Emerging Infectious Disease ISSN: 1080-6059

Ecologic and Geographic Distribution of Filovirus Disease

A. Townsend Peterson*

, John T. Bauer*, and James N. Mills†

Author affiliations: *University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas, USA; †Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Georgia, USA

Main Article

Figure 2

Geographic projection of ecologic niche models in which two Ebola virus species were modeled and used to predict the distributional area of the third. (A) Ebola Zaire and Ebola Sudan predicting (Ebola Ivory Coast omitted; note that distributional area is predicted in Ivory Coast). (B) Ebola Sudan and Ebola Ivory Coast predicting (Ebola Zaire omitted). (C) Ebola Zaire and Ebola Ivory Coast predicting (Ebola Sudan omitted). Darker shades of red represent increasing confidence in prediction of pote

Figure 2. Geographic projection of ecologic niche models in which two Ebola virus species were modeled and used to predict the distributional area of the third. (A) Ebola Zaire and Ebola Sudan predicting (Ebola Ivory Coast omitted; note that distributional area is predicted in Ivory Coast). (B) Ebola Sudan and Ebola Ivory Coast predicting (Ebola Zaire omitted). (C) Ebola Zaire and Ebola Ivory Coast predicting (Ebola Sudan omitted). Darker shades of red represent increasing confidence in prediction of potential presence. Open squares, Ebola Ivory Coast; circles, Ebola Zaire; triangles, Ebola Sudan; dotted squares, Marburg hemorrhagic fever occurrences.

Main Article

1Although filovirus taxonomy undergoes frequent revision, we follow nomenclature most recently established by the International Committee of Taxonomy of Viruses in 2002. Filoviruses consist of two genera. The genus Marburgvirus contains one species, Lake Victoria marburgvirus, with several recognized strains, and Ebolavirus contains four species: Ivory Coast ebolavirus, Reston ebolavirus, Sudan ebolavirus, and Zaire ebolavirus. For simplicity, we refer to the viruses using the unitalicized vernacular (e.g., Ebola Zaire). We use “Ebola viruses” to refer in general to members of Ebolavirus and “Marburg viruses” to refer in general to members of Marburgvirus. The diseases caused by filoviruses are termed Ebola hemorrhagic fever (HF; diseases caused by Ebola viruses) and Marburg HF (diseases caused by Marburg viruses).

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