TRACE ELEMENTS IN MEDICINE (MOSCOW)
2015. 16(3): 3-11
TOPICAL PAPERS

ECOLOGY OF EBOLA FEVER IN TERMS OF NATURAL DISEASE MODEL

E.V. Rotshild

A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution, Leninskiy prosp. 33, Moscow, 119071, Russia

DOI: 10.19112/2413-6174-2015-16-2-3-11 

ABSTRACT: Prospects of further study of ecology of Ebola fever are discussed from a position of the environmental concept proposed by the author, whereby the activity of infection in nature is regulated by the conditions of the external and internal environment of warm-blooded animals, particularly by their elemental composition. Data on the behavior of Ebola in tropical nature of Africa are compared with results of studies on the ecology of wildlife diseases in desert and steppe areas of Eurasia. Similarities in the behavior of Ebola and model infections in the two compared continents have been found. In both cases, periodic change of activation and inactivation periods of the diseases has been discovered. There were detected 4 periods of Ebola activity, lasted from 34 to 9 years. Ebola cases coincide with maximums and recessions in solar cycles. Similar dependence is observed in the European part of Russia for tularemia, Q fever, rabies, hantavirus fever. There is a similarity in regard to the role of geological conditions: places of frequent repetition of the plague in rodents and of the Ebola coincide with outcrops of ancient rocks, broken by faults. It is expected that other properties of Ebola meet the general patterns established on model infections. There is a widespread idea that Ebola virus is able to survive in the wild in ordinary pathogenic form in mammalian communities due to continuous circulation among the animals. The most likely condition that ensures the survival of the Ebola virus in nature is claimed cohabitation with microorganisms and protists in the lower layer: soil and litter of tropical rain forests. Activation of the foci is possible due to changes in chemical composition of soil solutions under the influence of tectonic processes. The use of herbicides, insecticides or other biologically active compounds in the plantations of tropical fruits is expected to be the most likely cause of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

KEYWORDS: Ebola virus, ecological concept, natural reservoirs, promoting factors.