The Ebola outbreak has left the world in a state of panic. First let us get familiar with it. It is a disease of humans and other primates caused by an “Ebola virus”. The origin of this disease were found in The Republic of Congo where it struck first on 26 August 1976. It was named after the River Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo where the first outbreak was identified. Symptoms start two days to three weeks after contracting the virus, with a fever, sore throat, muscle pain and headaches. Typically vomiting, diarrhoea and rash follow along with reduced liver and kidney functions. Ebola is a rare but deadly virus that causes bleeding inside and outside the body. As the virus spreads through the body, it damages the immune system and organs. Ultimately, it causes levels of blood-clotting cells to drop. This leads to severe, uncontrollable bleeding
Ebola has, this time, trashed our heart. Yes, it has! The economic situations are the second worst affected, first being the overall population health. It affected the sub Saharan areas and, as we know, this area constitutes of developing countries where the state of the general population is pitiful and the economic conditions are the worse. Countries such as Liberia, South Leone, Nigeria and Guinea are the most affected. The people staying there and the tourists are stranded because of the Ebola epidemic. The next paragraph talks about the different economic effects of Ebola virus.
Tourism is the worst affected of all. A large part of the GDP in these countries comes from the tourism sector. Fewer tourists are visiting the Ebola affected countries. The government of other countries are also checking on every single person who has been to the affected areas. The Indian health ministry has detained 6 people at the Delhi airport as the Ebola vigil continues. This is the extent to which the government is going to, to stop this breakout. British Airways, Emirates and two African airlines have already halted flights to some affected countries. The profits of these companies are going down.
Businesses have slowed down and the companies are pulling out their workers as they are at the risk of catching the virus. One such example is the downscaling of a Chinese company which began shipping out iron ore from Liberia this year. They have threatened to shut it up temporarily if the outbreak is not contained. Government has restricted the movement of goods and people have halted commerce in those areas. The World Bank has hence revised down its economy growth estimates for Guinea by one percent this year. This is the case in all these countries affected with Ebola virus. The growth rate of these countries will be adversely affected.
Governments and aid groups are spending a lot of money catering to the needs of the affected people. The economic situation is going to be affected due to this breakout. The cost of these medical bills might be more than the government could handle. The government has to employ more doctors and nurses to stop this epidemic.
This is only the short run scenario that I am talking about. The long run effects are yet to come. This will hamper the economy of the affected countries and will leave a negative impact on these countries. They will have to repair their economy and try to make it function better. The governments would have to step in to see to it that new companies start their operations. They would have to make sure that the countries commerce flourish and become healthy. The people who die of Ebola are needed to be buried underground so deep that there is no risk of the virus being able to come into contact with another creature. Similarly, ebola has to be buried so deep so that it can never again cause the havoc and chaos that it created.
