Ebola outbreak ‘could get far worse without sufficient aid’

A substantial increase in aid will be necessary to prevent the current Ebola outbreak from becoming far worse than it already is, according to a study.

Yale University researchers have developed a mathematical transmission model of the viral disease and applied it to Liberia's most populous county, Montserrado, to assess how fast the condition may continue to spread.

It projected as many as 170,996 total reported and unreported cases of the disease, representing 12 percent of the overall population, and 90,122 deaths in Montserrado alone by December 15th at the current rate.

However, many of these could be prevented by increasing contributions of Ebola treatment centre beds, prompting a fivefold increase in the speed with which cases are detected, and allocating protective kits to households of patients awaiting treatment centre admission.

Alison Galvani, professor of epidemiology at Yale University's school of public health and the paper's senior author, said: "Our predictions highlight the rapidly closing window of opportunity for controlling the outbreak and averting a catastrophic toll of new Ebola cases and deaths in the coming months."

The current Ebola outbreak is already the worst in recorded history and continues to spread across west Africa and gradually other parts of the world.