1. Welcome Ebola! Chicken pox seems history and common cold and influenza intrigued man for decades. It’s time now for new viral diseases like avian flu, SARS, MERS, West Nile virus, AIDS and … Ebola.

2. What’s Ebola? A hemorrhagic fever caused by one of five different Ebola viruses. It infects wild animals like monkeys, gorillas, and chimpanzees, as well as people. First detected in Congo (1976) on the Ebola River (hence named).

3. Why’s this frightening? The 2014 outbreak is largest ever in history claiming hundreds of lives. Up to 90% of Ebola viral infections proved fatal. As of Aug. 28, 1,552 people have died out of 3,069 cases in the current outbreak.

5. Can you believe it? Forty percent of ‘super power’ Americans fear a US Ebola outbreak, according to a recent poll. Incredible!

4. The countries most affected. Guinea (648 cases, 430 deaths), Liberia (1378 cases, 694 deaths), Nigeria (17 cases, 6 deaths), Sierra Leone (1026 cases, 422 death) — all in West Africa.

6. Nigeria too has it. Think of it, which virus is more deadly — Ebola or Boko Haram?

7. Virus power. Call NATO to destroy it, if it can. These parasitic particles, too small to be seen with an ordinary microscope, have the power to destroy the world of plants, animals and humans. … And we thought we had conquered Nature long back!

8. And, it has its own world. Millions of different viruses are believed to exist; some 5,000 have been described in detail since the first was identified in 1892 as an infecting agent against tobacco plants.

9. Why Ebolas happen? We make efforts to increase life expectancy, but God has His own design to maintain a balance, maybe. In modern parlance however it’s a continued battle between man and nature.

10. Where are we headed? Ebola is just the tip of the iceberg. Many such diseases come in cycles. With globalization and global warming, the trend is only going to get worse, a scholar commented.

10 things a layman must know about Ebola

1. Highly infectious, any contact with an infected person can prove infectious, especially with blood or body fluids.

2. Contact with an infected animal’s blood or body fluids could be one reason of its birth. Fruit bats are most suspected to be the host.

3. It needs proper burial of the Ebola victims, as their bodies become even more contagious after death.

4. Symptoms: Fever, headache, joint and muscle aches, weakness, diarrhea, vomiting, stomach pain, lack of appetite.

5. Some may experience a rash, red eyes, cough, sore throat, chest pain, breathing difficulty, bleeding inside and outside of the body.

6. Bleeding is common in the later stages of Ebola.

7. Ebola has its variants. Those affected by Ebola HF can recover, while others do not. The reasons are not yet known.

8. Any plan to travel to Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone or Nigeria? Postpone it.

9. No vaccine so far to prevent Ebola.

10. Typically, symptoms appear 8-10 days after exposure to the virus, but the incubation period can span two to 21 days.