Study finds 18 percent chance Ebola will arrive in the U.S. this month

Study finds 18 percent chance Ebola will arrive in the U.S. this month

The outbreak of Ebola in West Africa has public health officials very alarmed. It is the world's largest and deadliest outbreak yet, and has infected about 3,600 people and killed at least 1,841 in three countries, according to the World Health Organization's tally. But there's a good chance the virus will spread outside of Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia.

How good a chance? A study this week puts the odds that Ebola will arrive in the U.S. in late September as high as 18 percent. The study, published in PLOS Currents: Outbreaks, analyzed patterns of daily flights from the infected countries, keeping in mind how hard it will be to keep an infected person from boarding commercial airliners:

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Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.