This is good news — and here is to hoping it turns out to be both effective, and safe.
Here’s the latest — per the UK Guardian:
…[This] is a record pace to set up and start this kind of research, scientists said, with patients enrolled just six weeks after the outbreak being declared a public health emergency of international concern by the World Health Organization (WHO) on 17 May.
Nevertheless, in Bunia, the capital of Ituri province, where the virus is raging, people are impatient.
“I hope these drug trials proceed quickly,” said Neema Haba, a mother of three and banana seller. “Financially, we are being driven to the brink by this outbreak and nothing is going right. We are struggling to provide for our children.”
As of 9 July, there had been 1,792 confirmed cases and 625 deaths caused by the Bundibugyo strain of the virus, for which there is no vaccine and no approved treatment. It is still “in the expansion phase”, according to the WHO….
Hopes of turning the tide now rest with scientists searching for effective medicines.
The Partners treatment trial has opened with two drugs on its books — remdesivir, and MBP134. Patients will be randomly allocated to receive either drug, a combination of the two, or simply standard, supportive care.
Remdesivir is an antiviral made by pharma company Gilead Sciences, while MBP134 is a monoclonal antibody developed by Mapp Biopharmaceutical, containing two specially engineered immune proteins that recognise and neutralise the virus.
Both are given intravenously — MBP134 as a one-off infusion, and remdesivir as 10 days of intravenous therapy.
“These two drugs actually have been proven to work against the Bundibugyo virus in animal models,” said Prof Laurens Liesenborghs of the Institute of Tropical Medicine, Antwerp, who is working on the trial in Ituri….
Now you know — jetting out of Midway, by 11 am tomorrow. Smile….
नमस्ते
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