Economic burden of the Ebola epidemic larger than previously estimated

A very timely paper by my PRECISIONheor colleague Caroline Huber on the economic burden of Ebola in West Africa in 2014:

Current estimates of the economic burden of the [2014 West Africa Ebola virus disease (EVD)] outbreak range from $2.8 to $32.6 billion in lost gross domestic product. We estimated the comprehensive economic and social burden from the 2014 EVD outbreak to be $53.19 billion (2014 USD). The most significant component, $18.8 billion, was deaths from non-Ebola causes.

A key point here is not only did Ebola have direct health consequences for patients infected with Ebola, but patients with other