A statement in the USAMRID's Medical Management of Biological Casualties Handbook has been a cause for alarm as it has prompted the concern of a possible Ebola virus airborne threat. The handbook was published in 2011, and the page in question is page 117.

In the chapter of the handbook, "Viral Hemorrhagic Fever," a category of viruses that includes Ebola is discussed.

The handbook says that, in several instances, secondary infections among contacts and medical personnel without direct body fluid exposure have been documented.

In West Africa, the current strain of Ebola can be transmitted through coughing or sneezing in some circumstances, admitted by World Health Organization, according to WND.

"Theoretically, wet and bigger droplets from a heavily infected individual, who has respiratory symptoms caused by other conditions or who vomits violently, could transmit the virus - over a short distance - to another nearby person."

The virus undergoes a process nicknamed "genetic roulette," in which it gets a chance to mutate and develop new capabilities, according to Dr. Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.

Ebola, which is an RNA virus, copies itself and makes one or two mutations. Some of the mutations might be able to change the way the virus behaves inside the human body, CNN reported.

According to Dr. James Le Duc, the director of the Galveston National Laboratory at the University of Texas, no one really knows what the virus has become, since no one is keeping track of the mutations happening across West Africa.

One group of researchers at Harvard found more than 300 genetic changes in Ebola over a short period of time in just one area of Sierra Leone.

Dr. Pardis Sabeti, an associate professor at Harvard and senior associate member of the Broad Institute, finds it frightening to look at how much this virus has mutated within just three weeks, CNN reported.