Ebola 'kills over 5,000 gorillas'

BBC News has another article on the effect of the Ebola virus on the Western Lowland Gorillas of DR Congo.

More than 5,000 gorillas may have died in recent outbreaks of the Ebola virus in central Africa, a study says.

Scientists warn that, coupled with the commercial hunting of gorillas, it may be enough to push them to extinction.

The article concludes with an interesting fact about one transmission source of the Ebola virus.

The researchers concluded that the apes were not only infected by other species, such as fruit bats, but were also transmitting the virus among themselves.

Ebola was passing from group to group of the endangered animals, they found, and appeared to be spreading faster than in humans.

Outbreaks of the disease in humans have sometimes been traced to the bushmeat trade.