Photo: Umaru Fofana/Reuters/Corbis
It looks like researchers have identified the first patient in this year’s devastating Ebola outbreak: A 2-year-old boy who happened to live in such a place that his death created the perfect storm for infections. Because the boy and his family members, who also died of the disease, lived on Guinea’s border with both Sierra Leone and Liberia, mourners at the funerals took the disease back to their respective hometowns. By the time the outbreak was recognized, it had already spread across the region.
