West Africa already had some of the poorest nations in the world.  Now, experts are saying the Ebola outbreak is driving so much business and commerce away from the region it endangers some of the nations.

African Development Bank head Donald Kaberuka said that the economic growth of most of the infected countries has already been slashed 4% and could increase the longer the outbreak is uncontained.

“Revenues are down, foreign exchange levels are down, markets are not functioning, airlines are not coming in, projects are being canceled, business people have left – that is very, very damaging,” Kaberuka told Reuters.

Kaberuka said that most of the countries involved have total GDP each year of around $6 billion U.S. dollars, so they’ve already been impacted around $240 million U.S.

Sierra Leone and Liberia have fragile economies after years of civil war.