An infectious disease expert has stated that the test used to detect the Ebola virus in humans has a fatal flaw: the results will be negative until enough of the virus is built up in the person’s body.
As CBN reports, Dr. Nancy Khardouri, who has been studying infectious diseases for the past 30 years, said, “The test becomes positive when you have symptoms. So it doesn’t help you before the symptoms, like many other tests do.”
The director of infectious diseases at Eastern Virginia Medical School explained that this means someone infected with Ebola could appear to be in good health and enter the country undetected.
“People who are coming from Africa, I’m hoping that this education will happen at the entry level,” Khardouri said, “like at the airports, customs checks and all.”
“Look, you’re coming from XYZ country and therefore if you have fever, you don’t feel well, please just don’t take your time to go see a health care provider, go quickly,” she added.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is now saying that people who have been to West Africa with symptoms as mild as a low-grade fever should be detained and quarantined.
“If people have a small tear or abrasion that they haven’t even noticed, which happens all the time, and they come in contact with somebody’s blood, or somebody’s stool, or urine, or vomit that has the virus in it, in that case the virus will go in[to] the skin,” Khardouri continued, adding that she believes the new Ebola vaccine under development, which could be given as soon as six months from now, is the best hope for containing the deadly disease.
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