Sep 20, 2014 10:28 PM EDT By J Baulkman, UniversityHerald Reporter

New Ebola cases could reach 6,800 in West Africa by the end of the month, according to a recent study.

Researchers from Arizona State and Harvard universities discovered through modeling analysis that the rate of rise in cases significantly increased last month in Liberia and Guinea, around the time that a mass quarantine was put in place. This finding indicates that the mass quarantine may have made the outbreak worse than it would have been otherwise.

"There may be other reasons for the worsening of the outbreak spread, including the possibility that the virus has become more transmissible, but it's also possible that the quarantine control efforts actually made the outbreak spread more quickly by crowding people together in unsanitary conditions," researcher Sherry  Towers of Arizona State University said in a statement.

For the study, researchers assessed whether or not attempted control efforts are effective in curbing the ongoing West African Ebola outbreak that has spread over a large geographic area, causing thousands of infections and deaths.

They examined the current outbreak data for Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia through statistical research methods up until Sept. 8, 2014, as estimated by the World Health Organization.

The analysis examines the local rates of exponential rise to estimate how the reproduction number of cases appears to be changing over time. Calculations showed a range of 6,800 predicted new cases at the upper end of the spectrum and 4,400 on average.

Because the outbreak has spread to densely populated areas, the risk of international spread is increased, according to researchers. Also compounding the problem is a lack of resources for effective quarantine and isolation in the under-developed countries that have been affected, and the high mobility of the population in a region with porous borders, according to the study.

"No licensed vaccine or specific treatment for the disease is currently available. This leaves improved hygiene, quarantine, isolation and social distancing as the only potential interventions," Carlos Castillo-Chavez, Arizona State University's regent's professor, said. "Improved control measures must be put into place." On Tuesday, President Obama announced that 3,000 US troops and medical personnel would be sent to the region to help control the outbreak, he added.

The study, which was funded by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences at the National Institutes of Health, was published in the journal PLoS Outbreaks.

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