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Updated: Jan 28, 2026

Modeling The Lifecycle Of Ebola Virus Under Biosafety Level 2 Conditions With Virus-like Particles Containing Tetracistronic Minigenomes
Published on: September 27, 2014
HIV prevalence in suspected Ebola cases during the 2014-2016 Ebola epidemic in Sierra Leone
William J Liu1,2, Hai-Yang Hu3,4, Qiu-Dong Su5,4
1NHC Key Laboratory of Biosafety, National Institute for Viral Disease Control and Prevention, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention(China CDC), Beijing, 102206, China. liujun@ivdc.chinacdc.cn.
Background:
The 2014-2016 Ebola virus epidemic in West Africa was the largest outbreak of Ebola virus disease (EVD) in history. Clarifying the influence of other prevalent diseases such as human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immune deficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) will help improve treatment and supportive care of patients with EVD.
Case Presentation:
We examined HIV and hepatitis C virus (HCV) antibody prevalence among suspected EVD cases from the Sierra Leone-China Friendship Biological Safety Laboratory during the epidemic in Sierra Leone. HIV and HCV antibodies were tested in 678 EVD-negative samples by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. A high HIV prevalence (17.6%) and low HCV prevalence (0.22%) were observed among the suspected cases. Notably, we found decreased HIV positive rates among the suspected cases over the course of the epidemic. This suggests a potentially beneficial effect of an improved public health system after assistance from the World Health Organization and other international aid organizations.
Conclusions:
This EVD epidemic had a considerable impact on the public health system and influenced the prevalence of HIV found among suspected cases in Sierra Leone, but also provided an opportunity to establish a better surveillance network for infectious diseases.
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