Last Wednesday, the world awoke to the news that Erick Thomas Duncan, the first patient diagnosed with Ebola in the United States, had died of the disease. He had traveled from Liberia to Dallas, Texas, and developed symptoms of the disease four or five days after arriving in the states. This news—along with the information that a nurse had contracted the virus in Spain as a consequence of having been in contact with a patient diagnosed with the disease—has been seen as cause for alarm in the Western world.

What is Ebola?

The Ebola virus belongs to the family of filoviridae, which is capable of causing hemorrhagic fevers in a similar manner as does the dengue virus and other viruses.

Five different species of the Ebola virus have been identified, known under the names the Zaire, Sudan, Ivory Coast, Bundibugyo, and Reston agents. The virus was first recognized in 1976, and small outbreaks have been reported in different places with different mortality rates depending on the species of virus. The current outbreak in West Africa is being caused by the Ebola-Zaire species.

When did the current crisis begin?

An outbreak of Ebola was reported in Guinea late last year and confirmed by the World Health Organization this past March. This was the first outbreak in West Africa, though previous outbreaks of lesser magnitude had been reported in Central Africa. Unfortunately, the disease was not contained. In recent months it has expanded to Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, and Senegal.

To date more than 4,000 deaths have been reported and more than 8,000 cases suspected or confirmed. This current mortality rate is about 50 percent. In previous outbreaks, mortality has ranged from 30 percent to 90 percent.

How is Ebola transmitted?

Most of the current cases of the disease have occurred by transmission from person to person through contact with secretions from an infected patient—either blood, urine, feces, saliva, semen, or sweat. These secretions need to gain access to mucous membranes (conjunctiva, inside the lips and mouth or genitals) to cause infection.

Transmission may also occur when these secretions are exposed to skin that has lost its integrity (wounds, abrasions, and so on). To date there is no confirmation that the virus can be transmitted through the respiratory tract, as can the influenza virus. Some transmissions have occurred by accident in medical staff working with patients infected with the disease. Cases of the infection have also occurred through contact with affected animals.

Compared to previous outbreaks, the spread of Ebola has been rapid. Previous outbreaks occurred in isolated rural populations with a smaller number of people, unlike this outbreak that has spread in urban centers. Knowing that previous outbreaks were contained by implementing basic infection control measures allowed us to understand that the disease is potentially containable through measures already known to medical science.

What happens to the body during an Ebola infection?

Like any disease, once the causative agent enters the body, it is followed by an incubation period during which the patient may not show any symptoms. In the case of the Ebola virus, the asymptomatic period varies from 6 to 10 days, with a range from 2 to 21 days in extreme cases. To our knowledge, patients do not appear to be infectious during this asymptomatic period.

The disease can start with symptoms common to other viral illnesses: fever, chills, malaise, headache, lack of appetite, muscle aches, cough, sore throat. Some patients may develop an erythematous rash over the whole body, accompanied by symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea. Other symptoms may appear later in the disease, such as bleeding in the areas of venipuncture (area where the veins are punctured for blood sample or placement of an IV catheter).

These findings may be accompanied by a decrease in white blood cells (leukopenia), decreased platelets count (thrombocytopenia), elevated liver enzymes, abnormal coagulation tests, and injury to the lungs and kidney. Patients who survive the disease usually improve after the tenth day.

What are the reasons to be hopeful about the diseases containment?…Read More

Source and Original Content by Gospel Coalition

When a guesthouse belonging to one of Nigeria’s leading Christian pastors collapsed last month, killing 115 mostly South African pilgrims, attention focused on the multimillion-dollar “megachurches” that form a huge, untaxed sector of Africa’s top economy.

Hundreds of millions of dollars change hands each year in these popular Pentecostal houses of worship, which are modeled on their counterparts in the United States.

Some of the churches can hold more than 200,000 worshippers and, with their attendant business empires, they constitute a significant section of the economy, employing tens of thousands of people and raking in tourist dollars, as well as exporting Christianity globally.

But exactly how much of Nigeria’s $510 billion GDP they make up is difficult to assess, since the churches are, like the oil sector in Africa’s top energy producer, largely opaque entities.

“They don’t submit accounts to anybody,” says Bismarck Rewane, economist and CEO of Lagos consultancy Financial Derivatives. “At least six church leaders have private jets, so they have money. How much? No one really knows.”

When Nigeria recalculated its GDP in March, its economy became Africa’s biggest, as previously poorly captured sectors such as mobile phones, e-commerce and its prolific “Nollywood” entertainment industry were specifically included in estimates.

There was no such separate listing for the “megachurches,” whose main source of income is “tithe”, the 10 percent or so of their income that followers are asked to contribute.

As the churches have charity status, they have no obligation to open their books, and certainly don’t have to fill in tax returns—an exemption that is increasingly controversial in Nigeria, where poverty remains pervasive despite the oil riches.

The pastors argue their charity work should exempt them.

“We use the income of the church to build schools, we use the income of the church to serve the needs of the poor,” David Oyedepo, bishop of the popular Winners Chapel, told Reuters in an interview. “These are nonprofit organizations.”

Pastors on Forbes List

Nonetheless, the surging popularity of the megachurches among the Christians who make up half of Nigeria’s 170 million population has propelled their preachers into the ranks of the richest people in Africa.

In 2011, Forbes magazine estimated the fortunes of Nigeria’s five richest pastors. Oyedepo topped the list, with an estimated net worth of $150 million.

He was followed by “Pastor Chris” Oyakhilome of Believers’ LoveWorld Incorporated, also known as the Christ Embassy and popular with executives and politicians, at $30 million to $50 million.

TB Joshua, pastor of the Synagogue Church of All Nations, at the center of the recent diplomatic storm over the deaths in its guesthouse, was thought to have between $10 million and $15 million.

The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) declined to comment on how churches fit into their GDP figures, but a source there said they were included as “nonprofit,” which falls under “other services” in the latest figures. In 2013, the category contributed 2.5 percent of GDP, the same as the financial sector.

A former banker at Nigeria’s United Bank for Africa, who declined to be named, recalled being approached five years ago by a church that was bringing in $5 million a week from contributions at home or abroad.

“They wanted to make some pretty big investments: real estate, shares,” he said. “They wanted to issue a bond to borrow, and then use the weekly flows to pay the coupon.”

In the end, he said, the bank turned down the proposal on ethical grounds.

Yet Nigerian churches do often invest large amounts of their congregations’ money in shares and property, at home and abroad, he and another banking source said.

One pastor bought 3 billion naira ($18 million) worth of shares in the defunct Finbank, which later merged with FCMB, after it was rescued in a bail-out in 2009, a fund manager who handled the deal told Reuters. The pastor used a nominee trust account to keep his name off the books.

In 2011, Oyakhilome was investigated by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and charged with laundering $35 million of contributions to his church in foreign bank accounts. He denied all wrongdoing, and the case was dismissed for lack of evidence.

Oyakhilome was not available for comment, and Joshua’s media team declined a request for an interview with him…Read More

Source and Original Content by CHARISMA NEWS