Thai hospital says it has Ebola cure, could be mass produced within a year
A possible breakthrough that doesn't seem to have been covered by the MSM...
In a press conference on Thursday (Oct 2), the hospital announced that it has produced antibodies against Ebola that are small enough to enter infected cells, and also access the virus proteins within the cell.
Dr Wanpen Chaicumpa, head of the Ebola research team at Siriraj Hosptial, said: "Conventional antibody that works against virus was to prevent the entry of virus into cells. But our antibody, because it is small and cell penetrable, it can follow the virus that already enters the cell, like in an infected patient. And it can block ... the virus replication process."
The research will also result in a cure that is more efficient and effective than other potential cures, say the doctors. There is currently no vaccine or cure for Ebola, but an experimental drug, ZMapp, is currently undergoing testing.
Saying that the discovery is a breakthrough from a research standpoint, the doctors say their prototype antibodies were developed using human genes. The samples used are viruses similar to the five Ebola strands and no live Ebola viruses were used, they added.
More: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asiapacific/thai-hospital-says-it-has/1393414.html
Update...
Thai research scientists at Mahidol University's Siriraj Hospital, Thursday said they developed the world's first antibody treatment for Ebola, despite not having access to the virus.
Wanpen Chaicumpa, head of the Ebola research team at the Hospital, says they created a new kind of antibody using human genes that is so small that it can enter the Ebola virus and disrupt its ability to replicate.
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The WHO has said a vaccine may be available in significant quantities by the year's end to help control the Ebola outbreak. At present there is no licensed treatment or vaccine for Ebola. Scientists are said to have been testing two vaccines.
More: http://www.voanews.com/content/thai-researchers-claim-breakthrough-in-ebola-treatment/2471222.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
Some info from Up-To-Date (physician's resource)
Treatment — Supportive care is the mainstay of treatment for patients with symptomatic Ebola or Marburg hemmorhagic fever [30,31]. Because the manifestations of filoviral disease are caused principally by host responses to infection, supportive care should focus on maintaining circulatory function and blood pressure, correction of severe coagulopathy, and other measures to keep the patient alive while the immune system mobilizes the antigen-specific immune responses needed to eliminate the pathogen [30,32-34].
There are no approved therapies for patients who have developed Ebola or Marburg virus disease [35-37]. However, a "cocktail" of three monoclonal antibodies directed against the Ebola viral glycoprotein ("ZMapp"
prevented the death of Ebola-infected macaques, even when initiated after the animals had developed fever, viremia, and abnormalities in white blood cell counts and blood chemistry [38]. These findings represent a significant advance, particularly in its efficacy in protecting animals with established Ebola virus disease [39,40].
In the 2014 West African outbreak, ZMapp was administered to two United States healthcare workers, both of whom survived and recovered [41,42]. Two other severely ill healthcare workers given ZMapp did not survive, possibly due to the late initiation of therapy [43]. Because such anecdotal reports do not provide evidence for or against treatment efficacy, controlled studies are needed.
Postexposure prophylaxis — At this time, there are no approved forms of postexposure prophylaxis for Ebola or Marburg virus disease. In the event of an exposure, filovirus experts should be contacted for advice about the status of experimental therapies. In the United States, such consultation can be obtained by contacting the Special Pathogens Branch at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Several options for postexposure prophylaxis are in development [28,35,42,46]. Although none has been tested in humans, some appear promising in nonhuman primates.
Such strategies include:
●A live virus vaccine has been developed using recombinant vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV) encoding the Marburg or Ebola surface glycoproteins [42,47-50]. In one study, it demonstrated protective efficacy when administered to nonhuman primates 24 or 48 hours after challenge with Marburg virus, and prevented death in 50 percent of animals infected with Ebola Zaire virus when given 30 minutes after challenge [51].
●Small interfering RNAs and phosphorodiamidate morpholino oligomers have been found to decrease the occurrence of disease when administered to nonhuman primates following filovirus challenge. When small interfering RNA molecules targeting three different viral genes were delivered to macaques 30 to 60 minutes after virus challenge, 60 to 100 percent of animals survived infection, whereas all controls died [52]. In a related approach, antisense oligonucleotides also resulted in the survival of most animals [53].
●The synthetic small molecule drug BCX4430 inhibits viral RNA polymerase function, acting as a non-obligate RNA chain terminator [54]. BCX4430 protected macaques against disease when treatment was begun as late as 48 hours after infection.
●Polyvalent or monoclonal antibodies against Ebola virus have also been protective, both in rodent models and in nonhuman primates [55-58]. More recently, preparations containing several monoclonal antibodies were protective in macaques when administered two or more days after the initial infection, even when the animals had become viremic and developed a fever [40].
●Interferon-alpha was protective in mice when therapy was started before or soon after virus challenge, but treatment of nonhuman primates with a licensed product, human interferon-alpha-2b, only slightly delayed the onset of illness and death [55,59]. Interferon treatment, delivered by means of an adenovirus vector, has also been given to macaques in combination with monoclonal antibodies [39].
