Whats Your Ebola Risk?

By Tracey Lynn & Marya Morgan

October 16, 2014

In the latest outbreak, more than 8,000
people worldwide have been diagnosed with
Ebola. In Africa, it is a pandemic. With a
mortality rate near 70%, thousands have lost
their battle with the virus which disables the
immune system and speeds on to rupture
arteries and veins. Until recently, infections
were rampant only in West Africa where
sanitation and healthcare are shaky, but now,
healthcare workers in the United States have
been diagnosed with this feared disease.
Surveys find Americans are becoming
increasingly uncomfortable with each new
confirmed case. But are you really at risk for
getting Ebola? The symptoms of Ebola infection
mimic common influenza, but with key
differences. The flu is typically a respiratory
illness, says Dr. Ginger Cameron, Assistant
Professor of Pharmacy Practice at Cedarville
University in Ohio, but Ebola does not move in
that same pattern, so Ebola is gonna move
more into your guts. Youre gonna start having
upset stomach, vomiting, nausea and diarrhea.
Personal contact with an infected
person puts families and care providers at risk.
Theres bleeding with Ebola so youll start to
have bleeding, it can be from any spot on the
body, you actually have a significant amount of
that; and so youre having exposure to those
body fluids in the care of those family members.
So the easiest way is to use protective
equipment while theyre doing that.
Cameron continues, If you have not had
exposure to anyone with Ebola, we dont want
to panic -- your chances of having it are pretty
much nil."
Dr. Dennis Sullivan, Professor of Biology
and Director of the Center for Bioethics at
Cedarville University, agrees that careful
handling of infected materials is sufficient to
prevent infection. He calls the virus fragile
and says it quickly dries and dies on surfaces
making it very hard to catch without direct
contact. It is not a difficult disease to safely
treat and the risk to healthcare workers is
minimal, so we should not be fearful of this
here in the United States."
Even so, air travel into and out of the
U.S. has become the focus with the news of a
second infection of a Texas nurse who boarded
a flight the day before. Though the virus is not
believed to transmit through breathing, the
danger lurking in infected body fluids raises a
question about something as simple as sweat
left on an airplane seat.
"Your skin is gonna be a great barrier
for the most part unless youve had some type
of wound, you have a scratch or cut of some
sort, or you dont wash your hands and then
you touch your face, youre allowing that virus
to get in, says Dr. Cameron. She is confident
that direct contact is the only way to contract
this disease. Ebola is very infective but not
exceedingly contagious."
It seems to me, in general, its not a
good idea to let feverish people get on
airplanes, counters Dr. Jane Orient, President
of Doctors for Disaster Preparedness. She
advocates more stringent avoidance of invisible
droplets of fluid. There have been a lot of very
reassuring things put out by the CDC, for one
thing, saying you cant get it from a person
whos not symptomatic, but theres no way to
know that for sure. She does not warn the
public against boarding airplanes for routine
travel, but she wants high-quality screenings
and mandatory quarantine for all passengers
who may be carriers. If people want to come
to the U.S. from an area where this epidemic is
raging, they need to be quarantined in an
unaffected area for at least 21 days and
probably 25."

Whats Your Ebola Risk MC Questions
Instructions: Create 3 interim-style reading questions for the article Whats Your Ebola Risk? You need
one MID (main idea) question, one MOW (meaning of words) question, and one SUP (supporting
details). Each question also needs 4 answers to choose from (a-d multiple choice responses).
Use the chart below to help you create the questions:

MID MOW SUP
-Correct answer includes key
idea of paragraph
-Distracting answers should
seem right (based on details)
Question stems:
The main idea of
paragraph ____ is
Paragraph ___s main
idea can best be
described as

-Correct answer is a paraphrase
of the word that makes most
sense in context
-Distractors should include
alternate definitions of the word
or things that sound right
Question stems:
The meaning of _____
can best be defined as
_____ in line ___ is
best defined as:

-Correct answer is either a detail
from the reading, or the
INCORRECT detail from a list of
correct ones
-Distractors should include
things that sound like they are
from the reading, but are not
quite there
Question stems:
According to paragraph
___...
All of the following are
true in paragraph ____
(lines ____) EXCEPT:


1.___________________________________________________________________________
a. ___________________________________________________________________________
b. ___________________________________________________________________________
c. ___________________________________________________________________________
d. ___________________________________________________________________________

2.___________________________________________________________________________
a. ___________________________________________________________________________
b. ___________________________________________________________________________
c. ___________________________________________________________________________
d. ___________________________________________________________________________

3.___________________________________________________________________________
a. ___________________________________________________________________________
b. ___________________________________________________________________________
c. ___________________________________________________________________________
d. ___________________________________________________________________________