This piece gives us a very good picture of this thing called Ebola! This graduate nurse does go into some detail of the specifics of Ebola, discussing its operatives both outside the body and inside the body. It is a fairly graphic read, but this does cover it as more than an overview quite well. I believe we do need to be informed about this deadly disease, that started in other places in the world and is now in the U.S.
The Nurse speaks:
"So a few months ago the country was enthralled with the idea of a few patients, infected with the Ebola virus, coming to the United States. Up until this point, we had been safe from Ebola due to the fact that bats can't fly over the Atlantic. Some people were completely indifferent, while others had seen Outbreak one too many times. Most were a healthy mix, somewhere in between, but what bothered me the most was both the lack of education and the poor information that was spreading more virulently than the virus could ever hope to.
First, I want to stress that I am a nurse, not a virologist, and hopefully throughout my post you will see that I am not pretending to be one. I have a Bachelor's in Nursing and am currently a graduate student. I have worked extensively with Infectious Disease Specialists. I have been exposed to almost every infectious disease known to the modern world. I have taken courses in Biology, Microbiology, Anatomy, Physiology, Pathophysiology, Advanced Pathophysiology, Pharmacology, and an assortment of others. However, I am not and will not pretend to be an expert, just an experienced professional. When it comes to an epidemic of any sort, my first focus is on the patient, protecting and healing them, my second focus is on protecting the community. I don't care about which strain does what, or what we can do with in lab. As a nurse, I concern myself with the current patient and future possible patients. I feel the first thing we should examine is Ebola itself. It is foreign to the US, both literally and figuratively. What it does to people and how it harmonizes with nature are both things that most westerners have little concept of. It is a virus, not a bacteria. This means that it is not its own organism. It is actually much smaller and basic than you can imagine. It is nothing more than a few pieces of DNA and some proteins."
More: http://dtolar.wordpress.com/2014/10/01/ebola-a-nurses-perspective/