Ebola virus (file)
Ebola virus (file)Thinkstock

A Nigerian tourist in her twenties was hospitalized in isolation at Shaarei Zedek Hospital in Jerusalem Friday, after rising concerns that she may have tested positive for Ebola, according to Walla! News.

The tourist complained of high fever before being rushed to hospital, the news site said, and tests were conducted on her to diagnose the condition - the results of which are expected Saturday night.

The medical staff at the hospital has been placed under special protection and gave notice of the situation, as required by the Ministry of Health, saying that it is estimated that the chances the tourist is actually suffering from Ebola are low.

The tourist was working in the health system in Nigeria, which is not included in the list of countries at risk for the epidemic by the Israeli Health Ministry. She also did not visit a hospital in Nigeria in the month before becoming ill, which is considered one of the risk criteria.

Ebola is a worldwide epidemic. 1,900 people have died since the epidemic began in March - including nearly 400 in the last week alone. 3500 were infected with Ebola in Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia and other countries. The mortality rate from the disease is 51%.

The disease causes a severe hemorrhagic fever, inducing vomiting, diarrhea, as well as internal and external bleeding. 

"Ebola virus is one of the deadliest killers known," reported Ben Neuman, a virologist at the British University of Reading. "If this virus spread between people more easily, it would probably be more deadly than the black plague. Fortunately, up to this point, it has not."

There has not been much scientific incentive in developing a cure, largely because of the financial loss the expensive research process for a disease largely limited to impoverished rural areas of Africa would cause.

However, a recent experimental vaccine has been under intensive development, according to CNN, and wide-scale studies are being conducted on Ebola patients in West Africa to help expedite a cure. 

The vaccine, developed by the pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, is being given to three healthy human volunteers first to asses the risk and then will be administered in wider clinical trials if successful. 

(Arutz Sheva’s North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Arutz Sheva articles, however, is Israeli time.)