EBOLA IS BACK IN THE U.S.

By Alice Park

The folks in Alice, Texas, have good reason to be nervous around monkeys. Six years ago, several Philippine macaques imported by the Texas Primate Center in Alice came down with the strain of Ebola virus that had struck monkeys in Reston, Virginia, a year earlier, in a case that inspired the best-selling book The Hot Zone and the movie Outbreak. No humans got sick in either incident, but 100 animals had to be sacrificed.

Last week it happened again. The problem centered once more on a shipment of macaques sent by the same Philippine supplier. One monkey from the shipment was discovered last month with a raging fever and bloody diarrhea; three days later it was dead. The rest of the pack was quarantined, but the disease had already spread. After a second monkey turned up sick last week, authorities decided to destroy the monkeys housed in the same hut--49 animals in all.

Officials from the Centers for Disease Control were quick to reassure the public that Ebola Reston is a markedly different virus from the one that killed 244 people in Zaire last year. Ebola Zaire, as that strain is known, is one of the world's deadliest viruses; 80% of its victims bleed to death.

Ebola Reston, by contrast, has never been linked to illness in humans. Still, doctors are closely monitoring everybody who had any contact with the monkeys in Texas. Experts warn that they can't rule out the possibility that Ebola Reston could mutate into a strain that is fatal to humans. Says a spokesman for the cdc: "It would be folly to predict what the virus will do."

--By Alice Park