Is Ebola an Airborne Virus

It's not airborne in the typical virus vernacular - it might have more ability to spread via droplets or that sort of thing, but if it were truly airborne, we'd know it. Africa would be a hot mess, and the world would see a -lot- more infections. So obviously not your typical airborne virus, no.

And mutation.. sure, could I suppose.. but as about reliable predicting that as a meteorite striking your home. Why worry further about something that probably won't happen. There is enough to worry about with the current strain.

originally posted by: fleabit
It's not airborne in the typical virus vernacular - it might have more ability to spread via droplets or that sort of thing, but if it were truly airborne, we'd know it. Africa would be a hot mess, and the world would see a -lot- more infections. So obviously not your typical airborne virus, no.

And mutation.. sure, could I suppose.. but as about reliable predicting that as a meteorite striking your home. Why worry further about something that probably won't happen. There is enough to worry about with the current strain.

ebola the most infectious disease in history i guess. mr sauyer infected all nurses nigerians who tended him even they knew he has ebola and were prepared for him.
flu the airborne cant come close . ebola wins over flu

Ebola Virus Particles Can Be Transmitted By Air - Prof. S.A. Omilabu @ Sahara TV

College of Medicine and University of Lagos Professor, Consultant Virologist and Ebola expert Sunday Aremu Omilabu speaks with SaharaTV about the Ebola outbreak in Nigeria.

I'm having a bit of a hard time making out what his saying but..

3:00 -> ”It is not airborne, so to speak”
4:20 -> "possibility of generic aerosols cannot be ruled out"

So as far as I can see he is somewhat confirming what Dr. Gary Kobinger, from the National Microbiology Laboratory at the Public Health Agency of Canada had concluded about some sort of droplets in the air being able to spread the infection.

So what really is the difference between an airborne disease and a "droplets spread" one?

a reply to: reletomp

Considering 250,000 to 500,000 a year die from the flu, I'd say it's more dangerous by far.

If this becomes a pandemic, ok.. it may end up being much worse. But it's difficult to spread.. and it's not airborne in the traditional sense. Being spread on a couch via droplets is not the same as being airborne.

a reply to: glend

It can travel in small air droplets. Like sneezes and float for a bit, but it's a large virus.
It isn't airborne like the measles are where it hangs around a room infecting people.

If you want to answer the question all you really have to do is look at the isolation of the spread. If it were airborne then it wouldn't take 6 months to kill others or just start arriving in single persons in other countries. It would be worldwide.

What is scary about this outbreak is the extent of the spread.
Any virus that expands into new territories and finds new genetic victims/hosts has a higher chance of mutation the longer it spreads.
Given enough time to spread into the human population, the virus can become more infectious to humans by mutating.
The deadly ebola strain that is loose now has the same parent strain as the one that is airborne but not infectious to humans.
One little change and it could become airborne.

a reply to: badgerprints

Luckily Ebola is a very slow mutator. Like compared to HIV or any others, it's crazy slow. Like a dinosaur virus.

originally posted by: GogoVicMorrow
a reply to: badgerprints

Luckily Ebola is a very slow mutator. Like compared to HIV or any others, it's crazy slow. Like a dinosaur virus.

Let's hope it stays that way.
That stuff is a bad way to die.

originally posted by: GogoVicMorrow
a reply to: glend

It can travel in small air droplets. Like sneezes and float for a bit, but it's a large virus.
It isn't airborne like the measles are where it hangs around a room infecting people.

If you want to answer the question all you really have to do is look at the isolation of the spread. If it were airborne then it wouldn't take 6 months to kill others or just start arriving in single persons in other countries. It would be worldwide.

Thanks for your insight. Another explanation here. So basically the reach is much less with droplet transmission. But enough to make it highly infectious in crowded places.