Mark Zuckerberg donated $25 million to programs aimed at fighting Ebola. The Facebook founder, together with his wife, Priscilla Chan, made the contribution to the CDC Foundation. Managers of that organization report the money will be used to combat the disease in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, among other high-risk areas.
Ebola has already taken the lives of around 4,500 people, and roughly 1,000 new cases are diagnosed each week. The World Health Association announced on October 14 that 10,000 people a week will test positive each week by the end of the year. The disease was taking the lives of around half of the patients who caught the disease. In the last few weeks, the fatality rate from Ebola has climbed to 70 percent.
"The Ebola epidemic is at a critical turning point. It has infected 8,400 people so far, but it is spreading very quickly and projections suggest it could infect 1 million people or more over the next several months if not addressed. We need to get Ebola under control in the near term so that it doesn't spread further and become a long term global health crisis that we end up fighting for decades at large scale, like HIV or polio," Zuckerberg wrote on his Facebook page.
A Sudanese patient died in Germany on the night of October 13, after contracting the disease, according to a statement from the hospital where the unidentified health care worker perished.
"The patient sick with Ebola fever died during the night in St. George Clinic in Leipzig. Despite intensive medical measures and maximum efforts by the medical team, the 56-year-old U.N. employee succumbed to the serious infectious disease," the hospital reported.
Ebola outbreaks have taken place several times before in recent history, but this recent epidemic is the most serious to date. In addition to patients in western Africa, a nurse in Spain and one in the United States have been diagnosed with the disease.
Sihuan Pharmaceutical Holdings Group, a Chinese drug manufacturer with close ties to defense forces in that nation, claims to have developed a drug that cures the disease. They are seeking fast-track approval from Beijing for the medicine. Known as JK-05, the new potential treatment is currently only available for emergency use by the military.
"Grants like this directly help the frontline responders in their heroic work. These people are on the ground setting up care centers, training local staff, identifying Ebola cases and much more. We are hopeful this will help save lives and get this outbreak under control," Zuckerberg wrote.
