Thanks Iggy. This thread is 15 days old (started 7-31) and I recall the two patients were reported sick several days earlier. They are well past the 14 day mark. I hope they survive and eventually return to their families.
Nigerian nurse who treated Ebola patient fled from quarantine and traveled from Lagos to Enugu.
Nigeria has imposed quarantine or medical monitoring on 198 persons, contacts of the medical personnel who treated the initial patient in Lagos. Ten apparently tested positive according to a (rather confusing) reportin the local media.
One of the patient’s is said to be released this afternoon. I guess they’re going to hold a press conference about both patients.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/21/us-health-ebola-american-idUSKBN0GL0W020140821
I’m glad he’s recovered from it, and I hope the other patient is too. I wonder how much of the recovery is due to the new drug, and how much just to having Western standards of care. I guess a sample size of two isn’t very indicative of the mortality rate, but I suspect the disease gets a lot less deadly when it’s treated in an American hospital.
both out.
I want to say both. The virus opens the door for a host of other maladies which I hear were treated aggressively. Maybe someone else will come along to explain.
I didn’t hear both but they said there was no sign of the virus. Pretty sure they said “virus” and not “disease”.
With so few people being treated, it’s really impossible to say if the ZMapp contributed to their recovery. Also, the treatment was given under differing conditions (day of symptoms, patient status, etc), which you would want to control as much as possible in a true clinical trial to limit the effects of these potential confounders. It’s also not possible to attribute their recovery to modern medical care at Emory. The sample size is just too small to draw any conclusions, but both cases certainly support the continued investigation of these treatment processes.
Both patients tested negative for the virus two days in a row, which is the standard for declaring someone free of Ebola virus. Writebol is still very weak, so it’s fair to say that she is still suffering from the effects of the acute disease. Brantly seems to be fully recovered. Only time will tell if they have any long-lasting effects of the infection.
what exactly does “testing negative” mean? No sign of the virus in their blood stream? other body fluids? Bone marrow? Lack of symptoms?
So I understand that new cases in Africa are still rising exponentially. From what I understand in this thread, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’d do the same should it spread to Europe or the Americas, yes? Because if it does… Whoa, nelly.
If it spreads to Haiti, maybe.
Places with modern hospitals, trained medical staff, public health surveillance systems, and medical waste disposal facilities are at minimal risk for a generalized outbreak. Ebola is easy to contain, with the right stuff.
Think about it this way- how many people do you know who have died of diarrhea? None?
Your average Liberian knows a lot- maybe dozens- of people who died of diarrhea. Why? Because even diseases that are easily preventable and treatable in the US are massive health hazards in countries without adequate healthcare. If we can control diarrhea–which kills 1.5 million people every year-- we can control Ebola.
As far as I know, the situation regarding people treated with ZMapp is:
-The two Americans treated in Emory (Writebol and Brantly): Recovering or recovered.
-The Spanish priest treated in Madrid (Pajares): Dead. But he was 75 years old, so that may have influenced the outcome (Ebola: Spanish priest infected in Liberia dies - BBC News).
-Three doctors in Liberia: Apparently getting better (Ebola crisis: Doctors in Liberia 'recovering after taking ZMapp' - BBC News).
There is a Briton who was taken to London (Powell) last Sunday, but I do not know whether they are giving him ZMapp or not. It seems that the manufacturer ran out of serum with the doses sent to Liberia.
So far, out of 6 people treated with ZMapp, 5 appear to have survived or to be on the mend. Of course, from a statistical standpoint this means nothing, and who knows whether there are side effects or weird stuff going on that will only reveal itself with time. However, these are hopeful indications, and I think it warrants taking ZMapp seriously and working hard on it.
I completely agree with this. I was pointing out that the uses so far are not as controlled as they would be in a true clinical trial, thus we can’t say whether the recoveries are in fact due to ZMapp. Many of these people were late in their infection when they were dosed. At that point, the chance of recovery is already higher, even without intervention. We shouldn’t be comparing the ZMapp recovery rate to the overall recovery rate for Ebola, but rather to the recovery rate of patients with X days of symptoms, where X days is the day of treatment. I’m sure that analysis has been done, but, to my knowledge, it hasn’t been released. On top of that, the sample size is just too small to draw any conclusions. The fact that it’s a biased sample makes that even more problematic.
Blood tests. Past research has shown that negative blood tests correlate with other body fluids being negative. The only exceptions are semen and vaginal fluids. Both Brantly and Writebol have been told about this remaining risk.
They are, according to the BBC