Marburg Hemorrhagic Fever

While Ebola is horrifying, the good news is that, until recently, outbreaks have been limited to remote villages in Africa. And it’s the only disease of its kind, right? Wrong. Marburg hemorrhagic fever, first discovered in 1967 after an outbreak in several labs in Germany and Yugoslavia, is a disease with nearly identical symptoms and outcome to the Ebola virus.

Thought to be caused by the African fruit bat, this disease is almost always found in Central Africa (with the original outbreak being the result of the disease being spread by monkeys that had been imported for polio research). This disease may initially mimic the symptoms of malaria, and will later cause bleeding in the mouth and rectum, as well as neurological problems. Like Ebola, there is no cure, and even more rare, with less than 1,000 cases reported to date. Mortality rates for this disease range from 23 percent to 90 percent.

Cancrum Oris

Cancrum oris, known more commonly as nona, is a gangrenous infection that attacks the facial tissues of those unlucky enough to contract it -- mostly young children under the age of six. This disease is especially prevalent in the most impoverished areas of Africa and has an extremely high mortality rate (about 80 percent). Those who are lucky enough to survive are left terribly disfigured.

This condition is far more common than Ebola or Marburg, affecting nearly 100,000 children every year. The antibodies in a victim turn on the soft tissues in the cheek, mouth and nose, progressing quickly to leave the sufferers disabled and unable to speak or eat normally.

In the 100 years since its eradication, it has made brief appearances in Europe and North America -- most notably in Nazi concentration camps. For those in the developed world, the good news is that this condition can be stopped with antibiotics at the first sign of a lesion. The bad news is, for those children who are most likely to contract the illness, those antibiotics are either unavailable or too expensive.