<p>I don’t know if I can ask this but it’s been nagging me. If they ran out the drug to treat Ebola, how’s the cameraman that is being flown back going to be treated? i guess he is out of luck unless some other experimental drugs work.</p>
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<p>The same way the patient in Texas is being treated, as there was no vaccine for him either. The vaccine ran out some three weeks ago. </p>
<p>I do not know the protocol, but there is clearly a treatment regiment that is not dependent on a vaccine being a part of said treatment. </p>
<p>There is no “vaccine” for Ebola. The major treatment for the disease has been (and continues to be) supportive - that is, taking care of the patient (including respirators and dialysis when needed) and letting the body’s immune system take over.</p>
<p>There was a drug that treated the first American doctor who was flown in a couple of months ago. They may call that vaccine. I am assuming the meaning of vaccine in this case is not in the sense of inoculation.</p>
<p>That drug was/is zmapp. It is a monoclonal antibody, not a vaccine.</p>
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<p>Good catch. I was just going off the post and used the wrong word. Time to head to bed. Been up all night. </p>
<p>The tobacco-based serum is MA-based and clears the body of the virus. However, there is some talk that it could be preventative if used in conjunction with a couple other drugs, but should not be confused as a vaccine. That is still super experimental, as well.</p>
<p>I think I misunderstood health authorities too when they said “we are ready for Ebola in the USA.” I thought they meant they were ready in the way a school might be ready for a fire by having fire drills. I guess it was more like we think everyone knows where the exits are and we’re sure if there is a fire everything will go smoothly.</p>
<p>The standard treatment for Ebola is supportive - IVs for fluids, keeping the fever under control, medication to promote clotting and maintain bp, oxygen. One treatment challenge is if the veins collapse so they can’t get a good IV line going.</p>
<p>There are probably other experimental drugs they will try aside from ZMapp.</p>
<p>So they ran out zmapp? Did it help?</p>
<p>The numbers I’ve seen is that they gave ZMapp to seven Ebola patients and 5 survived.</p>
<p>Actually, you are not correct about “lengthy FDA trials” for a disease like that. There are exceptions that coukd be made for pharmaceuticals that cannot undergo a normal efficacy trail - the reasons are simple. 
So pretty much only Phase I (safety) needs to be completed and a somewhat convincing proof that the drug did have effect in an animal model that mimics the human disease (I assume here it would be tested in NHP, which is still much less expensive than human trials). So in a nutshell the costs of dealing with the FDA for an Ebola drug could be significantly lower than for a drug for obesity. Still, the major issue is not the FDA, it is the market - how would you sell it to those poor African nations where the actual market is? </p>
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<p>What?!? HIV came from Africa! </p>
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<p>What?!? Ebola is passed by body fluids. HIV is passed by body fluids. </p>
<p>This makes no sense at all. </p>
<p>Norwegian woman infected with Ebola
** Being flown to Norway tonight
** Worked for Doctors Without Borders in Sierra Leone
<a href=“English version: Norwegian woman infected with Ebola - VG”>http://www.vg.no/nyheter/utenriks/ebola/norwegian-woman-infected-with-ebola/a/23310487/</a></p>
<p>I wonder if they will try an experimental treatment on her</p>
<p>A nurse at Carlos III hospital in Madrid tested positive for Ebola.
If you recall, two Spanish missionaries contracted Ebola and were flown back to Spain for treatment this year. They both died.
The nurse was one of those who cared for the second priest who died, Father Manuel Garcia (he died Sept 25).</p>
<p>By the way, on comparisons to AIDS, one thing I wonder about is how come so many health workers are getting infected by this virus compared to other blood/bodily fluid viruses.</p>
<p>I thought AIDS was transmitted through blood or semen, not sweat or saliva. In that way Ebola is much more infectious. </p>
<p>“By the way, on comparisons to AIDS, one thing I wonder about is how come so many health workers are getting infected by this virus compared to other blood/bodily fluid viruses.”</p>
<p>Well, the largest percentage of people who get AIDS were infected by having sexual relations with an infected person. I don’t think the health care workers have sex with their AIDS patients. </p>
<p><a href=“HIV Transmission and Risks - POZ”>http://www.aidsmeds.com/articles/Transmission_9962.shtml</a></p>
<p>“By the way, on comparisons to AIDS, one thing I wonder about is how come so many health workers are getting infected by this virus compared to other blood/bodily fluid viruses.”</p>
<p>I am not sure that the incidence is higher outside the horrid conditions of African hospitals. It looks higher because is easier to make the connection to the source because the period between infection and symptoms is so short, and the infection is not present in the general population. There are probably many cases where a health worker picked up MRSA, HIV, or something else by carelessness or error (like a sharps prick), but since the pathogen can sit still and not show up as a full blown disease for many months, tracing the initial source is hard. FWIW, the individual could have contracted that outside of work. </p>
<p>@BunsenBurner that was my initial thought also - that it’s because of the conditions there.
But now we have a nurse in Madrid catching it and I think she only attended to one patient, who they knew had Ebola even before he arrived in Spain. I hope they can explain how she caught it - carelessness, accident?</p>
<p>Healthcare workers did come down with HIV, especially in the crisis days of the 80s. Usually from a needle stick, or some other way that a cut came in contact with blood. H went through six months of uncertainty when a faulty vial broke in his hand (generally considered that a negative test after that much time means no infection). He was a medical student and resident in a hospital, and city, devastated by AIDS. We knew others who had similar scares. Sadly, there were reported cases were transmission occurred. </p>
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<p>@Nrdsb4, I’m not sure if this referenced me - I know I posted about “buying a month’s worth of canned food” but I was not at all serious about this. I really need to learn the etiquette of those smiley face things.</p>
<p>Magwife is on the front lines of any outbreak, as an NP at a small family practice that keeps walk-in openings for sick people. She does worry about pandemics, has some plans in place just in case, but we have no fear at all over the current state of the Ebola outbreak and have not changed any of our daily habits.</p>
<p>That said, one of the first questions she asks everyone with suspected infectious symptoms is their travel history. Every single patient. It is diagnostic protocol and not asking would against protocol. So far we have heard it was the nurse’s fault (was she an RN or a tech?), then the software’s fault, then the system’s fault. They have never once admitted the doctor blew this one. Wife had a patient come from Nigeria last week and was ready to start the process to quarantine him if need be.</p>
<p>Another thing about poverty and healthcare - she does seem some Medicaid patients. They are so inured to not paying medical bills that they don’t bother, even if it is a $5 balance. She hasn’t had a single Medicaid patient that has settled a bill in the past 3 years. They have ALL been sent to collections. Public hospitals in poor areas understand the consistency of this behavior and often write off the remaining charges at time of discharge, not bothering to go through the motions. </p>
<p>I would think that HIV/AIDS patients aren’t as likely to be actively spewing fluids through vomit, diarrhea and bleeding from the mouth etc. Ebola may be less contagious in theory but their fluids seem to be everywhere once it ramps up.</p>