Ebola Virus Disease and MDG and SDG

This study sheds light on the impact of Ebola virus disease on Sustainable Development Goals and Millennium Development Goals. It discusses the key indicators of the disease and measures taken to control it.

Running head: Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
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1Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
Executive summary
The purpose of the study is to discuss one of the major health issues which have drawn attention
from the international health organizations as well as all the nations. In regard to the discussion,
the major recent health issue Ebola outbreak has been chosen. The paper sheds the light on the
factors because of which the disease has become a threat to the global health and well being. In
the whole course of the discussion, the paper highlights the effects as well as challenges created
by the disease on Sustainable Development goals and Millennium development Goals.
Specifically the paper takes a closer look at the third goal mentioned in the Sustainable
Development Goals which aims to reach global good health and wellbeing by the 2020 in
relation with the disease. Additionally, the paper mentions the key indicative factors of the
disease while giving an overview of the controlling measures that were taken to combat with the
deadly disease.

2Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Discussion........................................................................................................................................3
Why Ebola virus disease is a health issue?..................................................................................3
Effect of Ebola virus disease on Sustainable Development Goals or MDG...............................4
The key indicators of Ebola disease............................................................................................5
Measures taken to control Ebola Virus disease...........................................................................7
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................8
References........................................................................................................................................9

3Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
Introduction
The reports aims to cast the light on the on a health issue of global importance. In order
to proceed with the discussion, Ebola disease has been chosen. The outbreak of the disease
created a massive havoc all over the globe as the disease was of infectious nature. Ebola virus
disease was out broken first African countries causing death of many people in the African
regions (Beeching, Fenech and Houlihan, 2014). The disease turned into an epidemic as the in
the initial stage, the disease could not be identified. Therefore shedding the light exclusively on
the diseases and its effect on the health sector across the world in relation with the Sustainable
Development Goals and the Millennium Development Goals the study discusses the key
indicating factors in order to identify the disease as well as significant achievements in regard to
control the disease from further spreading drawing the connections with Millennium
Development Goals and the Sustainable development Goals.
Discussion
Why Ebola virus disease is a health issue?
Formerly known as the Ebola Hemorrhagic fever, Ebola Virus Disease often turns out as
a fatal illness causing death. In this regard, it must be mentioned that the disease is infectious
thus easily spreads (WHO Ebola Response Team, 2014). In the year of 2014, the major outbreak
of the disease rocked the entire world as it has spread a major health scare among people all over
the globe. Till date there is no possible treatment for the diseases therefore the international
health organizations like WHO advises of taking safety measures in order to restrict it the disease
from further spreading among other countries (Beechin, Fenech and Houlihan, 2014). The most

4Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
affected region was the West Africa as it was the origin of the disease. The nature of the disease
is suspicious hence causes a major threat on the health care sector. The disease mainly emerges
from the forest areas, as per the observation of the medical teams that have been to those African
regions, where the outbreak of the disease began (Baize et al. 2014).
In relation with the discussion of the paper, it must be noted that since the disease is
contagious and spreads rapidly, the risk of transforming it into an epidemic is high. Therefore
over the recent past years due its repeated outbreaks in the African countries made the disease as
one of the major health issue of global importance (Bausch and Schwar 2014). Another major
reason behind its transformation into a health scare is the absence of the specific treatment for
the disease. The changing nature of the virus and its five different species create difficulties for
the researchers to invent the appropriate medicine in order ease the impact of the disease. In this
respect, it the virus is easily spread through body fluids and medical instruments like needles,
scissors and so on (World Health Organization 2014). It is considered that during dry weathers,
the diseases breaks out most as compared to other seasons. As per the records, the first outbreak
of the Ebola virus was in the month of December. The medical teams’ statement suggests that
there might be such cases in during the dry season where the people of forest countries comes in
the contact with the Ebola infected bats more frequently.
Effect of Ebola virus disease on Sustainable Development Goals or MDG
The uncontrollable nature of the disease imposes a great threat on the on the Sustainable
Development Goals taken by the United Nations. A massive response have been seen from the
international communities and from the United Nations as they have convened a gathering in
order to discuss the social as well as economic impacts of the disease especially on the countries
that have been affected by the disease (Heymann et al.2015). The discussion also includes the

5Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
other regions as well as overall world as to evaluate the impact of the disease. The purpose of
conducting the meeting also was to identify or figure out possible solutions to reduce or
eliminate the negative impacts of the disease. As of now, the Ebola is being considered as one of
the biggest health issue affecting not only the origin country but the entire world. With the record
of 17000 cases, the outbreak of the disease turned into the nature of epidemic.
In line with the Sustainable Development Goals and Millennium Development Goals,
Ebola outbreak turns to be one of the major threats exploiting the third goal of Sustainable
Development Goals which is said to be achieved by 2020 (Sachs 2012). While the aim of the
goal is to secure the good health as well as the well being of the people across the world, Ebola
disease is acutely creating obstacles in reaching the goal as it puts global health in crisis. The
nature of the disease being uncontrollable created a massive havoc since it out broke to the
present time. In respect to discuss the impact of the sustainable development, it must be
mentioned that the disease is mostly seen among the poor people of the African country, who do
not get the essential amenities of proper treatment which reveals possible obstacle in the path of
reaching the Sustainable Development Goals (Kickbusch and Gleicher 2012). The medicine and
required treatment for the disease is not yet discovered which causes repeated outbreaks of the
disease in different parts of Africa. While the goal of Sustainable Development Goals is to assure
that the death due to the disease is lowered, the Ebola epidemics causing damage in the global
health increased the rate of death mainly in African countries as well as in the entire globe.
Along with the third goal which is concerned is securing the global health, obstacles are being
created in the path of other goals as the effect of Ebola epidemic is vast on primarily on Africa
(Buse and Hawkes 2015).

6Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
The key indicators of Ebola disease
After analyzing the impacts of the deadly disease on the Sustainable Development Goals
and the Millennium development goals, it is of suggestive opinion that in order to meet the goal
mentioned in the Sustainable development goals and the Millennium Development Goals, the
deadly disease Ebola must be identified as earliest as possible (Bah et al. 2015). Therefore there
are key indicative factors set by international health organizations so that the disease can be
identified soon and the unwanted death can be prevented.
It is still unknown that where the virus of Ebola disease does comes from. There are five
species of the viruses, out of them only one species spread the infection among humans.
However, as per the observation, it is perceived that the virus comes from the animal and bats are
the most likely animal that spread the virus (Chowell and Nishiura 2014). The humans get
affected by the virus when they come in contact with the bats that are carrying the virus or other
animals into which the bats spread the viruses. However the virus is transmitted to human body
through body fluids from the individuals who died of the disease or who have been diagnosed
with the disease. Therefore sexual contact is considered to be one of the major ways of through
which the virus is transmitted from one person to another person (Goeijenbier et al.2014).
Though the proper treatment could not be determined, certain indicators have been set in order to
identify the disease as earliest as possible. The most common symptoms of the diseases include
high fever with severe headache during the initial stage. As the time processed the person
diagnosed with the disease are found with physical weakness as well as severe muscle pain. In
some acute cases, fatigue is also observed in a sudden as well as rapid speed (Fasina et al. 2014).
The advance stage of the disease often witnesses bleeding and sometimes bruising as well
as abdominal pain leading to diarrhea and vomiting. Within an average time period of 8 to 10

7Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
days after being infected with the virus, the symptoms of the disease may appear (Goeijenbier et
al.2014). There are certain clinical laboratory tests which can detect whether the person is
carrying the virus or not. Some of the most useful clinical laboratory tests include antigen test,
serologic tests and molecular tests in order to detect the specific antibodies that are originated
against the virus in human bodies, to detect the RNA sequences and the proteins that are viral. In
most of the cases it has been seen that most of the people neglect the symptoms considering as
them as mere symptoms of viral fever (Goeijenbier et al.2014). In this regard, it must be
mentioned that the symptoms of the Ebola disease is no distinctive from the other diseases but
finally results into multi organ failure and death of the patients. In regard to the location of the
disease, it has been observed that forest areas and its surrounding areas are seen with most of the
infected patients. Along with that the dry season has been observed to be triggering the disease
among the people of forest regions.
Measures taken to control Ebola Virus disease
In order to control and prevent the deadly disease, world health Organization has taken
several measures keeping the Sustainable Development Goals and the Millennium Goals in mind
so that the by 2020, the well being of the global health can be achieved. As per the directives of
World health Organization certain measures were prescribed in order to control such an epidemic
from further spreading (Faye et al. 2015). The one of the most important suggestive measure
includes safe and secure maintenance of sexual relation as the disease spreads through the sexual
contact more. Along with that, the WHO directive also states that the as the bodily fluid acts as
the medium of transmitting the virus, the surgical instruments need to be destroyed immediately
after it’s is used for the Ebola virus affected patients (Fasina et al. 2014).

8Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
It must be noted that the as an initial measure several governments put an embargo on the
African immigrants in order to prevent the deadly epidemic from spreading into other counties.
Individual measures in terms of hand hygiene will the best way of preventive measures against
the Ebola virus disease (Faye et al. 2015). Apart from these measures, several awareness
programs are being conducted in order to assure that no single patients are left untreated. People
are in the African countries are repeatedly being awakened to avoid being in contact with the
body fluids and blood of the virus affected patients. It must be noted that there is still no
particular vaccine against the disease, however VSV-ZEBOV is an experimental vaccine was
considered to be effective as per the trial conducted by World Health Organization (Fasina et al.
2014). The embargo that was put on during the initial stage has been releases however every
immigrants from the African countries, are thoroughly scrutinized in order to secure that the
disease is not spread further in other countries.
Conclusion
The conclusion can be drawn with the present statistics which states that the despite of
several controlling measures, the outbreak of the diseases is still occurring causing massive death
occurrences. Therefore the purpose of the report is to exclusively throw the light on the health
issue which is of global importance. In order to proceed with the discussion, Ebola disease has
been chosen. The outbreak of the disease created a massive havoc all over the globe as the
disease was of infectious nature. Ebola virus disease was out broken first African countries
causing death of many people in the African regions. The disease turned into an epidemic as the
in the initial stage, the disease could not be identified. Therefore shedding the light exclusively
on the diseases and its effect on the health sector across the world in relation with the Sustainable

9Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
Development Goals and the Millennium Development Goals the study discusses the key
indicating factors in order to identify the disease as well as significant achievements in regard to
control the disease from further spreading drawing the connections with Millennium
Development Goals and the Sustainable development Goals.

10Ebola virus disease and MDG and SDG
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