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The deadly Ebola virus ravaging West Africa will likely reach the United States, but the risk of a widespread outbreak is almost nonexistent, experts say.

Superior infectious disease control measures coupled with advanced healthcare resources makes it extremely unlikely Ebola would spread from patient-to-healthcare provider or person-to-person in the United States.

“Ebola hemorrhagic fever is not easy to catch,” said Pennsylvania’s Physician General Carrie DeLone, M.D., one of five experts who discussed the threat posed by the disease during a Monday morning conference call.

Hosted by the Pennsylvania Medical Society, the conference call came just days after the head of the World Health Organization declared the virus outstripped efforts to control it.

“There is public anxiety in the U.S. about Ebola infection because it is so deadly, with a historic mortality rate from 60 to 90 percent, and no anti-viral medication or vaccination against the disease,” DeLone said. “However, the risk of Ebola coming to Pennsylvania or the United States and causing a significant outbreak is extremely low.”

Unlike the flu, Ebola cannot spread through the air. Instead, it’s transmitted from touching an infected person’s bodily fluids or exposure to contaminated objects, making it very unlikely that American travelers to West Africa could contract the disease.

If an Ebola patient were to be identified in America, health systems would quickly isolate and treat the person, along with anyone who may have come into contact with them, said Kristen Sandel, M.D., an emergency medicine physician in Reading.

Negative-pressure rooms in hospitals isolate air, keeping it in the room as opposed to circulating through the building.

Amid the outbreak the state Department of Health on Friday issued a guideline to healthcare providers, alerting them to safety protocols, such as fluid-resistant gowns and goggles, and common symptoms of the disease: fever, muscle aches, diarrhea and vomiting.

Because Ebola has never been detected in the United States, the guideline also advises healthcare providers to ask patients suffering from the symptoms if they have traveled to the affected countries: Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone or Nigeria.

“We might use things like IV fluid, oxygen, (and) we obviously will be taking blood tests,” Sandel said. “That patient would be kept in isolation and (providers would use) that personal protective equipment until we have confirmation that the patient either does or does not have that specific disease.”

Africa’s limited medical resources leaves healthcare workers without an adequate supply of disposable gowns, gloves and masks, and often means they reuse syringes, doctors said.

“The hospitals (in Africa) frequently multiply the infections ... and that is much less likely to occur here because of the awareness,” said John Goldman, M.D., an infectious disease expert in Harrisburg.

Despite health screening at airports, he said it’s likely the disease will reach the United States. Ebola’s incubation period is between two and 21 days, so infected people may appear healthy when they leave Africa but still have the disease.

Still, Goldman said, the nation’s heightened awareness and public health infrastructure makes a widespread Ebola outbreak very unlikely.

“There have been just shy of 10 patients treated here for hemorrhagic fever viruses, which spread in a similar way to Ebola, and not one has given it to a healthcare worker or spread it to another person.”, @miorfinoTT