--- title: Ebola In New York: How Do You Get It description: What's the risk of catching Ebola? canonical: https://time.com/3535728/ebola-subway-bowling-balls-explainer/ author: Alexandra Sifferlin article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-10-24T03:26:52.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-21T10:59:25.678Z article:section: Health og:title: Can You Get Ebola From Touching Infected Surfaces og:description: Some sobering information og:url: https://time.com/3535728/ebola-subway-bowling-balls-explainer/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte0b8239df014fad6/698762a08e06011324457e63/subway-polls.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2560 og:image:height: 1440 og:image:alt: New York City Subway System og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Can You Get Ebola From Touching Infected Surfaces twitter:description: Some sobering information twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte0b8239df014fad6/698762a08e06011324457e63/subway-polls.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Can You Get Ebola From Subway Poles and Bowling Balls? > Sponsored content. 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Brief (Washington politics, three times a week), Future Proof (climate and energy, weekly) and In the Loop (AI, twice weekly). All are free at time.com/newsletters and together reach more than 1.1 million engaged readers. #### Which TIME newsletter should I subscribe to? It depends on what you follow. For a daily briefing, The Brief. For health, Health Matters. For Washington politics, D.C. Brief. For AI and technology, In the Loop. For climate and energy as a business story, Future Proof. For culture recommendations, Worth Your Time. For how TIME's journalism gets made, Inside TIME. Readers can select any combination at time.com/newsletters. #### Are TIME's newsletters free? Yes. All seven TIME newsletters are free to join at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes TIME's newsletters? TIME journalists write them. Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin Oct 24, 2014 3:26 AM UTC  New York City Subway System New York City Subway SystemGetty Images by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin Oct 24, 2014 3:26 AM UTC Concerns were raised Thursday that the New York City doctor Craig Spencer, MD, who has been diagnosed with Ebola, had been to a Brooklyn bowling alley, had ridden the subway, and been inside an Uber taxi. So, can you get Ebola from bowling balls or subway poles, or Uber doorhandles for that matter? The short—and accurate—answer is no, and that’s based on what scientists know after decades of studying Ebola. Spencer was not symptomatic at the time, according to reports, which means he was not contagious at the time. But, you may ask again, shouldn’t people who rode on the same train, in the same taxi or who touched the same bowling balls as Spencer, worry a little? The research that exists says, again, no. The virus only survives inside bodily fluid of an infected person—meaning their blood, sweat, vomit or feces—that then comes into contact with an open sore or the mucus membranes of another person. Data suggests the virus can, in theory, survive on surfaces if it’s inside a liquid. But the only confirmed case of a person getting Ebola from an object or material that can carry infection was during an Ebola outbreak more than a decade ago in Gulu, Uganda, when a patient got the disease by sleeping with a blanket that had been used by an Ebola patient. Based on what we know about transmission of the virus, that blanket must have had an infected person’s wet bodily fluids on it. A study from 2007 by researchers at the Tulane School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine sampled 31 objects and surfaces that were not visibly bloody—they looked at bed frames, stethoscopes, etc—inside an isolation ward that treated Ebola patients. All specimens tested negative for the virus, suggesting the risk of transmission from surfaces was extremely low. _Read next:_ [_How Ready Is New York City for Ebola?_](http://time.com/3535680/how-ready-is-new-york-city-for-ebola/?xid=time%5Freadnext) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3535728/ebola-subway-bowling-balls-explainer/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3535728/ebola-subway-bowling-balls-explainer/"},"headline":"Can You Get Ebola From Subway Poles and Bowling Balls?","datePublished":"2014-10-24T03:26:52.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-21T10:59:25.678Z","description":"Lots and lots of research says no","url":"https://time.com/3535728/ebola-subway-bowling-balls-explainer/","keywords":["ebola"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte0b8239df014fad6/698762a08e06011324457e63/subway-polls.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Alexandra Sifferlin","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte0b8239df014fad6/698762a08e06011324457e63/subway-polls.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"New York City Subway System","caption":"New York City Subway System","creditText":"Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/ebola/","name":"ebola"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3535728/ebola-subway-bowling-balls-explainer/","name":"Can You Get Ebola From Subway Poles and Bowling Balls?"}}]}] ```