalziel Hilary Kagume Njenge Ginger Johnson Roselyn Nugba Ballah Daniel James Abdoulaye Wone Juliet Bedford Amanda McClelland |
author_facet |
Amanda Tiffany Benjamin D Dalziel Hilary Kagume Njenge Ginger Johnson Roselyn Nugba Ballah Daniel James Abdoulaye Wone Juliet Bedford Amanda McClelland |
author_sort |
Amanda Tiffany |
title |
Estimating the number of secondary Ebola cases resulting from an unsafe burial and risk factors for transmission during the West Africa Ebola epidemic. |
title_short |
Estimating the number of secondary Ebola cases resulting from an unsafe burial and risk factors for transmission during the West Africa Ebola epidemic. |
title_full |
Estimating the number of secondary Ebola cases resulting from an unsafe burial and risk factors for transmission during the West Africa Ebola epidemic. |
title_fullStr |
Estimating the number of secondary Ebola cases resulting from an unsafe burial and risk factors for transmission during the West Africa Ebola epidemic. |
title_full_unstemmed |
Estimating the number of secondary Ebola cases resulting from an unsafe burial and risk factors for transmission during the West Africa Ebola epidemic. |
title_sort |
estimating the number of secondary ebola cases resulting from an unsafe burial and risk factors for transmission during the west africa ebola epidemic. |
publisher |
Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
publishDate |
2017 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0005491 https://doaj.org/article/c2924b4fd4a74e4b8cc970378c52a29a |
geographic |
Arctic |
geographic_facet |
Arctic |
genre |
Arctic |
genre_facet |
Arctic |
op_source |
PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, Vol 11, Iss 6, p e0005491 (2017) |
op_relation |
http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC5480832?pdf=render https://doaj.org/toc/1935-2727 https://doaj.org/toc/1935-2735 1935-2727 1935-2735 doi:10.1371/journal.pntd.0005491 https://doaj.org/article/c2924b4fd4a74e4b8cc970378c52a29a |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0005491 |
container_title |
PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases |
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11 |
container_issue |
6 |
container_start_page |
e0005491 |
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1766342791120551936 |