Posted on 10/04/2014 10:28:18 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
With no proven drugs to treat Ebola and experimental ones in short supply, the health authorities are planning to turn instead to a treatment that is walking around in the outbreak zone in West Africa.
That would be the blood of people who have been sickened by the Ebola virus but have since recovered. Their blood should contain antibodies that might help other patients fight off the infection.
The World Health Organization is making it a priority to try such convalescent blood or plasma, as it is called, and is talking with the affected countries about how to do it.
This week, the organization issued guidance on how to collect the blood and administer transfusions.
“The concept that this treatment could be efficacious is biologically plausible, as convalescent plasma has been used successfully for the treatment of a variety of infectious agents,” the W.H.O. guidance document says.
Plausibility, however, is not proof that such treatments would work for Ebola and some virologists doubt it will. The results of studies in monkeys were discouraging, they note.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
And Glowbull warming is real...too...
Oh. . .great. . .Africa drawing blood. . .you know what WILL happen. . .re-using dirty needles and the AIDs infection rate will sky-rocket.
sheesh, talk about grasping at straws.
People sickened by the disease recover.
And the antibodies in their blood provide natural immunity.
We have to take advantage of the survivors to save lives.
http://news.yahoo.com/first-french-ebola-patient-leaves-hospital-144706059—finance.html
“A volunteer nurse who was the first French national to contract Ebola has left hospital after being successfully treated for the disease, France’s health ministry said on Saturday.”
” The French health ministry has authorised the use of four experimental drugs for treating Ebola: Favipiravir, TKM-100-802, ZMapp and ZMabs.
Japan’s Fujifilm Holdings Corp. said in a statement last month that its Avigan treatment, which contains Favipiravir, had been administered to the French Ebola patient.”
OMG! I take a shower every morning, I wonder if that guy in the picture has ever had even ONE shower.
An unknown, nameless virus was killing 100% of the calves on one farm in Oregon. Then Mt. St/. Helen’s went off. My friends went out that morning to find their farm covered by 4 inches of ash. There was one little mound they did not recognize. It was a newly born calf, only the blinking eyes gave away its identity. That was the first calf that survived. From that day on all calves survived.
Why is it ‘grasping at straws’? It’s the first thing that comes to mind when you don’t have a targeted antiviral. Speaking of antivirals, the HIV drug lamivudine, with which one doctor has claimed success, should be administered post haste to confirm his work.
Thanks for the story. We had the ash also but I hadn’t heard about the anti-viral property. Doesn’t surprise me, though.
I think he’s just ashy.
Once again the WHO director steps in it.
Wonder if she bothers to read the statistics, the part that undercounts the infected and avoids any mention of ebola survivors. She’s looking for a miracle more spectacular than the loaves of bread and fish. Seems to me one would need survivors several orders of magnitude greater then now exist to help infected. Ain’t gonna happen as a form of general treatment. However, for a select few.....
Oh I see. The first picture is him in his scrubs in his operating room. Got it!
My Jewish mother wanted me to be a witch doctor, we had huge arguments over it.
My position, and what I told her was, first mom, we aren’t Jewish, and second, a witch doctor isn’t what you think it is, he gets paid with goats and chickens, not dollars.
Sorta like Zombie Apocalypse
I think what you are calling grasping at straws, is people trying desperately to find ways to keep people healthy, for as long as possible. Until there is something better, wouldn’t you rather we try something than nothing?
There must be some people who have an immunity to the virus, those who I would be looking for.
I say this not knowing if it is possible for anyone to have a natural immunity, just a thought.
It seems logical that survivors' blood would contain antibodies that would work on another patient, but how did these antibodies get there in the first place? The survivor's body made them, of course.
Now the big question: will the new patient's body also create these antibodies, just because some were injected into him? If not, the patient will need constant transfusions of fresh, antibody-laden blood for treatment to be successful.
How many donors do we have, to treat how many victims?
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