Survivors of the deadly disease EBOLA may encounter serious pain and likely blindness

Firstclass newsline gathered that thousands of West Africans who got
the Ebola virus but survived it are experiencing deadly chronic
conditions such as serious joint pain and eye inflammation that can
lead to blindness, global health experts have said.
Survivors of EBOLA virus who fought off the most severe bouts of
infection are the most likely to suffer ongoing medical problems,
World Health Organization experts said, and their health is becoming
"an emergency within an emergency."
Its gathered that the world has never seen such a large number of
survivors from an Ebola outbreak," said Anders Nordstrom, a WHO
representative in Sierra Leone who took part in a five-day conference
this week about Ebola survivors.
"We have 13,000 survivors in the three countries (Guinea, Liberia and
Sierra Leone). This is new – both from a medical and from a societal
point of view," Reuters quoted Nordstrom as saying to reporters on a
telebriefing.
Daniel Bausch of the WHO's clinical care team on Ebola survivors said
about half of all those who fought off the virus now report joint
pain, with some suffering such severe effects that they can't work.
Eye problems including inflammation, impaired vision and – in severe
but rare cases – blindness, have been reported by about 25 percent of
survivors, Bausch said.
Little measurable but equally serious long-term problems, such as
increasing rates of depression, post traumatic stress disorder and
social exclusion, are also affecting survivors.
After the West Africa's devastating Ebola epidemic was by far the
largest ever seen – infecting more than 27,000 people and killing
almost 11,300 of them – scientists are not able to say whether
survivors' chronic health problems are unusual.
Firstclassnewsline.net